Longtime East Dallas residents are the latest losers in gentrification creep

My question – asked in hope three years ago – now only looks naive.

As the first very modern homes skyrocketed in Mount Auburn – above the 100-year-old cottages of both work-income families and modest-income retirees – I wrote:

“Gentrification is penetrating deeper into East Dallas. Will it be different this time? “

Nope.

North of Interstate 30 and west of Samuell-Grand Park, Mount Auburn has long been the last affordable working community near downtown.

While there are badly dilapidated and barely repaired houses here and there, most of the small houses in the neighborhood are charming and well-kept, with magnificent flower beds and centuries-old trees.

Long home to young families and seniors, artists and activists, renters and longtime owners, Mount Auburn is increasingly becoming the choice of people with far greater fortunes.

The hundreds of original residences are still far superior to the mega-modern houses and maisonettes. But the structural damage is already visible: the average real estate tax on old houses in Mount Auburn has risen from $ 1,500 to $ 4,250 over the past decade – especially the past four years – an increase of 183%.

Opal Benjamin, 2, watches her sister Ivy, 6, play in her front yard next to a large modern house under construction on Cristler Avenue in the Mount Auburn neighborhood of East Dallas.(Tom Fox / Employee Photographer)

Neighborhood advocate Lisa Lopez is used to local residents knocking on her door when they need help, and these days visitors come to say they can’t afford the taxes. “These weren’t happy endings for these families,” she told me. “You were forced to sell.”

None of the dozen or so residents I’ve spoken to blame the newcomers who bought the big new homes. Their anger is directed at investors and developers who have long circled Mount Auburn like vultures.

Forty years ago, residents thought they had saved their neighborhood from market forces by changing the area’s unprotected zoning into a planned development. But as community organizer John Fullinwider pointed out after the start of this modern building boom, “even non-speculative zoning cannot withstand the raw economic power building a $ 750,000 home next to a small half-timbered $ 58,000 in the tax list is. “

What I heard in all of my interviews was a scream for the voice of every resident. If the town hall listened, it would hear:

Sarah Mendoza grew up in Mount Auburn with her five siblings, mother and stepfather, in a house on Garland Avenue where her grandmother still lives.

Sarah, now 33, loves this neighborhood with all her heart. But despite a degree from Texas State University and a solid social work job, she can’t afford to live here.

After looking for something in her price range for almost a year, she and her four-year-old son finally settled in nearby Owenwood just south of I-30.

A panoramic view shows a block in which an original house is still standing near a new building, and a demolished plot of land that is to accommodate another new home.(Tom Fox / employee photographer)

“It’s not that far, but I wanted to be in Mount Auburn to be close to my family because that’s my support system,” Sarah told me.

Her brother and family are looking after their grandmother at the Garland Avenue home. Her mother, uncle and aunt still live in the neighborhood.

As a child, Sarah accompanied her grandmother as she sold her homemade tamales all over Mount Auburn. “We parked in front of a house, she chatted with a neighbor, sold her tamales and then moved on to the next house.

“That’s why I know so many people,” Sarah told me. “In retrospect, it’s a nice thing.”

Sarah has befriended many newcomers to Mount Auburn, but she’s discouraged by what’s happening.

She and her longtime friends from Mount Auburn – proud graduates of Woodrow Wilson High School and many of them teachers and city officials – say the changes leave them little opportunity to have a good life for themselves.

“People need workers’ housing,” she said, “and without them we are in a difficult situation.”

City hall is devoting energy to building a resilient economy for development, Sarah said, but not so much to address crime, unemployment and “resources for the barely making ends” in Mount Auburn.

Oscar Aparicio returned to the Mount Auburn home, which his family has owned for more than half a century, a decade ago from college. But he’s not sure how much longer he can hold out.

Keeping Garland Avenue home in the family is important to Oscar, who is 33 and works for Dallas County, especially since he and his wife Gisselle have a 7-year-old son and daughter along the way.

“Given these taxes, can we still be here, especially if I have a new baby and property taxes are due just a few months after they are born?” Oscar told me.

“They built these houses, but who does it really help?” He asked. “We… only pay more money to live there, even though we’ve lived there forever.

“It’s like it’s no longer our community. It’s like we’re being pushed aside and kicked out. “

Lisa Lopez hears such stories every day.

Lifelong Mount Auburn resident, who met her husband Salvador in Woodrow, advocated class justice issues when her four children were in public school.

Mount Auburn resident Lisa Lopez, who lives on Wayne Street, has long been a school and neighborhood advocate.(Tom Fox / Employee Photographer)

In the 1990s, drive-by shoots and deadly speeders led her to speak out on neighborhood issues as well.

Lisa said there is still a lot of work to be done to stop the reckless speeders on their streets, the random gunfire and the occasional robbery.

But what would she most like to change? “Stop the houses from going up,” she said without hesitation.

“Three or four years ago people were happy,” she said. “Then a house goes up and your taxes go up and then another house goes up. We have four times what we paid four years ago. “

Lisa found that many of her neighbors are housekeepers or mechanics, whose incomes rarely rise. “So they lose their home and have to move in with other family members.

“I could fall into the same category,” she said.

Karen Roberts and Jeanne Chvosta have lived side by side for more than 40 years on Cameron Street, home to the largest density of new buildings.

They experienced some of Mount Auburn’s worst days, such as the 1990s when a drug house was openly doing business on their block for several years. After living next to rental apartments, which the owners often didn’t care who they rented to, Karen said, “I wouldn’t trade these new neighbors for anything.”

Roberts credits the newcomers for helping in a variety of ways – they have come together to fight the proposal for a large football stadium in nearby Willis Winters Park, rebuild the neighborhood association, and keep City Hall on the speed dial to address issues Report.

The two women share their neighbors’ concerns about the loss of affordable housing, “but it happens all over town,” said Karen. But even with the exceptions her senior status brings, she’s nervous about the spike in her own tax bill.

Karen Roberts (from left), Sarah Mendoza, and Jeanne Chvosta on the Roberts porch are among long-time Mount Auburn residents who are committed to revitalizing the area’s community of neighborhoods.(Brandon Wade / special article)

Sky-high taxes sparked Denise and Stephen Knitch’s move from their 30-year-old home in Lakewood to one of the new homes near Karen in April 2019.

Denise admitted that the change wasn’t “100% wonderful,” but she said it is slowly invading her neighbors even if she doesn’t speak their language.

She has collected her pad to fix the city lights and clean the drains, but she remains amazed at the condition of the streets, curbs, and most of the blatant violations of the regulations.

“I have to keep reminding her – this is not Lakewood,” Karen said with a laugh.

Rudy and Katherine Karimi were among the first to move into a new home on the edge of Mount Auburn along the Santa Fe Trail.

Even after four years they are aware that they are still newbies, so Rudy’s response to this was to volunteer at every opportunity and try to make Mount Auburn better for everyone.

He led the “Our Park, No Stadium” fight in Willis Winters Park and had speed cushions and stop signs installed near the Woodrow campus.

Rudy wants to do his part to ascend Mount Auburn. “We don’t speak. We are marginalized. We do not have the feeling that we can ask or even demand anything from the city. “

The town hall must hear such voices and do everything possible to preserve the diversity of this district before it is too late.

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