To aei. I do want to make a couple observations in the beginning before we get started. So becoming president of aei made addressing the state of black america a priority for our institution. And im proud of the work weve done over the past few years. In 2022, we organized the old parkland conference, which brought together prominent intellectuals and public leaders to address the Biggest Challenges black americans. And last year, we created a new center on and social mobility, which is dedicated to developing solutions. Expand access to opportunity for all americans. And for the 60th anniversary of the march on washington, we hosted a special forum here at aei honoring, dr. Kings legacy. Now we some distinguished guests here, but i want speak for a moment about to a scholars who are not guests here but are part of our community. And they. And let say about them that no scholars have more to improve our work on issues than ian rowe and Howard Husock anns work on these issues is not just as an ace scholar. Hes an educator whos, founded and run Charter Schools in york city. He understands the power agency and opportunity can to transform individuals and communities. And hes been taking his messages and experience to leaders across the country as party as part of his Free Initiative as a journalist, filmmaker and scholar. Howard has been working on these issues for decades. Howards work powerfully chronicles how Government Policies have undermined urban communities. And were lucky to both ian and howard at aei. And i wanted to be here especially to introduce todays events to emphasize how important work is. And todays event is on the state of black progress. So thank you for being here. Now i like to finally conclude with one brief observation and. Maybe this isnt a quote completely in tone with the point of your presentations, which i know going to be that in the United States over the last hundred years we made great progress and. All americans are doing well comparatively to the way they were in the past especially black americans who have shown great ingenuity and effort and drive and success every day. They show that. But i want to be i want to remind all of an observation. Hubert humphrey once said that the measure of a society is how it treats its weakest members. When were discussing state of black progress, we cannot lose of the fact that by this metric, the United States is the best country in the world. No other country provides, its struggling people with more opportunities and more prosperity, which is why every year millions from around the world continue to seek to come here. But let me stop and turn over to our the main attraction, t w shannon and the rest of the group and present their success with the cure. With cure. So thank you very much. Robert f kennedy. Robert, thank you for that kind introduction, those brief remarks. Were so grateful to a are for opening their doors to. My name is t w shannon and i am from oklahoma. Greetings from the red state. And i. I am a former speaker of the house of the state of oklahoma and currently the vice chair for. And it is an honor for me to be to discuss this very important topic about the state of black progress. This is a ongoing journey where we are chronicling the absolute success and challenges that face a particular Minority Group here in america that is part of kiras mission. Our founder, star parker, is with us. And im going to begin with some opening remarks to introduce to you, those that sit on our panel today who you will be hearing. Our number one we have in row your eyes and we get those. And he is the founder of Vertex Partnership academies and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise institute and served ten years as ceo of public prep and has held leadership positions at. Teach for america. The bill and Melinda Gates foundation, the white house, mtv, where he earned two Public Service emmys with his recent book agency, mr. Seeks to inspire young people of races to build Strong Families and become masters of their own destiny in vitro. Please give him a hand. Gracemarie turner. She runs the galen institute, a policy Research Organization founded in 1995 to promote and inform debate free market ideas for health care reform. Shes been instrumental in developing and promoting to transfer power over health over Health Care Decisions to and patients through a more competitive patient centered health sector. Grace marie testifies regularly before congress and facilitates the Health Policy consensus group, a forum for market oriented policy experts to analyze, develop policy recommendations. Ms. Gracemarie turner. Mr. Howard husock is senior fellow in domestic policy studies at the American Enterprise institute, where he focuses on municipal government urban housing policy, Civil Society and philanthropy. Before joining mr. Was Vice President for research and at the manhattan institute. He also has been a director, case studies and Public Policy management at the Harvard Kennedy school. A member of the board of directors. The corporation for public broadcasting. A journalist and emmy winning filmmaker. And is the author of several books. Mr. Howard husock. And last but not least, founded the center for urban renewal and education in 1995 and serves as president and ceo. Cure aims to fight poverty and restore dignity through scholars ships. Supporting faith. Freedom. Personal responsibility. Star as a president ial appointee to, the Us Commission on civil rights California Advisory Committee and join the White House Opportunity InitiativeAdvisory Team in 2017 to share ideas on how best fix our nations most distressed communities. She hosted a nationally Television Program cure america with star parker and the author of several books. Ms. Star parker. At this time, were going to ask our honorees to a five minute introduction of themselves and maybe a brief of what their topic was and the latest tome, the state of black progress. First, were going to begin with howard, who have 5 minutes for remarks. Thank you very much. Speaker shannon shannon. Its really an honor to be on a panel convened here by and cure. Honored to be here with my fellow panelists. Cure does great work and the state of black progress is another example of it. And i appreciate very much being invited to contribute to that. Im going to talk about the following topic how subsidized housing has harmed african and what we can do to get out of that problem. It goes by many names Affordable Housing, Public Housing housing choice vouchers, section eight. Simply, the projects, but all housing policies from the 1930s to the present day have been and remain, in my view, especially harmful to the interests africanamericans. Let me explain why they have lured black households into dependency in. Long term poverty rewarded parenthood, and especially led to the gnawing gap in homeownership and wealth accumulation between white and black households. Our housing policies have had of these deleterious effects and a series of ways, especially by destroying demolish and clearing black neighborhoods that were filled with black owned businesses and homeowners but were labeled as slums, replacing them with Public Housing projects where ownership isnt possible. And blacks are overrepresented by setting housing rules. They are such that increasing income and marriage are punished, and by defining Affordable Housing as subsidized rentals rather than small privately owned homes where ownership accumulate wealth. These unconsidered consequences date to the roosevelt administration. Franklin National Housing act of 1937. The progressive of the new deal. Were convinced that the private housing was going to fail. The majority of the population. Government had to step and replace it with public. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt pushed especially hard for projects for africanamerican convinced that segregated neighborhoods that era needed to be replaced. She even came to detroit to cut the ribbon on the first Public Housing project named frederick douglass. She was viewed as progressive because she willing to include blacks in this alleged in the first place. But housing progressives utterly misjudged what they were replacing. Although we are often told that black neighborhoods were substandard areas owned white slumlords. Census data tells a different story. In detroit, a neighborhood known as black bottom that was for its original soil, not a racial comment. It was home to no less than this got cleared away. 300 black owned businesses, a percentage, a significant percentage, one, two and three. Family, homeowners thriving branch of the urban league and selfhelp groups and many churches including the bethel amy led by c. L. Franklin, whose had a famous daughter daughter all the that built black bottom aimed toward the of struggling toward selfimprovement. But by 1950 all that was left was vacant lots a highway and high which deteriorated so quickly theyd have to be demolished themselves. The same story of Community Destruction and high rise replacements would play out in neighborhood africanamerican neighborhoods. All across the country. East harlem avenue in cleveland. Desoto county. Louis. Bronzeville in chicago. In st louis. In 1952, low income predominantly neighborhoods later cleared Public Housing. There are 34 of housing was owner occupied. Additional percent were small multiFamily Structures where the owner lived. And one other one of the floors. Similar numbers found in slums quote unquote, in chicago, detroit, cleveland, owner occupants used their rental to pay the carrying costs. Tenants aspire to own. They had an example of ownership right in front of them. The st louis neighborhoods i mentioned were clear to make way for two high rises, 23 stories each. The pruittigoe projects they won an architectural award. When they opened in 1956. By 1971, they were literal imploded in a cloud of dust because they were judged to be in habitable. Im at work on a new book about the history of Public Housing and looking particularly at some of these communities. And one of my favorite quotes comes from a columnist named paul jones who wrote for the black newspaper in pittsburgh. The pittsburgh courier. He understood that not all the housing in the neighborhood called, the hill, which August Wilson made immortal in his plays that were all August Wilsons plays are set. The greatest american playwright of the 20th century. He understood all the housing was great, but he had this say in the pittsburgh courier. What . The churches, the schools, the business, neighbors associations, civic groups, all these are part of the whole problem of uproot the lives of many people whose patterns of living have been labeled not desirable, not acceptable, acceptable, not endurable. People understood that at the time. Nobody asked their permission to tear down their. What could have been done instead, it was simply wrong to judge poor narrowly on the basis of their physical antidiscrimination law would have helped rather than segregated housing towers. But so too would have been help in repairing restore ing these neighborhoods rather than demolishing them. We needed to help create a new of owners Building Wealth. None of this would happen until the Fair Housing Act of 1968, by which time had long since been steered into the alleged reward of public and subsidized. Today, even as African Americans comprise 13 of the us population, they are 48 of public and subsidized housing. But isnt that a benefit, a way to reduce poverty . No, just the opposite. Consider the rules which govern Public Housing and its close cousin section eight voucher housing in which government pays it pays the rent on a private apartment. First, how do you qualify as the poorer you are, the higher the priority. And that means the poorest households of single parent households almost single mothers. They go to the head of the line, were encouraging them to form in this way today in Public Housing. 4 of households are parents with two parents with children, 4 . We all know the life prospects of low income, Single Parents and their children, and theyre not positive. But even those who would seek to improve their lot are instead punished by rules subsidized tenants pay 30 of their income in rent. Might sound like a good deal to. You look closely. It means when your income goes up, so does your rent. Would you sign a lease like that . Its not a ticket out of poverty, but a shackle. I use that word consciously. That keeps one in it. All those affordable. This government benefit remains a temptation luring interdependency. The promise of physical comfort distracts from the struggle that leads to accomplishment achievement. The fact that some are new and have yet to deteriorate should not distract us from their fundamental invitation to dependency. Heres a figure for you. The average time residents spent in new york city Public Housing 23 years. There are some residents who have lived their entire in the project and passed two units on to the children. Ive met them myself in brownsville. The personal growth that comes with going to a home depot, get the stuff you need, do the home repairs. They dont get to do that. Theyre taught to be supplicants, begging, basic services. So where does that leave us today . One thing we need to change some of these rules. You need to be able to sign a lease, a flat rent. Save money. We need to say when you move in, we expect to move out in five years. We want you to have a life just like we have a time on cash welfare. We spend a lot less on cash warfare than we spend on Public Housing, but theres no time limit on Public Housing or subsidized housing. A signal that this is a transit, a temporary leg up would be the signal as an intermediate step to disentangling the community from Public Housing and subsidized housing, we must signal to Public Officials that they need to stop doing anyone the false favor of trapping them in the gilded cage of subsidize housing. They need to ask what can be done to rebuild and restore neighborhoods. The ones that are marked by vacant lots and food deserts. History needs to be our guide rather building high Rise Apartments on those vacant lots. We need to make sure our local zoning laws permit the Construction Homes that local residents can afford. Naturally, because their modest homes and small lots starter houses, maybe two or three family, maybe places you pay the mortgage by taking in lodgers. Thats what people used to do. You celebrated in new york the tenement museum. Thats what they did. We make a landmark out of it, but then we ban it. Some of these homes should have storefronts on the ground floors where stores and barbershops can set shop. Im trying to paint a picture here of a real neighborhood where there are people, the streets and kids walking to school and safety where wealth is created not by checks the government, but through ownership and appreciation. We have instead. Im arguing follow the housing path that has led to a dead end of impoverished meant especially for africanamericans. We need to rethink and redo and get back, if you will, to the old time ways it worked. Thank you very much much. Yeah. Thank you, howard. Its great honor to be here and howard, that was a great story about good intentions, unintended consequences and think my essay similar on may 17th, 1954. The us supreme issued a landmark ruling that is considered by many Civil Rights Activists to be the greatest judicial decision of the 20th century. In brown versus board of education. The court addressed the issue that, quote, minors of the race had been denied admission to schools attended by white children under laws or permitting segregation, according to race. End of quote. This decision, the precedent plessy versus ferguson, which in 1896 had established the separate but equal dr. And that allowed the government to legally sanction racial segregation in Public Schools delivering courts unanimous opinion. Chief earl warren wrote, quote, we conclude that in the field of public education. The doctor and of separate but equal has no place separate but equal educational facilities for. Racial minorities is inherently unequal. Violating the equal clause of the 14th amendment. End quote. The landmark decision deemed schools that were racially segregated order of the law were in fact unconscious, attentional. This meant de jure segregation, meaning schools enforced by the government to exclude educate white students only and mandatorily ban on black students because of the race. Those schools could no exist and would be punished if they violated new ruling. Yet the decision also meant de facto segregation, meaning schools that had exclusively educated bl