Leaders discuss past, future of Chattanooga’s Black neighborhoods

Where Miller Park now sits in downtown Chattanooga once sat a Black-owned hotel with a dance hall, restaurants, saloons and a casino.

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Where Erlanger’s downtown hospital is once was the Black neighborhood of Lincoln Park. Its pool and park drew Black visitors from as far as Birmingham and Huntsville, Brother Kevin Muhammad said at a Thursday night event.

Where thousands of Black residents settled on Cameron Hill now stands the BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee campus. When dirt was removed from the hill to construct highways through Chattanooga in the mid-1900s, it displaced around 1,100 families, Muhammad said.

“There’s a rich, rich history in Chattanooga when it comes to Black neighborhoods,” Muhammad said at Bushtown’s Community Haven on Thursday.

Community leaders gathered to talk about the history and future of those neighborhoods in a discussion as part of a week of Martin Luther King Jr. Day events organized by the Unity Group.

(READ MORE: Things to do in Chattanooga in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day)

Black Chattanoogans also once occupied what is now Hill City on the north side of the Tennessee River and neighborhoods called Tadestown and Scruggstown on either side of what is now M.L. King Boulevard. The boulevard, then Ninth Street, became the heart of Black business and culture in Chattanooga.

But after Reconstruction, troops were withdrawn from the city in the aftermath of the Civil War, and Black residents lost their protection. Parcels of residential and commercial land were gradually bought, razed or redeveloped by white people, helped by city codes written by white officials.

“Does this sound familiar?” Muhammad asked attendees Thursday. “Despite promises that new housing will be an improvement over the whole Westside neighborhood, most African American families were forced to find housing in the most polluted sections of the city.”

Now, as Chattanooga faces new developments on its west and south sides, Black leaders are worried they’ll see another exodus of Black residents from the downtown core.

“White flight, when it left in the ’70s, it done came back to the inner city,” Muhammad said.

After the city and Hamilton County announced plans for the Westside Evolves project, the Unity Group released a report finding that past development downtown has pushed and priced out Black residents despite promises they’d be able to return.

In 20 census tracts in downtown Chattanooga, the Black population decreased by 27% between 2000 and 2021, though the total number of Black residents in Hamilton County increased in the same time, according to the report.

“Whether by design or market forces, redevelopment in the urban core and surrounding neighborhoods has not boded well for African American residents,” the report states. “Thousands of them have been displaced by the destruction of public housing, market rents and higher earning workers in the innovative economy.”

(READ MORE: Chattanooga group fears One Westside plan will spur displacement of African Americans)

A survey in October showed 82% of people living in Westside complexes College Hill Courts and Gateway Tower want to keep living there after the redevelopment is done. Many said they want to stay during construction.

The Community Haven, with its Bushtown campus, is a good example of what revitalizing Black neighborhoods can look like, Muhammad said.

“We’re tired of liquor stores in our community,” Muhammad said. “We’re tired of these little corner stores with the lotteries and all the bad food, outdated food, that they sell us.”

The campus has security that ensures children and adults know they’re safe while inside, office manager Victoria Muhammad said. The organization has its own community patrol that monitors the neighborhood, unarmed, and has resolved fights and conflicts without needing Chattanooga police to be involved.

Bushtown itself, bordered by Milne and East Third streets and Holtzclaw and Orchard Knob avenues, is one of the oldest Black communities in Tennessee and the U.S., neighborhood association president Mary Morris said Thursday. It was home to a Black high school, a golf course and a stove company, all catering to Black residents.

The Bushtown Neighborhood Association reactivated in November after a few dormant years, Morris said. Now it’s working on installing historical markers around the neighborhood and getting T-shirts for block captains who keep an eye on the area.

“When you are not watching what happens in your community, or you sit back and you think someone else will take care of what’s going on in your community, who is that?” Morris said. “Someone has to step up, and collectively we can get a lot done.”

Kevin Hayes, who grew up in Eastdale, said his first priority would be bringing more economic opportunities to Black neighborhoods. He came to Thursday’s event hoping to see plans put in place for improvement.

“There’s an energy that there’s going to be some renewal in our communities,” Hayes said in an interview after the event.

Muhammad said he also wants to see revitalization led by spiritual leaders.

“It’s not enough for me and my church to do what we do in our silo in order to attract people to us so we can build our own kingdom — (that) does nothing,” Troy Brand, senior pastor of the Orchard Park Seventh-day Adventist Church, said at Thursday’s event. “What we’re interested in is improving the community.”

Contact Ellen Gerst at egerst@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6319.