By Harry Jaffe In 1960 the nation’s capital became the first major U.S. city to count African Americans in the majority, according to the census of that year.
The District had a total population of 763,956: blacks counted for 411,737, and whites made up 345,263. In the following decades, the percentage of African Americans kept rising to close to 80 percent.
Those were the days when D.C. earned the moniker “Chocolate City.”
The trend has reversed in the last 10 years. Now it’s official: According to new census estimates released last week, the nation’s capital is a few percentage points away from being even up: half African Americans and half Caucasians, Hispanics and Asians. The latest numbers put the black populace at 54 percent.
Basically, the city is becoming more integrated and better balanced — for better or worse.
The official numbers from the latest census document major changes. The headlines focus on the fact that D.C. has added nearly 10,000 residents in the past year and that the city’s population is nearing 600,000. Take a look back a decade and the changes are more dramatic. The 2000 census put the District’s population at just over 572,000. That means the city has added close to 30,000 residents in the past decade.
The news is very positive, but for a city that once had 800,000, we’re still short 200,000 people.
Why the shift in racial composition? What will it mean for African Americans? For whites?
Whites left the city for the suburbs in the 1950s when civil rights-era laws opened schools and housing to African Americans. It wasn’t as if blacks poured in; the whites fled. Gradually over the past three decades, African-American families have migrated from the city to the suburbs, too, in search of better schools, safer streets, bigger homes.
Flash forward to the first decade of the new century. The suburbs became known for wasted time behind the wheel of a car stuck on the Beltway. The District became the hip and safe place for young professionals and empty nesters — mostly white.
Dearly departed council Chairman John Wilson called them “dincs,” for “double income, no children.” They contributed taxes and didn’t use services. He loved them.
But are the demographic and racial changes good for black folks?
For many longtime Washingtonians, the 2010 census is proof of “the plan,” by which whites would eventually drive out blacks. There’s evidence to support that theory. Market forces are driving up the cost of housing and forcing out poor and middle-income residents. Most are black. That’s bad.
But the same market forces are replenishing the city’s coffers with tax dollars. If the mayor and the city council direct the city’s funds to boosting education, fighting crime and building affordable housing, Mocha Town could be a great place for everyone, regardless of race.
Why not?
E-mail Harry Jaffe at [email protected].
