Still second class?

My friend, Jeff Artis, often says that Roanoke City government treats black taxpayers like second-class citizens.

This is especially true when the city wants to control property in the black community. Think of the Kimball and Gainsboro urban renewal projects. Think Wells Avenue and the Coca-Cola plant. Think Henry Street and the Dumas Hotel.

Understand that the 30-year condemnation of the Claytor property in Gainsboro by the Roanoke Redevelopment and Housing Authority was so odious that the Virginia General Assembly passed a law in 2003 that requires any municipality that condemns property to purchase that property within five years or the condemnation has to be removed. The delegate who introduced this legislation, Thelma Drake of Norfolk, will tell anyone interested that the Claytor debacle inspired the legislation.

In that case, the housing authority never even purchased the property. When sued by the Claytor family in 2003, the agency contended they had the right under eminent domain to keep the condemnation on the property "in perpetuity."

That’s right, the RRHA argued in court that they could keep the condemnation on the Claytor property, and thus deny the family lawful use of its property, forever. It literally took a state legislator from Norfolk to say that these types of gross violations of the Fifth and 14th Amendments of the U.S. Constitution would never happen to another Virginia citizen.

You can now add the methadone clinic on Cove Road to this sordid list of local governmental agencies that have transgressed against the property rights of black Roanokers. Nothing can stop the city government’s pathological obsession with opening this clinic: Not the obvious NIMBY duplicity; not the 3,000 signatures of community residents who opposed the opening; not accusations of economic racism; not the clear double standard evident by the willingness of Roanoke County administrators to go to court to keep the clinic from opening in Southwest County while our city manager’s office bemoaned there was nothing that could be done to prevent the opening; and not the "silence speaks volumes" voice of U.S. Attorney John Brownlee who publicly argued that opening the clinic in Southwest County would attract drug dealers but has been silent when it comes to the same clinic operating on Cove Road.

OK, so it is obvious that the city treats its black residents like second-class citizens when it comes to property rights — that’s no surprise. It would take a sense of collective denial to believe otherwise. Yet, there is a strategy that city administrators use to accomplish this end. It is called co-optation. Importantly, blacks have to be complicit for the co-optation strategy to work.

The latest instance of city officials persuading black leaders to endorse a policy that clearly is not in the black community’s self-interest occurred when the local branch of the NAACP endorsed the Cove Road clinic. Chapter President Brenda Hale emphasized the need for a methadone clinic to treat addicts of opium-based drugs like heroin and OxyContin.

Yet, Ms. Hale totally misses the point. Artis, the local chapter of the SCLC, and other opponents have never questioned whether methadone was a viable treatment for dealing with opiate addiction. Indeed, the fundamental question has always been where the clinic should be located.

But . . . the generosity of her support for opening the clinic on Cove Road should be applauded — by the other communities in Roanoke who have fought so hard to keep it out of their neighborhoods.

Southwest Roanoke County residents feared crime, drug activity and traffic congestion if the clinic opened. Residents around the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Salem (where the clinic should be located) voiced the same concerns. Del. Onzlee Ware had a bill passed in the Virginia General Assembly this year that restricts the opening of methadone clinics within a certain distance of public schools.

Ms. Hale must have ignored the fact that Westside Elementary, Ruffner Middle School and William Fleming High School all would have prevented the Cove Road clinic from opening had Ware’s legislation included a "grandfather clause."

I bet those students and parents in Roanoke County and Salem are thrilled with Ms. Hale’s generosity.

Yet, Jeff Artis is only partially right about the second-class citizenship issue. We (collectively) are treated in this manner because we act like second-class citizens. Ms. Hale’s logic about the need and location of the methadone clinic is indicative of a second-class citizenship mentality.

Co-optation can only occur with the complicity of those being co-opted. Organization theorists have a nice term to describe this complicity: role socialization. People simply act out the roles they have been socially conditioned to play. The great African-American educator Carter G. Woodson long-ago gave this example: "You can remove the sign at the restaurants that say blacks have to enter through the back door and blacks would still go to the back entrance" while looking for the sign.

Hale made her comments at a community meeting with Artis and the SCLC. I am not sure if he thought that she shared his opposition to the clinic. It would not have mattered — the "co-optation fix" was already in. City officials had already "peeled" off certain groups and leaders to support their position.

In fact, Roanoke City officials co-opt better than any group of public administrators I’ve ever studied. It began in the 1960s with Roy Henley, the late director of the RRHA. He was able to turn many Gainsboro residents against the Claytor family (who opposed urban renewal in the area). Henley even promised (in writing) a local black church the Claytor property once it was secured as a reward for their support of the urban renewal effort.

An October 16, 1992 Roanoke Times article by Mary Bishop, "Road Splits Gainsboro Unity," describes how seven community organizations came together to prevent Historic Gainsboro from being bisected by two four-lane traffic loops. It took then-City Manager Bob Herbert less than two months to break-up that coalition and gain support from four of the groups to support the city’s vision of the traffic pattern. Of course, three of those groups had received $645,000 in federal funds from the city the previous year. Oh, to dangle such a carrot!

Someone asked me recently if I thought Henley had left a playbook on co-optation for future local public officials.

Maybe so, but it doesn’t seem to work in other parts of the county or city. Southwest County residents were not going to be split on the methadone clinic issue. When the Carilion Biomed Center was announced, Jefferson Street business people formed a coalition, and even hired an attorney, to ensure that they would receive fair market value for their property when it was condemned under eminent domain. Their group had real solidarity.

If there is a co-optation playbook, it only works in certain parts of town.

No one should be surprised by the turn of events concerning the opening of the Cove Road clinic. Everything has followed a predictable script and all actors have played the roles for which they have been socially conditioned. It simply has always been a foregone conclusion that the clinic would open. The real trump card to offset co-optation and mindless role socialization in this case are public nuisance laws (see "When public health becomes a nuisance," January 26, 2004). These laws can only be used after the clinic has actually opened.

Federal courts have ruled that violation of public nuisance laws can shut down methadone clinics. These laws even trump American with Disabilities Act guidelines when it comes to closing methadone clinics. Consequently, opponents of the clinic should take heart — opiate addicts play well-documented socialized roles as well. The concerns articulated by Brownlee and Ware are real and will manifest on Cove Road.

The only remaining question is whether the U.S. attorney and city manager, because of their vested interest in seeing the Cove Road clinic open, will strictly enforce all applicable federal and state laws. Given their past performance, it appears enforcement will be lax. If so, opponents and neighborhood residents will have to hold their feet to the fire.

That exercise will result in the closing of the clinic and also will provide an opportunity for Roanoke’s African-American citizens to demonstrate that they see themselves as first-class citizens. Walter Claytor did and won. He should be an example for us all.