America Behind the Color Line (28 page)

The culturally diverse upper-middle-class neighborhoods tend to cluster around DeKalb County, which is just east of Atlanta. We have the city of Lithonia in South DeKalb and Stone Mountain in North DeKalb. When you hear of DeKalb County, people generally know that it is highly culturally diverse.

Lithonia has the two Sandstone Estates and the Belair Estates. The Sandstone Estates comprise one of the premier subdivisions of DeKalb County. There are write-ups on it all the time. I sold out the subdivision. A house that sold there several years ago for $465,000 would now go for about $700,000 plus. A single female doctor at Emory bought a house in the Sandstone Estates for $600,000. There’s a new house going up, and I’m not sure how much it’s going to run. The Sandstone homes go up to $2 million plus. Most of the owners are of color.

About two-thirds of the residents in the Sandstone Estates are entrepreneurs, or they work from a computer base in their home. The other third commute to jobs in town. It’s a thirty-five- or forty-minute drive, which is not bad considering other areas in the world where it takes two or three hours to go thirty miles.

An African-American CNN news anchor lives at Sandstone. We have the recording artists Kelly Price and Montell Jordan. I can’t point to their houses because I do work with a lot of celebrities and their privacy is protected. Their houses are well secured, so people think, okay, they must be someone famous.

A guy who’s a black golfer owns a very contemporary house in the Sandstone Estates. He even has a putting green down in the basement, with a simulator and a golf screen. He’s a pro golfer and his wife is a computer consultant. They’re a young couple. They probably bought the house for about $800,000, and in the three or four years they’ve been building it, the value has risen to about $2 million. A single black doctor is building a house in a cul-de-sac in Sandstone Estates. Her house is worth about $1.7 million, and it’s a very safe area.

The only problem they have in the Sandstone Estates is that so many people know which celebrities own all the beautiful million-dollar houses. When friends and family come to town, you want to show off your neighborhood. So during the weekend, it is nothing but constant cars up and down. They’re trying to vote to gate the community to keep people out, because there is no privacy.

Ten or twelve years ago, we had an all-black neighborhood called Sandstone Shores. It was completely built up with nothing but doctors, builders, and professionals. Then five of those owners, including a CNN executive, bought some land on the back side of Sandstone Shores and developed it into Sandstone Estates. So we had a successful minority neighborhood twelve years ago with all million-dollar homes in it. That was the original Sandstone Shores.

We can all speculate on whether homes in DeKalb County would sell for more if white people owned them. I think yes, they could command a higher price. But many of the builders are of culturally diverse backgrounds as well. There are forty-eight homes in the Sandstone subdivision. So we have black builders, black real estate agents, and then black people buying the homes. It’s unique, and it works.

Belair Estates, five miles from Sandstone, is another subdivision with million-dollar homes. Physicians, attorneys, CEOs, bankers, entrepreneurs, all types of people who own their own businesses and live in the Belair Estates are just like people who live in Buckhead, but they happen to have a different skin color. The average price of a Belair home is about $900,000. The homes are sold out even though all the lots are not built on. I just sold a house there for $1 million to a couple that are both dentists.

There’s a contemporary house in Belair that everybody calls the library, because here in Georgia they’re not used to that type of architecture, and so they don’t understand it. The house is about 6,000 square feet and is on the market for $750,000, again a great value compared to places up North. There’s another house for sale in Belair for $1.5 million that’s about 12,000 square feet. And there’s new construction that’s going to be about 10,000 square feet, and that will sell for $1.4 or $1.6 million.

Stonecrest Mall is two and a half miles from the Belair Estates. It’s one of the new amenities, because there are so many people moving out to the area and building homes for between $500,000 and $1 million there. They had the mall on the books for ten years, and finally, when all the subdivisions started coming up, they decided it was time to go ahead and put it in because we were demanding it. We had to drive in to Buckhead and other areas and we had nothing to serve our subdivisions. So they considered it and here we are. The mall is less than six months old, and the outparcels across the street from the mall are still being built with freestanding stores like Sam’s Club, Best Buy, Toys “R” Us, and McDonald’s.

Buckhead is situated in the center of Fulton County. The county is on a strip of land that runs from the southwest to the northeast of the Greater Atlanta area. Buckhead is where the most affluent businesspeople and millionaires live. It’s culturally diverse, though less so than DeKalb County. Most subdivisions in Buckhead start at $1 million and go up to the $12-million-plus price range. The cost of living is much better in Stone Mountain. You don’t have the same amenities there that folks have in Buckhead; you miss out on the fine restaurants and things like that. But you do have shopping and movie theaters. And if you want to go to fine restaurants, they’re only seventeen miles away.

In the Stone Mountain area, in North DeKalb, houses start at around $150,000, so DeKalb County has something for everybody. In the neighborhood of Stone Mountain that I specialize in, called Smoke Rise, there are a lot of culturally diverse, affluent owners and lots of million-dollar homes. In one part of Smoke Rise there’s an area where diverse buyers are purchasing homes from $500,000 to $1 million plus.

A house that would go for $3 million in Buckhead would sell in Stone Mountain for between $700,000 and $1 million. It’s approximately seventeen miles from Stone Mountain to downtown Atlanta—about a twenty-minute ride. People want to move out there because of the space and the beauty—even if it means they can’t walk to work or walk around in downtown Atlanta whenever they like.

There are country clubs and organizations in Greater Atlanta that are not considered to be black courses, but they are majority black. For example, in Stone Mountain, there are many golf courses close by, and when you go on the courses, you see African Americans. That’s where everybody seems to migrate to.

Stone Mountain was incorporated in 1839. The Confederate generals are carved on the mountainside in Stone Mountain Park, which covers close to six hundred acres. The park used to be Ku Klux Klan headquarters. A new Ku Klux Klan was started in Stone Mountain in 1915. In 1963 Dr. King said, “Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!” He spoke those words to more than 200,000 people at the Lincoln Memorial in his “I Have a Dream” speech. And the irony is that we have come full circle and we now monopolize Stone Mountain. It’s rumored that Stone Mountain’s first African-American mayor, Chuck Burris, lives in the home that was built by the former Grand Dragon of the Georgia Ku Klux Klan. The Klansmen are turning over in their graves. We bought up all the property and built big houses. Who would have known? Isn’t it ironic how things turned completely around, and now we occupy their area. We ended up winning anyway. It’s amazing.

DEIRDRE AND JERALD WOLFF
“Why Not?”

Deirdre Wolff

Jerald and I lived in West Bloomfield, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit, for ten years before we moved to our new Atlanta home in September 2000. When we first saw our home, it was in the framing process. We were blessed that our property value had escalated in West Bloomfield, so we were able to sell our old house for more than the cost of our new home in Atlanta. We were also pleased to find that the price of new construction included features that hadn’t been part of our home purchase in Detroit, such as kitchen and bath wallpaper, a finished garage, and basic landscaping, with a sprinkler system. Property taxes were much higher in West Bloomfield, and property values continue to rise here in Atlanta. All these economic advantages allowed us to finish the basement of our new home, something we had not done in Michigan.

Michigan is much colder than Atlanta, and although I don’t miss the snow, my fourteen-year-old son, Jerald, missed playing ice hockey during our first winter in the South. Ice hockey rinks are a lot harder to find here. Many schools in the Detroit area have hockey teams. However, football is an adequate substitute, and Jerald has enjoyed playing for his school team in Atlanta. Our younger son, Quincy, who is seven, continued playing baseball and basketball for the community without even pausing to get used to living in Atlanta. Both the community we left and the one we found seem to share equally in the excitement of youth sports programs.

My husband and I joke that we had more visitors in the first ten months we lived in Atlanta than we did in the ten years we lived in Detroit. Atlanta is so dominated by people who have moved here from other areas that everyone seems to know someone who lives here. It’s a popular venue for conventions and cultural events, including art festivals. For the most part, our friends who visited did not come to Atlanta to visit the Wolffs; they visited the Wolffs because they were coming to Atlanta. For instance, my dear TLC Book Club sisters from Detroit came here during the National Black Arts Festival last year. TLC Atlanta hosted their visit, and all fifty of us thoroughly enjoyed the fellowship and events we shared, including the twenty-fifth anniversary production of
Dreamgirls,
starring Jennifer Holliday.

Like my husband, I am a middle child. My sister is six years older and my brother is two years younger. I suppose that the memory of our middle-child experiences contributed to our decision to have an even number of children.

I was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. My father is a Baptist minister and has been since before I was born. In fact, he is still pastoring his first and only church, Antioch Baptist Church, where he has been for over forty years. My precollege days were spent at Waring School, which was predominantly black, and Southwest High School, which was predominantly white.

The process of desegregating the St. Louis public schools began in 1980, and my family and Jerald’s family were there, in the midst of the transformation. In 1981, a federal district court asked the public school system to submit plans for a voluntary desegregation, and the schools began redistricting students to achieve racial objectives. It was the first time that a federal district court had rendered a decision with regard to the St. Louis public schools. John Ashcroft was attorney general of the state of Missouri at the time, before he became governor. The 1981 decision was the prelude for the mandated desegregation, which occurred in 1983. At that time there was a lawsuit involving the city of St. Louis and twenty-three suburban school districts, the state of Missouri, the NAACP, the U.S. Department of Justice, St. Louis residents, and a plaintiff named Minnie Liddell. That was the beginning of the real fight to integrate the schools.

Jerald and I met when we were fourteen, but of course I never imagined that he would one day be my husband. We met in the Inroads Pre-collegiate Engineering and Applied Science Program. Through Inroads, talented minority students selected from the metro area took math, science, and standardized test preparation classes at Washington University on Saturdays during the school year and throughout the summer. The program was designed to better prepare us for college success. Jerald and I became friends, and eventually, in our junior year of high school, he invited me to his prom. We continued to date and eventually got married. But during our teen years, we were far too busy with our books, sports, friends, and extracurricular activities to monopolize our time with each other. After high school we both left St. Louis. Jerald headed to Northwestern University just outside of Chicago, and I went to Washington, D.C., to attend Georgetown University.

With graduate school behind me—I had earned an M.B.A. from Washington University—I received a job offer that took us from St. Louis to Detroit. At that time, some ten years ago, Atlanta was one of the cities where I thought I might like to live, but nothing had come through for me in terms of work. Jerald was not interested in moving anywhere south in those days. Years later, however, his anti-South attitude softened when he was offered a good job in Atlanta. By then, we were well settled in West Bloomfield. The kids were involved in their activities, we loved our church, and we were happy in our community. So when Jerald was presented with the job offer in Atlanta, I needed time to consider it.

Most likely, had the job been in a city less desirable to us, we would not have relocated. But Atlanta made all the difference. Like many people, we already had friends who had relocated there. Atlanta still enjoys a reputation for being a place where African Americans love to live. It’s something of a mecca.

Currently, I work as an associate general counsel for a major hospital in Atlanta. There are many African-American professionals here, as in Detroit. The distinction I notice is that in Atlanta, African Americans hold a wider variety of professions. Not only do many successful African-American doctors, lawyers, and corporate executives live here, but African Americans in Atlanta also own golf courses, publish books, and own dirt businesses, meat companies, and a great variety of other enterprises. We have neighbors who are state-elected politicians, news anchors, inventors, and builders of subdivisions and schools. Such professional diversity generates networking opportunities among ourselves, and offers our children exposure to varied career options within the African-American community.

Before we moved to Atlanta, we lived in predominantly white neighborhoods where people did not openly object to living near successful African Americans. Now we enjoy living in a neighborhood filled with successful African Americans. Though most of us lead busy lifestyles, we find time to socialize and develop friendships. The swim, tennis, playground, and basketball facilities within the subdivision draw neighbors together all the time. Parties and events for youth and families are planned each year for residents and are held at the subdivision’s clubhouse.

We did not live in predominantly white areas of other cities to escape our own people. We sought the typical American dream: a nice house near nice grocery stores in a good school district. We wanted neighbors who shared similar religious and family values and whose children would likely make fitting playmates for ours. We like Starbucks coffee, Einstein bagels, and Barnes & Noble. We wanted the amenities and nice restaurants that, unfortunately, are typically exclusive to white communities. We also wanted to feel safe; thus, we were not attracted to areas with higher crime statistics. And so, like many thriving African Americans, we were led to live in white neighborhoods. Atlanta is refreshingly unique in that it is not uncommon to find African-American communities with subdivisions of homes valued in the $300,000 to $500,000 range. Many of these subdivisions are large, consisting of more than two hundred homes, pleasantly spaced on rolling hills. Several are gated communities of affluent African-American families living in homes valued at half a million to a million dollars. So, why not? It means our children have playmates who look like them. They have role models who look like them. They are surrounded by traditional families who look like them. In other places, lifestyles are often color-coded. But in Atlanta, African Americans are able to choose the lifestyle they want to live and the color in which they wish to live it. Why should African Americans who want the big house, kitchen fireplace, extended deck, and gazebo be compelled to live in a white community? African Americans should have access to the same variety of lifestyles enjoyed by other Americans.

I sometimes see white people looking at the model home in our subdivision. They come and they look, and then they drive around, and they keep on driving around and around. I imagine they probably peek at the pool and the tennis courts and then go on out. Why? Perhaps they see that the community is African American. It is their choice to stay or go. People have the freedom to choose among whom they will live.

For fourteen years before moving to Atlanta, our family lived in barely integrated communities. Each year, our son was the only African-American child in his classroom until the fifth grade, when there was one other. Now our children see something different. They know many other intelligent African-American children. They see them as the rule, not the exception. I imagine that Dr. King would have been delighted to see what is happening today in Atlanta. Our people are fully exercising the freedom to make a choice. We are not forced into segregated areas. At the same time, we can choose to live in predominantly African-American areas without sacrificing lifestyle, education, or traditional values. With no sisters or even girl cousins living nearby, my sons might have embraced the BET image of young femininity, with the possible complications that might have attended, had they never had real opportunities to interact regularly and develop close friendships with female African-American playmates.

In some places, credentials carry clout. However, many of Atlanta’s African-American professionals have graduated from prestigious Ivy League schools. Having a degree, or two or three degrees, is common among African Americans in Atlanta. Therefore, networking becomes very important to professional success. Entrepreneurs often need to make the right connections in order to gain potential business. Opportunities for making networking and social connections are abundant here. Just about every African-American fraternal, professional, or social organization is sure to have a local Atlanta chapter. More than that, you can count on the Atlanta chapter to be one of the most progressive and dynamic in the national organization.

I have found much more race consciousness in the South. At times, I have seen both blacks and whites attempting to even out the number of blacks and whites within their departments, or at least ensure that they have the representative token. Even at my son’s school, the principal assured me that they would carefully group the African-American children so that none were left alone in any class. While I doubt these situations were nonexistent in the North, they would be far less likely to be up for discussion. Behind closed doors, educators may have decided how they would divvy up the black children, but they would probably feel less comfortable speaking openly about it to a parent. I suppose that in the South, the issue of race is so deeply rooted that white educators want black parents to know they are addressing it.

I have personally encountered racism in Atlanta, sometimes in the ignorant embracing of stereotypes. For instance, I was walking with four young African-American male scholars coming from a science enrichment camp at Emory University’s School of Medicine. When we arrived at my office, a white co-worker took one glance and commented that I must have found a basketball team. All of these young gentlemen were less than six feet tall. Much has changed in the South, but some people are clearly holding fast to old racist attitudes.

Jerald Wolff

My wife, Deirdre, and I moved to Atlanta a couple of years ago. We are enjoying our life here and have no immediate plans to relocate. We are pleased with the school where our sons are enrolled. We like our neighborhood and hope that the property values continue to rise.

Deirdre and I met as we began our sophomore year in high school. We both participated in Inroads, a corporate-sponsored program designed for minority students interested in engineering and applied science. Deirdre and I attended college in different cities but maintained our relationship. Overall, we dated for about seven years, then got married. We have been married for almost seventeen years.

Like Deirdre, I grew up in St. Louis, Missouri, in the inner city. For some time my family lived near an infamous housing project. The area was crime-ridden—a classic ghetto setting. We were very poor, but our home was never broken. My mom worked as a registered nurse, and my dad, a decorated World War II veteran, worked at the post office. With seven siblings, our family was large and our needs were great. The overriding cause of our impoverished lifestyle was the disappointing fact that my father abused alcohol. He ended his postal career early, retiring on disability based on his war injuries. Health concerns and the closing of Homer Phillips Hospital in St. Louis led my mom to retire early as well. After that we lived on a fixed income. I was still young, as were several of my siblings. When I was eight years old, fire destroyed our old house, and we moved into a house near Deirdre’s neighborhood.

I fell in love with Deirdre when I was trying to fix up a good friend who had a serious crush on her. After I realized what a good catch she was, I forgot about fixing him up and focused instead on introducing myself to Deirdre. It was a classic tale of two teenage boys. I was the charming and gregarious athlete—the boy who was not afraid to talk to girls. My friend was a nice guy, but very reserved and shy. He did not feel comfortable talking to Deirdre for himself, and that is how he lost out.