WSJ | Residents in Sherman Park and other African-Americans in Milwaukee blamed the city’s extremely segregated communities for the eruption of tensions over the weekend, said their neighborhoods are seeing social services being cut and residents moving away. Sherman Park and areas immediately surrounding it have few commercial businesses except for liquor stores and fast food restaurants, and residents here say they have little by way of opportunity. Foreclosed homes dot the street, and almost every other car is badly dented.
The Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, described Milwaukee earlier this year as “the most segregated metro area in the United States,” with 260 of its 296 census tracts having one demographic group account for 60% of the population. Nearly a fifth of the tax base is in 3% of the city’s land area. While a new office tower is rising downtown here, slated to be the city’s second tallest, homes here in Sherman Park are crumbling.
“The only thing we can hope for after something as shocking as this is that there will be a new sense of togetherness and a realization that we must do better,” said Mr. Southerland. “We have to move forward.”
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