A Divided Humboldt Pkwy. Will Not Divide the People!

By Betty Jean Grant

Betty Jean Grant

I am sitting here wondering why Carl Paladino came to the meeting held recently by the Eastside Parkways Coalition at the Delavan-Grider Community Center. I think he came to talk and to donate a hundred dollars to the group to buy signs. I believe he did that to discredit the group by trying to have the community believe that he was working with true community activists such Terrence Robinson, India Walton, Michael Gainer, Betty Jean Grant, Candace Sherrell Moppins, and groups like the Olmsted Conservancy, Preservation Buffalo Niagara and the Clean Air Coalition.

Just like Carl Paladino spearheaded and recruited suburbanites for the Byron Brown Write- In, mayoral campaign initiative, he is using his unlikablity, in this campaign, to try to discredit the people who want to Fill In the Humboldt Parkway section between Dodge and Sidney St. Some of those who want to see a tunnel partially covering the Parkway are using his appearance at a meeting to spread rumors and hate against the white people who have views that are different from theirs. These same naysayers had no problem with Paladino when he sat at their table during the Stamp-In election. And they fail to realize that some of those white people who want the restoration of Humboldt Parkway actually have lived there since before the Parkway was destroyed by putting the 33 Expressway there.

Buffalo has always had problems with racism, segregation, and redlining. The destruction of Humboldt Parkway was a racist move against the newly Black homeowners who were not told that an Expressway was coming down the middle of their community. But to use that event to smear those of us, Black, white or any other racial group, for wanting Frederick Law Olmsted’s Parkway restored, is racist in itself and dangerous. It does nothing to promote peaceful and effective dialogue in bringing this city to the best possible solution, for all of us.

Finally, the fact that Carl Paladino has not been involved before, and after he made his infamous appearance at the one meeting, leaves me to believe that he was a ‘plant’ sent there to discredit the rest of us. Those with hidden agendas are trying to attach good, decent white and Black activists to a known racist simply because he chose to attend a public meeting held in a public community center.

Buffalo, we are better than all this race baiting that is trying to divide us by color or by what side of Main Street we live on. We all can disagree and when the final solution for Humboldt Parkway is decided, we can come together and then begin to work on the huge disparities in quality housing, adequate income and a well-rounded education as they relate to African Americans and minorities and all others who call Buffalo