L.A. Parker: Art presents canvas for gentrification
Art will not save Trenton.
So, it’s embarrassing, disheartening, unfortunate and disappointing to witness the uproar about a potential sale of the Roebling Wire Works building.
Personally? If a valid project appeared that offered Trenton fair market value and blue collar jobs there then government leaders should consider a sale.
Published reports have mentioned opinions made by members of our city’s important arts community and politicians who share their passion, including assertions that Roebling Wire Works ranks as untouchable based on historic and civic value.
Roebling hosts an Art All Night event in June, several Punk Rock Flea Market productions and serves as home base for Trenton Circus Squad and Skateboard Park enthusiasts — all important for the gentrification of this capital city.
Published articles circumvent and write around the fact that these popular events at Roebling attract predominantly Caucasian audiences — important for Trentificationists.
Personally, love art, music, museums, planetarium, buildings, literature, parks, film, gardens, etc. all important entities necessary for cities to thrive.
Disappointment occurs when memories return from August 2010 as Trenton shuttered four libraries without a word from artists, residents, historians, politicians, parents and others.
Mayor Tony Mack said then that budget talks focused on police and fire, maintaining staffing levels to keep Trenton safe. Public safety ranked as Priority 1.
In October, 2014, Mayor Eric Jackson told The Trentonian, “Of course, having a safe city, safe children, safe residents will not be achieved only through policing. Education, which includes active libraries, has a significant role in turning around this city. I recognize the critical importance of libraries, that they provide vital services to city residents.”
One solid decade here of screams for a focus on education and reopening libraries has attracted minimal support — because the city’s master plan hopes for building a safe Trenton that lures Caucasians and wealthy Blacks back to Trenton.
Schools Superintendent Ron Lee departs in October as 15,000 city public school students attempt remote learning during a COVID-19 pandemic and our leaders dismiss another city emergency.
Trenton appeared headed for the inevitability of gentrification with Caucasian Mayor Reed Gusciora, plus three Caucasian City Council members, a constituency that comprises half of this capital city’s power grid, until a shootout at Art All Night stymied gentrification efforts.
The Roebling Wire Works affair occurred in June 2018 just a month before Gusciora took office as he outmaneuvered several African American candidates in a general election then out-pointed top vote getter Paul Perez in a runoff.
Trenton attracted national infamy as police killed one shooter while 17 other people suffered bullet wounds.
This capital city retains negativity with a city council involved in several nefarious events including anti-Semitism, homophobia, a brutal brouhaha regarding a developer, plus, 28 murders and hundreds of shootings.
During times of great bloodshed, Gusciora mentions a $4.5 million real-time crime and intelligence center being created as a partnership project between the Trenton Police Department and the New Jersey State Police.
Gusciora recently touted a $1.25 million COPS grant that will gain back ten police of the near 100 positions lost in a 2010 house cleaning.
Most cities rampaged by crime share commonality of struggling school systems, shuttered libraries, apathetic voters and crime driven by drug trade.
While good police remain vital to any municipality, great societies flourish with education which plays an integral role in healthy cultivation of art.
Trenton needs a library project, a redevelopment effort that restores and reopens these buildings vital to construction of successful communities.
Discussions have materialized regarding reopening a library in East Trenton although no passionate voice exists, at least nothing comparable to sound and fury about Roebling Wire Works.
Pull back the curtain on a potential sale of Roebling and the upset connects to gentrification.