Interview with Yolanda Walker, October 11, 2021

Michael Jones: Hello, my name is Michael Jones. It is October 11 at 5:30. I'm with Unfair Housing and Oral History Project from the Metropolitan Housing Coalition and the University of Louisville's Oral History Center. I'm talking with Miss Yolanda Walker who is president of the California Neighborhood Leadership Council. So how are you doing today?

Yolanda Walker: I'm doing good today.

MJ: All right, and so why don't you tell me a little bit about your organization?

YW: Well our organization was spinned from another organization that Dr. Michael Brooks had founded both. And it's an organization to do things in the community to revitalize, relift, and rebuild those things in the community and bring that 1:00feel of community back in place.

I met Dr. Brooks working with some teenagers. He had a program with the youth on both sides of California Victory and the California area. And they were getting stipends, workshops, and education. And we are a group that is just trying to bring the life back to the community. And we support other neighborhoods that have issues that are not being supported and bosses are not being heard.

MJ: So, are you originally from the California Neighborhood? Is that where you grew up?

YW: I grew up in the Parkland Neighborhood. I grew up in Parkland. I lived in Northwestern Parkway. Then I settled in the California Neighborhood which I've 2:00been there over 33 years.

MJ: Okay, and so what was Parkland like when you were growing up there?

YW: Oh, when I was a little kid, around 6 and 8 years old, it had black businesses all through there. Grocery store, five and dime, restaurants, I mean it was just thriving.

MJ: And what year were you born? What year would that have been?

YW: I was born in '59.

MJ: Okay. And so when you were growing up, you were still saw black businesses there?

YW: Yes, I saw the black businesses. I don't know if you recall, the March Bank, she had a five and ten cent store. She was a notary across the street. We had the library which now is a substation for the police detectives and I think 3:00they're been talking about bringing it back. We had a restaurant called Senators. You know, the Triple Triangle and it was when community was community, you know the neighbors looked out for you.

You walking down the street, they knew the news before your family knew the news. Because they were just watching us as children and nobody was exempt from an adult correcting you and leading you down the right path. Also we had the doctor. I don't know if it was Dr. Young? He used to be there in the community. So it was very prominent black-owned.

MJ: And when did that start to change?

YW: It started with the riot. It started in the riot. I don't know what year 4:00that was. I don't know if it was '68, whether when the riot came, right there on Greenwood, 26th and Greenwood I believe. It was 26th or 28th and Greenwood--28th and Greenwood. And that's when it started going downhill.

MJ: So how old were you then?

YW: I think I was about 8, possibly 6 or 8. Somewhere along in there, I think I was about 8.

MJ: So what do you remember about that period?

YW: I remember being in my front yard and seeing people running and people was telling me to get in the house. I was wondering why they were telling me to go get in the house. And when I went in the house and I looked at TV, there was fire, I'm not sure if it was a police car, but something was turned over. And I was telling at the time, my auntie that I was living with and her husband. And I was telling them, I said, "That's around the corner."

Because we lived at 29th and Kentucky. And I'm like, "That's around the corner." 5:00And I was like, "Oh I see," so at a young age, it was like what is going on? And I really don't think the truth has really came out, you know, there's bunch of speculation of what happened. But I really don't know what the truth was.

MJ: And how did that affect your family, what happened? Did you have people who were involved in the riot, or afterward, did their attitudes about the community change?

YW: I had a cousin, I had a young cousin that was a teenager at the time. And in my house, I didn't realize it until some years ago, there's a picture of him standing--it takes you back to the riot with Breonna when they were down there on the statue and on the steps.

And he's captured in this book holding the flag, but that's more when militant. 6:00He went to militant, Black Power, you know, the people need to stand up, those type of things. So it was like seeing that all over again. But I was (inaudible 0:06:24.1) to really be involved or anything. But I did have a cousin that was a youth, I guess he's about 16, 17, might have been 18, that started in the movement of activism.

MJ: And so after that--after the riots, what was your neighborhood like? Did it slowly change? Or was it a swift change after that?

YW: It kind of slowly changed. It slowly changed. I think I stayed there for about another year because my auntie passed away and I winded up living with a cousin. Because with my youth, my mother died when I was young so I lived with an auntie, she raised me, and so she passed.

So I didn't really--I seen it starting to decline, but you still had that neighborly--they were still neighbors. But then I left from there and I went over in the (inaudible 0:07:33.2) area. And was raised up so I didn't really get to see it, but then as I got older, I saw the decay and the decline as I started getting older in my 20s.

MJ: And so, what schools did you go to?

YW: I went to Brandeis Elementary. I went to Mill for a year. I went to Shawnee 8:00for a year. And I graduated out of Pleasure Ridge. But I did also go with Jessie R. Carter. Then in DuValle, and I went to DuValle in the junior high school years.

MJ: So did you go through busing?

YW: I happened to miss the busing. And the reason why I missed the busing cause I had a lady to adopt me after some time in my life. She adopted me. And she wouldn't enroll me in school. So I tried to enroll me in school. So when I enrolled myself in school, I enrolled myself backwards in school. So I missed that first year of busing and I was in the house one day, that's when I was at Shawnee, they had me go to Shawnee for a year because I had enrolled backwards. 9:00Because she--

MJ: A grade backwards?

YW: No, I enrolled because the elective that I needed, they wouldn't have brought me all the way from Pleasure Ridge into the city for the elective. And I was almost finished with that elective, so they had me to stay in to the city. So I winded up at Shawnee so I could go out there, which now is McFerran, but it used to be Detrick.

And I was taking cosmetology and I was in my last year so they wouldn't bring me all the way from there to in the city. And I happened to come in one day from school and the buses was turning over. They were, you know, rocking the buses and everything. And she told me, she said, "Now do you see why I wouldn't enroll you in school?" And I lived in that community that the buses were being turned over, they were talking to them--and so I ran down to the corner because everybody on that bus was my neighbors.

Then the next year, I did wind up going to Pleasure Ridge, but I missed that 10:00year of all that hostility and turning over the buses and mistreating everybody. And I ran down there to make sure all my friends were okay.

MJ: And so, go ahead, it was what?

YW: It was on the news cause that's what she was showing me. And all of everybody in the neighborhood, all the teenagers, everybody that I hung around with had lived in the neighborhood, that was their bus on the TV that they were flipping over at, calling them all kind of names and didn't want them to go back. It really did something to me cause I stood there and then after I seen it, next thing I knew I was running out the house to meet them at the bus stop to make sure everybody was okay.

MJ: And is that sort of when you became an activist?

YW: No, I really didn't become an activist I guess, my oldest is 33. And I guess I started becoming the activist probably when they were teenagers. I started to really see injustice. I started to see how people were mistreating kids as far as education. And I was in the community and I would ask my neighbors certain things, and they were like, "No, we don't know nothing about it. We never heard of it." And it was like I've got to get the word out.

The people got to know what's going on. And I guess that's when it really started my--I was really not at, I don't say at the level that people will recognize me, but those that had known me then, they always know I was trying to make sure they had resources. They knew what was going on in the city. You know, 12:00I trended walking in the neighborhood. And I think really when it--I've always been an activist at heart, but when they tried to put the methane over in the community that I love and the different things, my eyes kind of opened up a little bit more.

Because I was walking in the neighborhood that I didn't even realize how deep this fungus of things were on the home. It was like, you know, you walking by, you in the community, and then when your eyes are open, it's like, "Oh my God." And then hearing the stories of people cause I've always had the heart for those individuals that, I guess people call them the underdog, they don't get ahead.

So I've kind of always been--it's always been in me. It just kind of emerged further cause I always wanted everybody to be aware of what's going on. Because it doesn't have nothing to be with, people all they ignorant know they haven't had the exposure. Nobody has brought it to them to understand.

JONES: Okay, is this so when you're in the California Neighborhood that your eyes were opened--(inaudible 0:13:13.6) going on?

YW: Yes, yes. I would say when I moved in the California Neighborhood and my children roughly were teenagers, is when it started.

MJ: And what year was that, about what year?

YW: 19--let's see, my daughter was born, I believe, in '88. So I would say--I give it about the '90s, about maybe '94 or '95. I give it the '90s.

MJ: And so, what were some of the first issues that you got involved with?

(Technical difficulties)

YW: Different, sorry about--people in the neighborhood, just wasn't--I was receiving information and other individuals in the neighborhood wasn't receiving. And that's what got me started. It was like, how do I--

MJ: Were you receiving because you were looking for it?

YW: No, it was coming to my house. It was coming to--

(Technical difficulties)

YW: Hold on just a second--

MJ: All right. So yeah, I was asking you about some of the early issues you were 15:00involved in fighting.

YW: Well, some of the issues was the methane. Also about them which they're going forth with from this weekly moving it out of the community. Air pollution of Heaven Hill, those type of issues.

MJ: So do you think that you--

YW: --got a TIF now.

MJ: Yeah and well, do you think that California Neighborhood has to put up with things that other neighborhoods don't?

YW: Yes, they put up with quite a bit. It's like a dumping ground. It's like 16:00let's pick on them, you know. And I don't know why.

MJ: You had talked about the West End TIF and I know that you've been going to the meetings and you've been critical about the TIF. Why is that?

YW: There's a lot of reasons why is that. Number one, it was done without community involvement, even though it is said it was community involvement, there was no community involvement. No one was talking with--under (inaudible 0:16:34.7), it was put in legislation and a few hours before the end of session, that nobody could talk about it, when you asked the individuals that drafted it and put it in to give you clarification of understanding what it's about, they don't even know they self.

They even tell you, "Well we need to go back and read it." We need to educate yourself. How do you educate yourself in a bill that you orchestrated, you signed it, and you took (Technical difficulties 0:17:09.3) of it. So it's like how do you not know what you put your signature on? And then you're asking me and other homeowners, business owners, renters to fund something for 20 years down the road that puts another burden on individuals that may not have the income to do it.

So you are pricing us out and we have no voice of what's saying what will be built. You know, we'll tell you what is needed and then you say, "Well, oh, there's gonna be 9 people represented in the community." Well they still over voted. They'll over vote it if you do put 9 on there. Even if they're not 9 of 18:00your window dressing. Well your tax will be freezed. You cannot freeze taxes. If taxes go up, tell me how is it frozen? Is it from that base?

Okay, say that for November, your tax is $500. So is that $500 gonna last for that 20 years? But on your $500, you have JCPS which can do this, it has done this, 89.6% on your $500 for this year. Now say 2 years down the road, okay, you're still sitting at $500, but you got that 89.6% and they say, "Oh, well we need to tack on another 89.6% on top of that?" Where is the freeze? As long as 19:00it's (inaudible 0:18:58.7)--

MJ: Yeah, well are you supposed to be able to get a rebate for what you overpay?

YW: The way that this rebate sounds, and as they are saying and they put in a check wrong. Okay, your max is $1000, your max is $1000. You can file it on your tax, but what if I don't file tax, I'm a senior, I'm on a fixed-income, my house is paid for but I still got to pay my taxes. I still got to pay my taxes because that's just how life is. But if I don't put in, I don't get it. But okay, I have $1000 threshold that I can rebate for.

So if my extra is $600 and I put in for the $600, that leaves me $400. So if you come back next year or 2 years down the road, and I've already got $600, I got 20:00$400, but it's another $600 on top of that. So I don't--where do I profit? Because I'm still gonna owe--I had $400, I got $600, I'm gonna owe $200. And then after that year, there's no more. I don't have that plateau anymore. It only runs to what they're showing is $1000.

But then what we're hearing is not--we're not too sure, but that's what is on the tax, what's that Turbo Tax or whatever it is. That's what they were showing to us. So after I reached that $1000 and anything over that, that's on me. You know, I can't get it because I've got the max.

MJ: And so this savings also it goes to the property owner. So a renter is not 21:00really going to benefit from this, is that right?

YW: No, what the renter will do, because it is property, and if I was the landlord, I'm gonna pass that cost on to my renters, which means their rent increases and it depends on where you are renting because some have utilities included, some do not. So if I am a landlord and I don't have utilities included, you have to pay your own utilities, then I'm gonna spend that cost to you. That's an extra cost on you, plus your utilities that (inaudible 0:21:38.6) decides they want to put another fee on, what they are doing and come back, or LG&E wants to put another fee on, then you are triple taxed.

But I'm gonna pass that to you because as the landlord no matter how much I love you, I got to pass it to you. If I'm a business owner and on my property you 22:00come and spend money for my goods, I'm gonna have to inflate my product. And so that may price me out. You're gonna go find services somewhere else. If you're a renter, you're gonna try to find somewhere else, and it may not even happen.

MJ: So let make sure I'm understanding, so as far as the extra cost you're talking about to the landlord, are you saying that the landlord would pay like the, whatever the frozen rate is, but school board fees or whatever, he would pass on to his renter?

YW: Yes, but you cannot freeze, that's what I'm not understanding. Because I'm 23:00even hearing that's unconstitutional. That's where there's a lot of things that are going on that need to be clarified that individuals are not given correct answers. One minute they say, "Oh, it's gonna be freezed," and then the next minute, they come back and say, "Oh no, it's unconstitutional. You cannot freeze nobody's taxes." So which one is it? But if I'm the landlord, whatever new fees I get, I may have to pass it on to my renters. No matter how much I love them.

MJ: And have you seen any projections of how much they expect the TIF to bring in?

YW: No, they don't know anything. We don't know, we don't know where to find them, we don't know where they are, we got to wait and see. The $30 million, we won't know. I think the thing was we won't know until after the taxes start this 24:00year. But then I'm hearing--that's what I'm saying.

You're saying one thing and you're saying that's misinformation, but the misinformation is coming from you. So we have to listen to what you're saying but then you say, "Oh it might be 2 or 3 years down the road before we even can project the (inaudible 0:24:19.4)."

MJ: So would you like to see some changes in the legislation when the General Assembly gets together in January?

YW: I'd like to see it stopped. We have completely start from bottom, period. There's no need to even go into something that has so much confusion and nobody knows what's what and this is happening, you know, you flying the plane and building it all at the same time. Who does that? We're building the plane and 25:00this is what he is--and we're doing it as we go along. So whatever pops up in the head, that's what it is. No it should be concrete.

It should be where everybody knows what it is. And when individuals sign something that you have elected to sit and tell you they don't even know what they signed? What they orchestrated, there's something wrong. So no, it needs to be completely tossed. Just cause it's a law don't mean it's a good law and all laws ain't great laws. And then these morning just--to go back with the ordinance, it needs to completely be vetoed and let's start it from the beginning because how did you get a bill and everybody's in Covid?

You said you had this amount of this and that, but nobody knows anything about it. Everybody's like when this happen? All in they know when the announcement. 26:00When was these meetings? How did these meetings happen? My aspect of it is toss it in the trash. And if we're gonna have something, then that board needs to be completely changed because these are individuals that I think you heard me say that has raped and robbed and stood in line for this money for years and nobody has benefit but selected few. And the selected few are the few that they have decided.

Cause I have sent people to a lot of these organizations to get help. Them people to come back and tell me it did not happen. They went through this program and when they got so far, here came this stumbling block. But that's not what you said, but you have been in line for grants and monies and on the backs of communities and saying, "Oh I'm doing it for the community. I need your 27:00support." And the support comes, I've been one that even supported some of them. When it came back to what you said, it wasn't what you said and nothing has ever benefited the community. So they need to relook at who's over what.

MJ: Are you afraid that ultimately gentrification is going to displace black people from their homes in the West End?

YW: Well I'm gonna answer that for you, but I'm a sure also what was told me at one of those meetings by Mr. Neal to everybody that was on it. Gentrification is here, it's been here, it's gonna continue, so you might as well get comfortable basically with it. It is gonna get--

MJ: Is that what Senator Gerald Neal?

YW: Yeah, yeah. On one of his meetings, that's what he told everybody. Gentrification's already here. It's gonna happen. It doesn't have to happen with 28:00this TIF. You know, you move to Highland Park, you displaced up there in Sheppard Square, you have displaced out there in Iroquois, you have displaced down at Cotter Homes, you know, so yes, displacement and gentrification is gonna be priced out but then you asking us to gentrify our own selves with our own money.

You're asking us to turn around for 20 years, which is a mortgage payment, and give you money for the max of 20 years to move us out and out price ourselves. So you're asking us to gentrify our own selves. That's how I feel. That's why I really have a problem. Then you can't give me no concrete on what that money is 29:00gonna do, where is that money gonna go, are you gonna build what this neighborhood over here says they need food, grocery stores. They need this over here for them to survive.

You can't tell me it is what the developer says. And the way the developer is, I looked at a thing the other day and it's just mind boggling that the Planning Commission would okay a project for some buffers and some (inaudible 0:29:34.4) use and don't have a plan of who's gonna buy the property, what the property's gonna turn into, but we okay. Who does that? Shouldn't a plan be there first and then we go forth?

That's another we're gonna build a plane that we're flying. I'm a get approval 30:00for all this stuff on this property but we have no (inaudible 0:30:01.7), we don't have no plans, we don't have nothing. We don't need no--somebody gonna go buy the land. We just want you--and they pass it? So this is the same thing. What are you gonna build? What are you doing? What are you giving us, skyscraper? You know, are you gonna build some more apartments that people are gonna be out priced and is not affordable, but it's maybe capital affordable for those that build it, but it's not low-income affordable? So it makes no sense.

MJ: So your concern is they're not gonna build affordable housing?

YW: Low-income. Low-income, cause when we talk about affordable, we need to say affordable for who? Is it affordable for low-income that meet lower than the 31:00minimum guideline? Or is it affordable for the developer that's gonna get paid? Is it affordable just for the capitalism of the money? So when we say affordable, we need to specify what type affordability. You know, there's a lot that can be done with that money.

We can look at the streets. We can look at the houses. We can look at the boarding houses. We can look at those that are sleeping in abandoned houses, on the street. And you know, so it's--what are your plans, your true actual plans? And from what I see is to keep somebody comfortable but then the lower income, 32:00to make them uncomfortable and continue to struggle?

MJ: So have you been attending all the meetings?

YW: I've attended all of the Gerald Neal meetings maybe except for one.

MJ: And so, you haven't gotten any answers to your questions?

YW: Nobody has gotten answers to the question is that you need to come with a positive attitude. You need to have positive energy, and excuse my language, I ain't got no positive energy when you're doing me and you can't tell me how. I'm supposed to like it cause you say to like it. In my childhood coming up, to get along to git-along is what my family used to do, and then I see them suffering. 33:00So I'm get along, git-along and continue to suffer and how the woe is me when they need to know it's no comfortable.

This is not comfortable. It doesn't fit and you didn't take the time to really do your due diligence of how this will affect. To you it sounds good, oh 80% gonna stay in the West End. But at what cost? And then it's at the cost of the individuals that are living in the West End, that are funding it, and have no voice of actually what happens. Yes, it needs to be vitalized, yes there are a lot of things that need to come back and needs to be done and make a vibrant neighborhood.

Cause I would like to, cause I do remember you could walk out your back door, 34:00like I was talking about at 28th Street. I'd go over there and get me a hamburger. I'd go down here and get my soda, get my pop, get everything I needed, and then come right on back home. I didn't have to ride all the way to St. Matthews and Middletown to get quality.

MJ: Well what do you think about what they've already--the renovations that have already been done in the neighborhood, like on 18th and Broadway where the YMCA? Do you see positive changes coming out of this revitalization?

YW: I don't see anything positive down at the YMCA when you're out-pricing people that their families can't really afford to be there. When you're talking 35:00about $98 a month to walk around a concrete floor. But when you came, you said it would be open to the community. You have a program in there unless your parents is a part of it, you may not even be a part of it. So when you are pricing individuals that cannot even afford to go in there, how is that helping the community? I see no help in that.

You know, but we say these wonderful things and you get the community fired up, you get them behind them, but then after it's done and when the community comes to hold you on what you said to get it established and built, there are so many 36:00other things that are not happening. You know, you want to go in people's bank accounts so you don't want to surplus it if you do surplus it. People don't need you in the bank accounts. Some may not have a bank account.

A woman over here, she's got three children. She would like for her children to enjoy the Y. Well, she can't enjoy the Y--they can't enjoy the Y because they are outpriced. So here is the child on the corner and you got this great facility in the West End. But unless Mama work two or three jobs, I can't get you in it. So what has that done?

MJ: So you're not really hopeful for any of the kind of Russell revitalization 37:00and the greater revitalization efforts in the Russell though? Do you feel like they're kind of directed by people outside the neighborhood?

YW: I believe it's directly outside for the neighborhood to keep the pockets lined of those that like the caviar and the champagne and like to say the (inaudible 0:37:20.8) say they're doing a wonderful thing. I don't see the benefit of nothing but displacement for those in the community that are already there that is trying to hold on what little bit they have. You know, would love for it to be the other way. Would love for it to really generate what it should truly generate. But at this point, I don't see it.

I just see total displacement of homes and families and those that have for 38:00years tried to get what little bit on whatever little salary that they have. Cause if we look at Beecher Terrace, everybody didn't come back. Meanwhile everybody didn't come back. Iroquois when they tore it down I don't believe anything is still built up there but a fence and grass. So where did these people go? And that was all to what? Revitalize, rebuild it? But some of those areas look like California. Almost close to a ghost town. With the boarded houses and those type of things, so I wish--cause we build a pretty building does not mean that that's for the people.

MJ: Well, that's all the questions I had for you, is there anything I didn't ask 39:00you about that you'd like to talk about?

YW: Well I guess, one thing with the housing, I guess, I would like to know how they calculate that an individual may not be able to afford a home? Cause that was a little something, I got married and we used my husband's VA to purchase the home. But before I even met him, I looked into the home and they were basically, "Well due to your income, you don't make enough money for x amount of years." But I worked two jobs, and to me, that is another way of not necessarily redlining but not giving individuals the opportunity.

Because if somebody wants something bad enough, they are going to make sure. And then the bank on top of it, if they don't meet it, you gonna foreclose on it, so 40:00you're not losing any money, but you done already made money while they in it. So I have an issue with where do you get these calculation, x amount for so many years, for so many in the months, just like purchasing a car? Where'd these calculations and where did the banks and you--you have more interest on it than you do with the house.

So when you do buy the house, you done triple or double paid for that house. And so the bank's not--and to me, I feel like that's really a barrier for low-income. You know, families or single moms or dads that want to purchase something.

MJ: Well thank you very much.

YW: Okay, well I hope I helped, I don't know.