A
Controlled EnvironmentA
Controlled Environment
Oak Park is as community
that seeks to maintain its identity by regulating if not micromanaging
the behavior of its citizens. I plan to write something about
Oak Park as a very controlling world. This street sign conveys
a small sense of this approach to community life.
Filming
I spent most of the month filming at the Housing Center. I continued
to follow clients through the process of locating an apartment.
Sometime I went with them and an escort to look at apartments.
I interviewed more of the staff and started to contact clients
I had filmed to arrange follow-up interviews about their experience
at the Center. At the end of the month, I began the transition
from filming at the Center to the beginning of the film about
the Helena McCullough family - a family that has been in the community
for five generations. Through Helena, a 91 year old, to her children
and their children, I will be able to chronicle continuity and
change in the basic values of Oak Park. This film will now be
my major focus. On Friday September 8th, there will a birthdya
part for Helean. She is 91 and I will film it.
I have also secured permission to film a lesbian family with children. One of the women is a native Oak Parker and a founder of the Oak Park gay/lesbian organization, OPALGA and a community activist. Her partner is not such a public person. Through their family, I will be able to explore the place of gays and lesbians in the community. I am still negoitating with a gay family with children and an Evangelical family with adopted African-American children for permission. I will not know for certain if they will allow me to film until sometime in October.
I have decided to organize
the films (better the videos) into something that for now I will
call a "Video Book." It will contain an introduction
in which I will describe Oak Park and the intention of the research.
Then each film will constitute a "chapter" - The Housing
Center, Helena's family, the lesbian family, the gay family, and
the Evangelical family. Finally there will be a concluding film.
A Question of Class
Oak Park's official
policy is to strive to maintain economic diversity - a task not
easily realized. Oak Park has always been a solidly middle-class
community with a good number of its citizens having incomes that
qualify for the higher reaches of the upper middle-class. As the
real estate market soars and "handyman specials" sell
for more that $200,000 and small apartments start at $600, the
likelihood of modestly incomed and poverty class people being
able to stay in Oak Park decreases. While Oak Park has always
been generous in its acceptance of people with subsidized housing
certificates (HUD's Section 8 program), I have noticed while working
at the Housing Center that many of them are unable to find apartments
that suit their needs and ability to pay. In addition to being
costly, the variety of apartments available is diminishing. The
larger places, three bedrooms or more, are being transformed at
a rate alarming to many residents. Even two bedroom places are
scarce. The accidental result is that Oak Park is becoming a place
where those wealthy enough to purchase a house for at least $250,000
or a condo for $100,000 can find shelter. Singles, couples, and
families with only a few children and a middle-class income constitute
the bulk of the apartment dwellers. While there are some subsided
units set aside for senior citizens and those with disability,
these folks make up a tiny percentage of the population. At the
bottom of the economic ladder are the homeless. Oak Park offers
no permanent facilities but rather from the fall through to the
late spring opens up various churches on a one night basis to
those without places to stay called PADS. It is assumed that during
the warm months these folk will sleep out-of-doors somewhere.
While there is a little "NIMBY" grumbling that the existence
of temporary shelters attracts homeless from nearby communities
that do not offer such services, Oak Parkers seem to accept their
moral obligation to help the needy. I have noted only a few obviously
homeless in the village. They are not a significant part of the
population. Given the harsh economic realities of the marketplace
Oak Park will never have a significant number of people with less
than a solidly middle-class income. If Oak Park wishes to seriously
be an economically diverse community, it would have to consider
providing some sort of subsidy to lower income people and that
seems unlikely. The real diversity is not in income but socio-economic
class - a concept rarely discussed in the meetings I have attended
about maintaining diversity. While it would be out of place to
discuss the notion of socio-economic or socio-cultural differences
here, I can point to one clear example of why one's annual income
is not always a serious determinant of one's values. In New York
city (and I assumed many large urban centers), the salary of an
beginning assistant professor in one of the City Universities
and that of a garbage collector is the same. How they allocate
their resources could not be more different.
The American Anthropological Association meetings
A panel I co-organized with Tom Fricke, University of Michigan, on ethnography in the U.S. was been accepted at the national anthropological meetings. It will be my first presentation of my Oak Park research. I will post the talk when it is finished. Here is the abstract:
RUBY, Jay (Temple) INTEGRATION
AND DIVERSITY REVISITED IN OAK PARK This paper reports preliminary
findings from an ethnographic study of Oak Park, a middle-class
Chicago suburb, a community regarded internationally as a model
of an economic stability, ethnic integration and diversity. In
the 1970s Oak Parkers embarked on an innovative proactive campaign
to integrate African-Americans into the community without causing
the white flight and resegregation common to other places. It
seems to have worked. Today Oak Parkers appear to be almost consumed
with the need for constant vigilance to maintain their successes.
Over the last decade a new challenge to the maintenance of diversity
has appeared - the emergence of a public and politically active
gay and lesbian community. As gay rights are considered by some
to be a major civil rights issue in the U.S. for the twenty-first
century, a study of Oak Park offers an opportunity to examine
whether middle-class gays and straights can live/work/share together
in a mix that will not diminish the quality of community and family
life for either group.
Village Managers Association (VMA)
The Village Managers
Association begins its public meetings in September. I am attending
the meetings as a resident of the village with the intention of
eventually publishing something about the politics of Oak Park.
I believe the VMA approach to local politics is a homegrown invention
and as such is revealing of some important features of the community.
Unfortunately it is not possible to film as some of the sessions
are confidential.
The process is this:
1. There will be three informational meetings in September in
which the VMA board invites the standing trustees and some panelists
to deal with what they consider important issues. This time it
will include economic development and diversity.
2. Beginning in October and ending when all potential candidates
have been heard, there are closed meetings in which anyone who
wishes to run for office can present themselves to the nominating
committee. Any Oak Park resident can join the nominating committee
providing they attend all meetings or make arrangements to hear
the audio tapes for a meeting they miss. Prior to the full committee
interview, subcommittees will meet with the candidate to screen
him/her. Most people get through the pre-screening. The potential
candidate makes a presentation and then is asked questions by
the selections committee. This takes about one hour. The candidate
then leaves and then the nominating committee discusses and critiques
the candidate..
3. When all of the candidates have presented themselves, the selections
committee then meets to decide on which candidates they will recommend.
They then make a presentation to the VMA membership.
4. The membership endorses (or not) the Selection Committee's
recommendation. The Selection Committee's work is finished when
the "selected" candidates agree to be on the slate.
5. The endorsed candidates form themselves into a temporary political
party and begin their campaign. The VMA board members and selections
committee may join them but an individuals only. The VMA may loan
money, equipment, space and mailing lists but that is all.
6. The April election is almost a forgone conclusion.
As always I welcome comments, criticisms and suggestions. Email me at ruby@acsworld.net.