FAU Baltimore
It took just five weeks to prepare a proposal for Amazon HQ2, what can we do on top of that by August 25th 2019, this time for the people of Baltimore
Baltimore used a lushly designed website to offer itself up to Amazon — unsuccessfully, it turned out — as a place where the online retailer could reshape the city by bringing its second headquarters and a promised 50,000 jobs to the Port Covington waterfront.
“The HQ2 project will be — in the right place — an opportunity for true urban revitalization and community invigoration. Establishing its headquarters in Baltimore, a majority African American city, is a public statement of Amazon’s investment in diversity and inclusion,” the city wrote in its pitch. it even had a flashy video:
This development for Amazon HQ2 was built the plans of Sagamore Development, a private real estate firm owned by billionaire Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank,. They have proposed a plan to redevelop Port Covington, a mostly industrial waterfront area in South Baltimore.
in their plan over the next two decades, the ambitious plan would remake the area with offices, homes, shopping, restaurants, waterfront parks and a new state-of-the-art campus for Under Armour.
Another view of Baltimore
(The) Racial economic inequality in Baltimore is very similar to the nation. In Baltimore Blacks have a median household income that is 54% of that of Whites, while nationally Blacks have 60% of White income. The small Latino community in Baltimore has 70% of the income of Whites compared to Latinos having 72% of White income nationally. The very small Asian community in Baltimore sees the biggest difference in national racial inequality trends. In Baltimore Asians have 84% the income of Whites whereas nationwide Asian Americans have a much higher income making 124% of what Whites on average make. Dedrick Asante-Muhammad Director, Racial Wealth Divide Initiative, CFED
Racial_Wealth_Divide_in_Baltimore_RWDIThe Previous Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (Below) that tells of the city’s ‘poverty.
CEDS-BDC-ReportThis (National Community Reinvestment Coalition/NCRC) report, below,, Home Mortgage, and Small Business Lending in Baltimore and Surrounding Areas details lenders’ abandonment of neighborhoods in Baltimore based upon the race of members of those neighborhoods and the preferences of lenders for white borrowers and majority-white neighborhoods. Using maps, statistical analyses, and public data, the National Community Reinvestment Coalition (NCRC) presents an alarming picture of Baltimore. Located in one of the wealthiest states in the U.S., and amidst some of the wealthiest counties in that state, the economic circumstances in Baltimore are an anomaly, raising questions about why lending occurs in some areas and not others. At the heart of this report is the role of race in Baltimore.
NCRC’s analysis clearly shows that while majority-white neighborhoods are sites of robust lending activity, majority-black neighborhoods are consistently excluded from lending activity. This sets Baltimore apart from the surrounding areas, and keeps it mired in poverty while surrounded by healthy, vibrant communities. As Professor Elvin Wyly notes, this leaves areas of disinvestment, such as West Baltimore, as “islands of decay in a sea
of renewal”.
The Department of Justice “INVESTIGATION OF THE BALTIMORE CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT”
bpd_findings_8-10-16
July 28th 2019, Open Letter to Baltimore,
Sunday we celebrated the end of the year when our ancestors became American citizens in 1868 (July 28, 2019). Yes it was a flawed citizenship but it set the stage for us today with a $1.2T GDP. On July 28th 2019 we start the creation of today #BaltimoreCEDS based on a new Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy for Baltimore.
In it we will answer President Trump’s tweets when he said, “. “Rep, Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men & women of Border Patrol about conditions at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous. His district is considered the Worst in the USA……,” Trump tweeted.
“(T)he Border is clean, efficient & well run, just very crowded. Cumming District is a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess. If he spent more time in Baltimore, maybe he could help clean up this very dangerous & filthy place,” he said.
In a third tweet, Trump questioned why so much money was spent on Cummings’ district, which covers the downtown area of the city of Baltimore, about 40 miles (64 km) northeast of Washington, “when it is considered the worst run and most dangerous anywhere in the United States.”
“No human being would want to live there. Where is all this money going? How much is stolen? Investigate this corrupt mess immediately,”
WITH ALLIES, WE WILL
The African Diaspora Directorate is creating this day July 29th 2019 a study group in Maryland to build a new Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (#CEDS) for Baltimore that embeds our operational principles in it as part of a national model. We now reach out to additional residents of Maryland and organizations who support the empowerment of People of African Descent and their allies.
Over the next 26 days we will create a framework report around the Baltimore’s Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (2014) which offers a blueprint for us to continue to grow solutions to the debate between Congressman Elijah Cummings and President Trump.
A new #CEDS for Baltimore must be produced by 2020 and the African Diaspora Directorate and it’s co-founders and allies will create #BaltimoreCEDS to do so.There are POTUS Executive Orders and other tools in place to do a variety of what is proposed by Junetenth 2020.
Solutions proposed on the African Diaspora Directorate Conference Call Sunday, July 28th 2019 to President Trumps Tweets
Based on online and dial in conference call Sunday, July 28⋅2:00 – 6:00pm EST and the modifications of the Under Armor and the HQ2 Plans through a Employer based Community Benenfit Agreement in a PublicPrivate Partnership with voters of Balatimore and their organizations and commmunity coalition particpation.
In 2005, the African Union defined the African Diaspora (AU) as “… peoples of African descent and heritage living outside the continent, irrespective of their citizenship, and who remain committed to contribute to the development of the continent and the building of the African Union.” In 2012 The AU expanded, in writing but not in fact, its membership to those who do not live in its established 5 regions to a 6th region – the African Diaspora.
The African Diaspora is mainly those persons of African descent dispersed from Africa into Europe, Asia and the Americas during Arab and European commercial slave raids. It also consists of those persons who voluntarily migrated from Africa in the 20th and 21st century. The African population in the Western Hemisphere is about 150 million persons in South America (mainly Brazil & Columbia), with 3M in Central America, 42M in the Caribbean, 22M in the Middle East, 20M in Asia (Including India/Indonesia), 13M in Europe and 50M in North America, 47M of them in the United States of America (According to the 2018 US Census Bureau Estimate)
