IN 2022, Boston’s city council established a commission to study reparations. While some cities have decided to pay reparations, most can’t overcome the opposing arguments, and White support for reparations is low.

Contemporations may be the solution. Coined by Ron Marlow, the term means “a systemic approach involving public and private policies and actions to address, arrest, and reverse the economic and social marginalization of Black individuals and communities.” Former state senator Dianne Wilkerson has outlined contemporations policy positions, potential costs, and funding sources.

While reparations are typically linked to slavery or historic discrimination, contemporations focus on contemporary discrimination. With contemporations, there is no need to determine the responsible parties’ intention, only the impact of their decisions and actions on community and personal wealth. The harm inflicted on Black Americans came from a variety of sources, and all of those sources should address the problem they helped cause.

The turmoil of the 1960s and 1970s profoundly shaped Boston’s Black community. Actions by the city government, the Boston Redevelopment Authority and others destroyed the economic base of Black neighborhoods.

Urban renewal in the 1960s and 1970s, combined with corrupt government and private practices, led to the seizure of many Black-owned brownstones in the South End and wholesale destruction in Roxbury, where 3,000 homes and 500 commercial properties were bulldozed or taken, affecting some 18,000 people.

The Boston Housing Authority routinely engaged in discriminatory practices, steering White and Black applicants to different housing developments based on race. Because of this practice, the BHA settled a class action lawsuit with 1,900 Black, Latino and Asian claimants, with each receiving a $5,000 settlement.

Decisions made decades ago have had repercussions for generations. Redlined areas did not receive capital investments or parks, and residents have suffered the effects of busing, poor school quality, and disparate policing practices. These neighborhoods became food deserts and the preferred sites for public housing, highways, and environmentally hazardous facilities. These, in turn, damaged personal and community wealth and health.

From 1968 to 1972, Boston banks and City Hall collaborated in the Boston Banks Urban Renewal Group. Founded in response to the Fair Housing Act of 1968, which forbade discrimination in home mortgage availability, the Boston Banks Urban Renewal Group engaged in blatant redlining. Its actions had a devastating, lasting impact on the Black community, which is why bank-specific reparations are essential.

As Lew Finfer explained in The Boston Globe, Blacks faced significant barriers in obtaining conventional mortgages. Banks would only offer Federal Housing Administration loans, which required lower down payments compared to traditional mortgages but were subject to foreclosure and property transfer to the federal government after just one missed payment. Because the banks weren’t fronting the money for the mortgages themselves and didn’t have to manage the foreclosed properties, they had no incentive to work with borrowers who ran into financial difficulties.

But Black homeowners had plenty of financial difficulties due to corrupt inspections. Although the Fair Housing Act required a home inspection before insuring a mortgage, these inspections were not being done properly in redlined Boston neighborhoods. Consequently, unsuspecting Black families bought properties needing costly repairs for issues that should have been caught by inspection and repaired by the sellers. When buyers fell behind even one month on the mortgage while attempting to pay for crucial repairs, they lost their homes.

Dorchester Community Action Council and Dorchester Fair Share worked to outlaw shoddy inspections and to enable homeowners to file claims for the cost of necessary repairs following such inspections. The organizations helped more than 600 Black homeowners apply for and obtain these rebates. Unfortunately, it was too late for over 1,200 others who lost their homes to fast foreclosures.

Federal mismanagement exacerbated the problem. The government evicted tenants living in foreclosed multifamily homes, leading to vacant buildings that got vandalized, stripped of materials, and even set ablaze. At one point, Dorchester and Mattapan had over 1,000 empty homes, and banks used this neighborhood deterioration—to which they had contributed—as an excuse to redline the area.

These events fed the narrative that when Blacks moved into a neighborhood, it deteriorated.

Concurrently, many real estate agents engaged in blockbusting. They went door-to-door in targeted neighborhoods, telling White homeowners frightening lies about their new Black neighbors. As scared White families started selling and moving, the exodus built its own momentum.

Boston’s leadership failed to respond to blockbusting in Mattapan. Local civic groups opposed these activities, but the damage was already done.

Royal Bolling Sr., a Black real estate broker, led the effort to end blockbusting in Boston. Despite huge resistance, he persuaded the City Council to outlaw the practice. However, the fine for breaking the law was just $25, which agents viewed as the cost of doing business, so blockbusting continued.

Urban renewal plans and the demolition of Black neighborhoods hurt homeowners, destroyed communities, and devastated Black-owned businesses. Widespread destruction of commercial buildings and lack of support for Black and Latino businesses compounded the economic loss while hindering entrepreneurship within these communities.

More recently, during the national foreclosure crisis, Black homebuyers fell victim to predatory lenders who underwrote mortgages with unfavorable terms as part of a corrupt scheme. These loans worsened the crisis and disproportionately affected minority communities.

The systemic racism and oppressive tactics behind the bulldozing and taking of thousands of Black-owned properties in Boston are well-documented. Determining compensation for the harm is the next step. Potential funding sources include leftover money from the American Rescue Plan Act and pledges from the private sector, particularly the banks that profited most from discriminatory practices. This funding could remedy the damage caused in the 1960s and 1970s.

Contemporations are more than just a good idea; they’re a direct path toward healing and equity. Boston’s City Council should explore the merits of Wilkerson’s proposals, her implementation plan, and the required funding. It’s time to take the next steps toward a more prosperous and equal tomorrow for all.

Ed Gaskin is executive director of Greater Grove Hall Main Streets.