EQUITY AND INCLUSION -- Part 29

Planning, Zoning and other Land Use Policy Best Practices to Erase Errors of the Past that Perpetuated Bias and Deepened Inequality

Antoine M. Thompson

Antoine M. Thompson is executive director of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers (NAREB), the largest organization of African American real estate professionals in the United States. 

He said planning for equity can be as simple as placing caps over expressways or removing them — to reconnect communities separated by such major transportation projects that almost always were built through African American neighborhoods.

Thompson, who severed as a state legislator in Buffalo, said the planning and zoning departments of most American cities could benefit from having more diverse staffers, noting a staff that lacks diversity may have good intentions, but it’s likely to make paternal, detrimental decisions.