Today, as a direct and proximate result of the Massacre, Black Tulsans face disparate treatment and outcomes with respect to the most basic human needs: jobs, financial security, education, housing, justice and health, as listed below directly from a recent City of Tulsa Equality Indicators report:[1]
Jobs. Unemployment among Tulsa’s Black community is more than twice that of unemployment among whites in Tulsa.
Financial Security. The median household income among white Tulsans is over $20,000.00 more than that of their Black counterparts.
Education. Students in predominantly Black schools in Tulsa are nearly nine times as likely as students in predominantly white schools to be suspended from school.
Housing. While 58.2% of whites in Tulsa own their homes, only 34.8% of Black Tulsans own their homes.
Justice. The arrest rate of Black juveniles in Tulsa is nearly three-and-a-half times that of white juveniles, and the arrest rate of Black adults is over twice that of white adults.
Health. The rate of infant mortality among Black Tulsans is over four times that of the rate among white Tulsans, and a Black mother is more likely to give birth pre-term than a white mother is. “[Black] residents of north Tulsa have unusually high incidents of diabetes, cancer, stroke, and heart problems,” compared to residents of South Tulsa. Perhaps most notable is that the life expectancy in years past the age of 66 of people who live in South Tulsa is nearly three times that of those who live in North Tulsa; “[a] northsider will die 14 years sooner than someone in south Tulsa.”
Adding to the injuries, the City of Tulsa began enriching itself by promoting the site of the Massacre as a tourist attraction, obtaining funds to do so, as well as aiding in obtaining funds to create a history center that appropriates the narrative of the Massacre, and distorts the City’s central role in the continued oppression of Greenwood and its Black residents. The known living survivors, and the descendants of those victimized by the Massacre, including current residents of the Greenwood neighborhood and North Tulsa, have reaped no material benefit from City’s appropriation of the Massacre.
[1] C.U.N.Y. Inst. for State & Loc. Governance, Comm’y Serv. Council & City of Tulsa, Tulsa Equality Indicators 20 (2019) [hereinafter “2019 Equality Indicators”], available at https://www.tulsaei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Tulsa-Equality-Indicators-Report_2019.pdf
Reporting on the Impact of the Tulsa Race Massacre 100 Years Later | Field Notes