On Housing Discrimination and St. Therese

 Housing in America  
As I reflect on this upcoming week of President’s Day, I couldn’t help but think about our Nation’s history regarding housing in America.

When I give tours to prospective families, one of the first places we stop is our annuals in the front hallway. We highlight the 1950s when the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace (our founding order) reached out to the communities of color in the Central District to invite them to attend St. Therese.

In 1952, St. Therese had two African American students join. This was the beginning of generations of colored and white Americans worshiping and attending school together. Due to Redlining, Black Americans were only allowed to live in specific designated areas. A practice that dates back to the early 1920s, many neighborhoods in Seattle had covenants that read "No person or persons of Asiatic, African or Negro blood, lineage, or extraction shall be permitted to occupy a portion of said property." What I believe is most surprising is that although Lyndon B. Johnson legalized the Housing Rights Act in 1968, finally outlawing discrimination on the basis of race or  ethnicity in the sale or rental of housing.  

Still, well into the 1980s many race restrictions remained embedded in so many deeds in Seattle and King County communities.  Neighborhood associations organized petition drives and convinced white homeowners to add racial restriction clauses to their properties in Capitol Hill, Madison Park, Queen Anne, Magnolia, and parts of Madrona. These covenants can still be found on many of the property titles today. When we speak about the systemic  racism that exists, this is one key example.  

However, when we focus on the Justice served by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace, I can celebrate the 70 years of Black Americans who have thrived in the Central District of Seattle due to the rich faith-based education they have received here at St. Therese.  This community is well known throughout the city, partly due to the restrictions placed years ago, but more importantly because of the change-makers we have produced who are out in the community making a difference now.

St. Therese currently serves over 44 zip codes.  Families travel from as far as Tacoma and Everett because the new evil is “pricing communities of color” out of the very area once designated ghetto enough for us to reside in.  But the community is still here, holding on within the walls of St. Therese classrooms.  We have an important legacy here. We are the glue that holds together the housing-discriminatory laws of the past and the very fabric of our Catholic educational journey up to this point.