CHARLOTTE — Dot Counts-Scoggins grew up in Biddleville, and she says she’s seen changes in one of Charlotte’s oldest neighborhoods for Black residents.
“I was one of four African-American students to attempt to integrate Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools,” civil rights icon Dorothy “Dot” Counts-Scoggins told Action 9’s Jason Stoogenke.
Eventually, life took her elsewhere, away from Charlotte for many years, until finally, she “just said, ‘I’m going home,’ because this is where I grew up.”
So she came back in the early 2000s. Now, literally from her front door, she sees how much her neighborhood has changed since then. For every older home – like hers, built in the 1930s – there’s new construction. Modest houses disappear. Million-dollar homes pop up in their place.
According to UNC Charlotte, Biddleville is often considered Charlotte’s oldest surviving Black neighborhood. Formed in the 1870s, it attracted preachers and teachers who worked at Johnson C. Smith University. It was a “favored residential area for the Black elite who felt a cultural connection living there, and who wished to raise their children in an ‘intellectual atmosphere.’” Counts-Scoggins says her father taught at the college and that she graduated from there.
Fast forward more than a century. According to the Charlotte Observer, in 2000, Biddleville’s Black population was around 96%, but dropping. In 2016, it was at most 75%. It’s not clear the number today.
But what is clear is how much more expensive this neighborhood has gotten. Stoogenke checked County records for three houses along the street where Counts-Scoggins lives. He compared 2003 to 2023 values. One went from $80,000 to $238,000. Another: $30,000 to $240,000. The third: $61,000 to $375,000.
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Biddleville isn’t alone. Many traditionally Black Charlotte neighborhoods keep changing. That kind of change usually means more homeownership, less crime, and more retail, including grocery stores. But it also translates to higher property taxes.
Does Counts-Scoggins worry it will hit a point where the property taxes will force her out of the neighborhood? “I don’t really even think about it. As I said to my children, I will live here as long as I can. And my hope is I can live here until I close my eyes,” she said.
Obviously, gentrification isn’t new.
Rebecca Hefner is the City of Charlotte’s Director of Housing and Neighborhood Services. The City launched an Anti-Displacement Strategy in 2023 to help residents stay in their homes, despite gentrification.
“It’s a whole toolbox and what the strategy helps us do is think through what’s the right tool in the right place at the right time?” Hefner said.
So what are those tools? “We call it ‘Beyond the Bricks.’ So it is housing and helping residents meet other needs. So housing and we think about income, we think about health, aging needs, childcare, transportation,” she said.
That includes helping people start small businesses, change careers, or use their property to make money, like creating a granny flat to rent out. “Housing stability is also related to income stability,” Hefner said.
Counts-Scoggins doesn’t mind change. She sees it as progress. “It has enhanced the neighborhood from what it was,” she said. And she -- and Hefner -- told Stoogenke the same thing: they just want to make sure we preserve the history of these streets and others like them across Charlotte.
“This neighborhood has rich history,” Counts-Scoggins said. “Rather than changing the history, embrace the history and add to it.”
There are resources if you feel you’re being priced out of your neighborhood:
1. You can get help paying property taxes. It’s called the “HOMES” Program.
2. You may qualify for certain tax exemptions as well.
Questions: call 3-1-1.
(VIDEO: Residents want neighborhood to be a historic district to fight gentrification)
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