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Welcome Residents!
Historically Black Neighborhood (HBN) residents are fighting back to protect their neighbors---not just their neighborhoods! Anyone living with conditions of housing insecurity--whether from rising property taxes or rents--is a tenant. The HBN Assembly is a tenants' movement based in Louisville, Kentucky. We conduct a reoccurring series of meetings and strategy sessions aimed at protecting and stabilizing Black communities against the violence of gentrification. The HBN Assembly is bringing Black Louisvillians together to develop organizing campaigns, policies, and other strategies to combat displacement and dispossession. We center those most vulnerable to gentrification and are actively building freedom colonies in the city of Louisville.
Who are we?
The HBN Assembly is led by current and returning residents of HBN in Louisville, KY. This coalition was founded by the Smoketown Neighborhood Association's Housing & Tenants' Rights Committee in partnership with Books & Breakfast Louisville.
More about our founders: Since the revitalization of the Smoketown Neighborhood Association (SNA) in 2015, SNA has been a fierce advocate for the residents of Smoketown. SNA is made up of a group of current and returning residents who have reclaimed their neighborhood planning process and are building new economies outside of capitalism. They know that there is no better group of people to draft a community protection policy than those who live in that community and are legacies of it. SNA believes that all legacy community members (current and former residents who were displaced due to gentrification and/or gun violence) of historically Black neighborhoods possess a right to remain despite the changes of tomorrow. Furthermore, these founding SNA members profoundly understood that people should always be more important than profit and property.
Today the Assembly is organized by members. We are excited to facilitate this work and introduce the Historically Black Neighborhood Ordinance, which is a living document that is already gathering feedback from community members online. This ordinance is being written in collaboration with the Office of Councilmen Jecorey Arthur and will be presented in a live public on August 21, 2021.
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