I’m a young, Black Kansas Citian planning to move – KC, why should I stay?

I’ve been looking at apartments in Atlanta since I was 13 years old. Yes – I was looking before I was old enough to pay rent. I was sure there was a future for me down south.

That feeling only increased when I visited Atlanta twice during my senior year of high school. There, I experienced a sense of belonging and comfort that I had struggled to create for myself in Kansas City. I felt like Atlanta was already my city.

I ultimately remained in Missouri for college, attending Washington University in St. Louis. I feel at home on the campus, and my time spent in the city has been mainly enjoyable. However, as my final years of college approach, one question looms larger and larger: Do I return to Kansas City, or head off to Atlanta?

That question has always felt easy to answer. Atlanta is a hub of Black history, culture, and opportunity – a vital fact for me as a Black woman majoring in African and African-American Studies. There are networks of young Black people, especially Black women, doing the things I want to do: writing fiction, engaging in the arts scene, working at predominantly Black nonprofits, founding organizations for Black girls, supporting a wide variety of Black-owned businesses, and attending predominantly Black colleges.

I don’t hear about those opportunities very often in Kansas City.

I’m not the only one. In a Black youth panel conducted by the Kansas City Chamber of Commerce, other Black students expressed that they also have to look elsewhere – in places like Chicago or New Mexico – to find opportunities built for them.

When I spoke with Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas in January about my plans to move, he told me we could “build an Atlanta here.” I smiled at his enthusiasm to convince me to stay but found I couldn’t match his confidence.

I don’t necessarily need a replica of Atlanta to be built here, but I’ve lived in Kansas City all my life (admittedly, only 20 years). While there certainly has been some change in KC during that time, its pace is usually slow – and the change isn’t always for the better. Economic development in the city often equates to gentrification and uprooting the low-income and Black inner-city populations.

If I’m going to consider Kansas City my long-term home in the future, there are several changes that would have to occur first. Here are three broad ones that come to mind.

Invest in Black youth

Academic, professional, and personal development programs are vital to the success of Kansas City’s Black youth. I was blessed to have the experience of being a member of Awesome Ambitions, a career- and college-readiness program founded by Cynthia Newsome for girls in grades 8-12. The program is open to all, and during my two years as an Awesome Girl the participants were predominantly Black, Latina, mixed-race, and low-income.

Awesome Ambitions was the key to my high school success. Throughout my junior and senior years, I held leadership positions from designated blogger to Junior Advisory Board President and grew as a public speaker and collaborator with other girls like me. I practiced coming up with, and pitching, a business with a group of other girls, formulated a personal elevator pitch with the help of reporters at 41 Action News, and met several Kansas City-area women of color who mentored me through the college application process.

Kansas City needs more of these programs made by and for underrepresented and historically under-resourced youth, but it also needs to support programs that already exist.

Membership in Awesome Ambitions and most of the experiences it provides – from college campus visits to introductions to Black businesses owners like Chris Goode, founder of Ruby Jean’s Juicery – are free or offered at significantly reduced costs for all girls involved. But Awesome Ambitions needs funding in order to provide these experiences to girls. And the organization severely lacks it.

Programs like Awesome Ambitions, which encourage economic and social mobility, prepare young people for college and careers, and create rich networking opportunities, should be heavily funded.

But it isn’t.

Sure, every city has a different fight to wage for equity, but programming for young Black people in Kansas City is so underfunded, overlooked, and unconsidered that it becomes an exhausting and frankly fruitless fight. If Kansas City prioritized programs which explicitly supported Black youth – beginning with increased funding, but also publicity, visibility, and community support – the battle for equity would feel a lot less defeating.

Make space for the city’s Black population

I once stood inside the One Light Luxury Apartments in downtown Kansas City. I was attending a reception with Sisters’ Circle of Greater Kansas City, an organization which had awarded a large grant to Awesome Ambitions. I spoke as the newly selected Junior Advisory Board President. I remember walking into that building with front-desk security who closely scrutinized and sharply questioned me and the two Black women who walked in with me. I remember riding up the glistening elevator, and walking awkwardly around the immaculate, modern top-floor club room. I remember white tenants walking along the perimeter of the room, making their way to the rooftop pool and giving confused, annoyed looks at the sofas packed with well-clad Black women.

I remember thinking, as soon as I stepped into that place: I do not belong here.

As the Three Light apartments are constructed, and plans for Four, Five, and Six Light apartments are underway, I wonder if young Black people in Kansas City feel the same way as I do. That they don’t belong. Not only in those buildings, but in that area, in the Power & Light District. Outside of the abovementioned occasion, I’ve only ever driven through “P&L;” it’s never been a destination for me. And it feels like it never will be. It isn’t meant for me.

“Urban development” in Kansas City often means creating clean, new, modern, safe living and social spaces for decidedly white, middle- to upper-income populations. Kansas City needs to create inclusive housing where Black and low-income people can feel safe and welcome. Stop the gentrification of neighborhoods near Troost and develop the neighborhood for those that already live there: keep it affordable, remodel what’s there, and bring in businesses that the current residents need and want.

I am not interested in remaining in a city that is not made for me. I want to live in a city that values its Black population.

Give Black communities the resources to lead

I visited Nile Valley Aquaponics with a group of fellow Black homeschool families in 2017. I remember the barn with a large Black power fist painted on it; wandering chickens and produce growing outside and greenery and tanks filled with tilapia inside. I watched my brother chase chickens with the other young kids and tried to grapple with the fact that I was standing in the middle of a nonprofit community garden and urban farm at 29th and Wabash.

The founder explained that Nile Valley’s products are sold to local restaurants, giving the community a place in Kansas City’s economic cycle. The farm also supplies fresh fruits and vegetables to the neighborhood, combating the food desert currently plaguing communities east of Troost. I had never imagined Black empowerment looking like a nonprofit urban farm but visiting Nile Valley changed the way I imagined how inner-city Black folks could attain a place in the economic cycle.

We need more initiatives like this. Rather than external entities coming into Black inner-city neighborhoods and trying to tell residents what they need, or even disrupting these communities altogether, we need Kansas City to empower its low-income communities directly: listen to what developments Black folks in the city want (or are already working on) and then support and/or implement those developments. These efforts require funding and, in some cases, volunteer support. Kansas City needs to provide more resources directly to low-income people to create true economic mobility.

I, and other young Black people, need to feel that Kansas City is for us. I know that right now, many folks are looking to young people, the up-and-coming generation, as the change-makers. Many young people are working for change right now, but we need to know we’re not alone in the fight. And truly, it’s unjust for the burden of change to fall on Black youth when inequity is consistently maintained by those with power and privilege.

The folks who are already in power have the responsibility to fight for us: folks on city councils, in foundation boardrooms, in voting booths, on school boards, in recruiting offices. Otherwise, my young, diverse generation will take our talent, leadership, and drive to create equitable, anti-racist communities elsewhere.

So, Kansas City, I’ve asked my question – why should I stay? Now, how will your actions answer?

Uncommon Voices columns bring new perspectives and opinions on topics related to the Kauffman Foundation’s work. If you have an idea for a column, please read the guidelines for contributors.