Chapter 5: Park Hill, Denver

Katherine Woods

Greater Park Hill Community, Inc.

Greater Park Hill is a uniquely integrated neighborhood in Denver, Colorado. Although the proportion of White residents in the city declined from 66.7 percent to 61.4 percent between 1980 and 1990, Park Hill's White population remained stable at about 36 percent. By 1980, under the assumption that Park Hill had already passed a racial tipping point, many urban researchers predicted imminent resegregation. This has not occurred. In fact, one developing trend finds more White Anglos and White Hispanics moving into predominantly African-American neighborhoods.

Park Hill remains largely a residential neighborhood of single-family houses. Its rate of 72 percent owner-occupied housing units is significantly higher than the citywide average of 51 percent. However, parts of the community are experiencing greater poverty, while other areas are home to a wealthier population than in the past. Neighborhood leaders continue to address the many difficulties of successful integration, but in recent years economic disparity and class differences, as well as increasing housing costs, have compounded the challenge.

Park Hill's popularity as a residential neighborhood is, in part, derived from its convenient location in the metropolitan area. It sits 3 miles from Denver's central business district (a 10- to 15-minute drive) and it is served by several bus routes. It also sits just south of the Interstate 70 industrial corridor, which links downtown to the new airport and points east. Until the spring of 1995, when the new Denver International Airport opened, Stapleton International Airport, immediately adjacent to the eastern part of Park Hill, was Denver's main airport. The closure of Stapleton has considerably reduced noise pollution in the neighborhood.

There are several small commercial clusters in Park Hill. These typically include neighborhood grocery stores, liquor stores, bakeries, and barbershops. There are several major cultural and recreational amenities on the western border of Park Hill, including City Park, City Park Golf Course, the Denver Museum of Natural History, and the Denver Zoo. Another golf course is immediately north of Park Hill. The University of Denver's School of Law is also located in East Park Hill. In the northern part of Park Hill, two major city recreation centers with parks and indoor pools provide programs for adults and youth.

Recent community investments by the city include a totally rebuilt and enlarged neighborhood health center, a new neighborhood library in the northern part of Park Hill, and the remodeling of the old library in South Park Hill. These improvements were the results of neighborhood lobbying.

: A Journal of Policy Development and Research • Volume 4,

of Housing and Urban Development Office of Policy Development

However, not all segments of Park Hill have benefited equally from its location. Recent demographic trends show several disparities. When compared with the city of Denver as a whole, Greater Park Hill appears a successful, stable, integrated community. Although this study fundamentally affirms that judgment, it also examines several of the problems facing the community today.

Community Demographics

City demographers pair Park Hill's six main census tracts into three tiers of two, from north to south (see exhibit 1). (An additional partial census tract in the southeast corner of Park Hill was not included in this study.) As with the city as a whole, the overall population of Park Hill has declined. As shown in exhibit 2, both non-Hispanic White and nonHispanic African-American populations declined from 1980 to 1990 (12.7 percent and 18.1 percent, respectively), while there was a slight increase (1.7 percent) among Park Hill's small Hispanic population. Overall, the community's racial and ethnic mixture has remained steady.

The northernmost tier (census tracts 41.01 and 41.02, north of Martin Luther King Boulevard) reflects the highest concentration of African-Americans (91 percent), the lowest income levels (1989 median household incomes of $15,492 and $23,683), the highest concentration of renters, and one of the highest concentrations of publicly assisted housing units in Denver "with an overall poverty rate of 26.6%, and a child poverty rate of 41.6%." (Piton Foundation, 1994). In contrast, the median incomes of Park Hill's other census tracts (41.03, 41.04, 42.01, and 42.02) were $27,113, $36,169, $42,266, and $43,866, respectively. The middle pair of census tracts (south of Martin Luther King

Source: 1980 and 1990 U.S. Bureau of the Census (census tracts 41.01, 41.02, 41.03, 41.04, 42.01, and 42.02)

Boulevard to 23rd Avenue) is the most integrated, with 22.4 percent White, 71.8 percent non-Hispanic Black, and 4.3 percent Hispanic (Piton Foundation, 1994). The rates of homeownership are 86 percent and 77 percent in these two census tracts (41.03 and 41.04). The poverty rate in the middle census tracts is 13.6 percent (1990 U.S. Bureau of the Census). The final pair of census tracts (south of 23rd Avenue and north of Colfax Avenue) is 75.3 percent White, 16.9 percent Black, and 4.7 percent Hispanic. The average rate of homeownership is 75.2 percent. The income levels are highest in this area of Park Hill: The incomes in 42.8 percent of these households are double Denver's median household income (Denver's median household income in 1989 was $25,106; Piton Foundation, 1994). The 1989 poverty rate in the two southernmost census tracts was 5.4 percent. There is economic diversity in the Greater Park Hill neighborhood as a whole when compared with the rest of the city, but within the neighborhood, there are three tiers of economic stratification, closely following the lines of racial diversity (see exhibits 3, 4, and 5). In 1980 Greater Park Hill was composed of 22 percent lower income households, 62 percent middle-income households, and 17 percent upper income households. By 1990 the composition of Greater Park Hill had shifted to 25 percent lower income households, 48 percent middle-income households, and 28 percent upper income households. Essentially, the neighborhood's lower and upper income groups increased at the expense of the middle-income group, with the upper income group increasing at a greater rate than the lower income group.'

Exhibit 3

Economic Stratification in Park Hill, 1980 to 1990*

Population

Northeast Park Hill North Park Hill
South Park Hill
Population Percentage Population Percentage Population Percentage
of Total

of Total

of Total

* Census tracts included are: Northeast Park Hill, 41.01 and 41.02; North Park Hill, 41.03 and 41.04; and South Park Hill, 42.01 and 42.02.

Source: 1980 and 1990 U.S. Bureau of the Census

In the past, this economic diversity (of lesser extremes) has been considered by many residents to be a positive feature of the community. The largest community organization, Greater Park Hill Community (GPHC), Inc., has drawn on the resources of more affluent families to meet the needs of lower income residents through an emergency food shelf, summer youth programs, and so forth. However, the growth of economic disparity is particularly problematic in this community because it compounds the difficulty of maintaining racial integration.

Racial, Ethnic, and Class Relations

Understanding Park Hill today requires some knowledge of its past. Throughout the early 1950s, Denver's African-American community was centered in the Five Points Community, 2.5 miles west of Park Hill. This neighborhood, just north of the central business district and adjacent to several railroad yards and facilities, was home to many middleclass Blacks, including railroad porters and doctors, lawyers, and other professionals. However, as in many other northern and western cities, there was a large in-migration of Blacks from the South following World War II.