When I say character, it means making it more unaffordable, a city I grew up in that I don’t recognize, that I can’t afford to live in, that my kids can’t afford to live in, that my business can’t sustain because we have no parking. That’s what I’m talking about. So, when I talk about character, it’s about the loss of character. It’s about me seeing the elderly people leave this town in droves because they can’t afford a cup of coffee down the street because we’re building development that down below has to sustain a coffee place that sells lattes for $12. It’s about my kids not being able to live here like I was. It’s about brown and black people being displaced even today.

Read More: https://smmirror.com/2025/08/sm-a-r-t-column-the-rhetoric-of-municipal-control/