To the Editor:
People love to complain that Republicans use racist dog whistles. Last week town Council member Leighton Newlin unleased a marching band of dog whistlers to call anyone who doesn’t want a too-big, out-of-scale, historic-neighborhood-destroying apartment complex a racist [“‘Defending’ Historic Princeton? From Whom, And From What?,” Mailbox, June 11].
Bad enough to smear your neighbors, but do you know what’s worse? Not having your facts right. I went back and looked at the Census data from 2000. Do you know what percentage of Black Princetonians was 25 years ago? About 6 percent.
What is it today? Nearly 7 percent. So the Black population isn’t shrinking. Sorry Mr. Newlin.
You know what else he got wrong? The town is actually more diverse today than it was 25 years ago. Maybe Mr. Newlin’s worried that the white population fell from 80 percent to 62 percent, but I doubt it.
In 25 years, not only has the Black population increased, the Hispanic population has increased and the Asian population has almost doubled. Mixed race residents increased by 200 percent.
An inconvenient truth: Princeton is the most diverse today than it ever been.
Go back 50 years and Mr. Newlin’s claims look even sillier. Whites were 90 percent of 1975 Princeton. Black Princetonians, 5 percent, Asians 3 percent, and Hispanics less than one percent. See a trend?
Do you know when the Black population was 20 percent? Never.
The Black population in Princeton peak was about 12 percent in the 40s and 50s. Not my facts, but the Census’ facts. It seems Mr. Newlin was pulling a Trump with “alternative facts.”
Playing the race card is despicable. The project should be considered on its merits. Subtract the racist dog whistles and we are let with no compelling reason for this project and many compelling reasons to consign it to the dust bin of history. I thought those of us who live here in the Athens of New Jersey were better than that. I guess not.
Residents wanting to Defend Princeton against a cultural atrocity isn’t racist. It’s a rational response to an arrogant Council that seems to want to turn a historic farming village into Queens, New York, all to satisfy some liberal fever dream.
Real affordable housing? I lived in what my parents referred to as North Hall on the site of this planned monstrosity, then married students housing at the Seminary. I played on the lawn that was torn up to make way for apartments we don’t need to house people who aren’t poor by any stretch of the imagination. Want to find really poor people living in affordable housing? Talk to a divinity student with a wife and kid, circa 1959.
Mr. Newlin, apologize. Town Council, try defending Princeton instead of ruining it.