By Mike Templeton

The Greater Cincinnati Homeless Coalition, a community partner of the Urban Appalachian Community Coalition, provides material assistance to people in Cincinnati struggling with homelessness. They are also a crucial voice of advocacy on behalf of all people who are living with or are at risk for homelessness. Former Homeless Coalition Director of Education Mark Mussman worked directly with our predecessor, the Urban Appalachian Council before he took on his role with the Homeless Coalition. “I worked with UAC… through AmeriCorps, at the Northside Community School as a GED tutor,” he explained. Mussman has also been a long-time friend of UACC, and has taken part in many of our events. Mussman has a new book out, Steal the Street: The Intersection of Homelessness and Gentrification, that collects the many articles he wrote for Street Vibes, the publication of the Cincinnati Homeless Coalition.

Mark Mussman’s book begins with a detailed history of Over-the-Rhine that reaches far back to its pre-history to provide an overview of the indigenous populations that lived in the region before the influx of Europeans who came to build what we now know as Cincinnati and Over-the-Rhine. This is the kind of care Mussman takes throughout the book as his focus turns to the issues of social justice and those people who have been on the downside of economic privilege and power. He follows the paths of a great many groups that worked in Over-the-Rhine, taking care to cover all of them and even recounts the time when “Over-the-Rhine still had the Urban Appalachian Council headquarters on Walnut Street, which was the first stop for many migrating families out of eastern Kentucky, West Virginia, and Tennessee” (7). This section operates as a springboard for the social and economic changes that would affect Over-the-Rhine and Cincinnati more generally over many decades.

This first chapter is a build-up that provides a broad historical context for the many issues he takes on in the book. Homelessness is the obvious beginning for his work, but he never loses sight of the forces that drive homelessness. The racism, economic predatory practices of city leaders and their financial benefactors, and the contemporary problems of gentrification are all threaded throughout the book. Mussman has a particular sensitivity to language which is evident as he begins his criticism of gentrification with the use of the term “OTR.” In the essay titled “What’s in a Name? 06/02/2017,” Mussman reveals how this abbreviation has served the gentrifiers as it helps re-brand the neighborhood as a new and exciting playground for wealthy people and obscures the name “Over-the-Rhine” along with the thousands of low-income Black people who live in the neighborhood. Even what appears to be a simple abbreviation or other label, as Mussman reveals, is a feature of the ways powerful interests colonize our city and our streets. He writes, “3CDC began its takeover of the properties in Over-the-Rhine, they began by renaming Vine and 12th Streets ‘The Gateway Corridor,’ a moniker meant to convey entry into the new and improved neighborhood but has come to stand as the barrier to what amounts to the gated community that is “’OTR” (30).

Mussman’s sensitivity to language is also at work in his chapter that deals the events that came in the aftermath of the police killing of Timothy Thomas. Mussman shows how wealthy powerful white people were keen to label these events as a “race riot” when there is another term Mussman insists is far more appropriate: “Race Riots have always been when white people destroy and kill people in Black neighborhoods. Calling the Rebellion in 2001 a “Race Riot” is entirely racist. Calling it a Civil Unrest is slightly better, but we know “Rebellion” is accurate because the DOJ [Department of Justice] showed unequivocally that the Cincinnati Police Department was operating unjustly, and rebellions are fights against injustice” (9).

Mussman is not asking anyone to get on board with a political agenda. His purpose as an advocate for the homeless has been for the humane treatment of people who are suffering, and this same purpose is on evidence here. He is never on a soapbox as he insists that language is always aligned with political interests, and this same purpose is at work here as he reveals the political interests that are invested in the ways local crises have been described in the media.

In the chapters that treat gentrification directly Mussman explains the multi-pronged strategies that lead to and propel current forms of economic and racial injustice, along with the simultaneous displacement of low-income residents that comes with it. Again, his approach to these issues is detailed and nuanced, but he explains all of this in ways that are accessible and readable. His goal is clearly to reach a general audience and not a specialized readership. Mussman shows us that even things which appear to be done with the best of intentions, like cleaning up the neighborhood, end up becoming profoundly destructive as people are displaced from their homes due to rising rents, eviction notices, or the overall loss of housing and small businesses, people are forced to move from their homes under the guise of ‘cleaning up the neighborhood” (47).

Mussman never loses contact with the work that led him to write these essays. He spent years working as an advocate on behalf of homeless people, and the book remains focused on this problem. From the displacement of the indigenous people at the beginnings of the city, through the wholesale destruction of neighborhoods such as Kenyon-Barr from which thousands of Black Cincinnati citizens were displaced overnight, to our present issues of gentrification and displacement, the issue of homelessness pervades and remains ever-present. Work with and on behalf of homeless people is not an issue of preserving our neighborhoods or finding the balance between “progress,” whatever that means, and maintaining life as it is, the issue of homelessness and protecting lower income people is a matter of basic humanity. We look after people who are struggling because they are human and deserve not only to live, but to have a chance at living on their own terms. In the chapter on “Gentrification and Homelessness,” Mussman talks about the profound difficulty of living outside on the street. He explains: “It’s important to realize just how vulnerable people are when they are sleeping outside – not only to the weather, but also to people who look to hurt them. Violence towards people experiencing homelessness has happened here recently, but hopefully our educational program helps to stop it in the future” (138). This is just one of many issues Mussman walks the reader through in order to provide a detailed understanding of the profound challenges homeless people face in simply living from day to day.

Steal the Street is an important book for anyone interested in issues of homelessness, economic and racial justice, or social justice more generally. The book stands up as a touchstone for scholars and as a stunning portrait of contemporary urban life in American for the general reader. Mussman covers a lot of territory in this book, but the form of the short essay as it appeared in Street Vibes allows him to build in increments that never overwhelm by overloading the reader. If the book becomes overwhelming it is due to the forms of racial, economic, and social injustice that keeps people economically disadvantaged while compounding their suffering in the service of making the privileged more comfortable and richer. To that end, Steal the Street is truly disturbing primarily to those who need to be disturbed.  

Homelessness can affect anyone. However, the kinds of racial, social, and economic forces that drive homelessness have always been tied to racial and social injustice in general. The Greater Cincinnati Homeless Coalition has long advocated on behalf of homeless people in our area, and they are in the street providing help to people who do not have homes. The Urban Appalachian Community Coalition is a community ally of the Homeless Coalition and some of our work regularly crosses paths. Former Homeless Coalition Education Director Mark Mussman has worked in both camps. His new book, Steal the Street: the Intersection of Homelessness and Gentrification, is a powerful window into some of the most pressing issues in Cincinnati. Gentrification and homelessness are tied in with virtually everything that unfolds in our city. Mussman’s book makes this clear. This book is required reading for anyone who has an interest in how economic, racial, and social justice works in contemporary life.

Steal the Street: the Intersection of Homelessness and Gentrification is published by Parlor Press and is available on their website: https://parlorpress.com/.

Michael Templeton is a writer, and independent scholar. He is the author of The Chief of Birds: A Memoir published with Erratum Press and Impossible to Believe, from Iff Books. He is also the author of Collected Apoems, forthcoming from LJMcD Communications and the awaiting of awaiting: a novella, with Nut Hole Publishing. Check out his profile in UACC’s Cultural Directory. He has published numerous articles and essays on contemporary culture and works of creative non-fiction as well as experimental works and poetry. He lives in West Milton, Ohio with his wife who is an artist.