Photo by Tom Jenz
East Side Hour Near Lake Michigan
One Saturday morning a while ago, I decided to explore two Milwaukee neighborhoods on foot, starting in Whitefish Bay, the charming village that borders Lake Michigan. The streets here seem pulled from a postcard, older homes with painted porches and trimmed lawns framed by carefully attended shrubbery. Particolored flowers bloomed beautifully as if witnesses to the neighborhood's tranquility. Lounge chairs rested quietly on porches, though unoccupied. In driveways or along curbs, polished late-model cars and SUVs sat napping. The absence of children on the sidewalks felt odd, and I only glimpsed them in backyards. Noise, beyond the occasional passing car, was slim to none. Black Lives Matter signs were absent, George Floyd having faded away.
Over 85% of Whitefish Bay’s residents are white, most upper middle class. I ran into various residents walking dogs, and I posed the same question, “How do you like living in Whitefish Bay?” The answers were similar, versions of “I really like it here,” emphasizing quiet and safety. I can see why they would like it here. The area offers a smorgasbord of amenities including the vast upscale Bayshore Mall, scenic Lake Drive and Klode Park’s Lake Michigan beachfront.
In Whitefish Bay, most people earn their livings in professional jobs, including management, healthcare, sales, business and the law. According to village data for 2024, the average annual household income in Whitefish Bay is $208,063. According to Redfin, the average cost for a house was $531,000 in December of 2024. Most residents own homes.
Fifteen minutes later, I was walking streets in the heart of the predominantly Black inner city. Sidewalks were cracked and uneven, curbs broken, and alleys pockmarked with debris. Once the pride of European immigrant families from past generations, Colonial Revival houses showed their age, with peeling paint, sagging siding, and sway back porches. Some homes were carefully maintained, others abandoned, standing as reminders of what history can do when a city turns its back. Here and there were makeshift memorials for the deceased victims of gun violence or car crashes - stuffed animals, framed photos, candles, and personal memorabilia.
Yet here, the atmosphere showed energy. Families sat on porch chairs and front steps, watching the world pass by. When I waved, they waved back. Children played on the sidewalks, their noise cutting through the clamor of porch conversations. On a few porches, teenagers exchanged secrets. Bursts of laughter echoed from one side of the street to the other. Cars sped by, some with wounded mufflers, their engines belching. Speed bumps did little to curb the din, as vehicles clattered over the humps. Groaning buses and police sirens added to the soundtrack of the neighborhood. Churches dotted certain corners, mostly Baptist, their steeples reaching skyward as if seeking peace for the community below.
Comparing Cultures
It was impossible not to notice the stark contrasts between these two neighborhoods. In Whitefish Bay, silence and solitude seemed to be the norm, the absence of visible human life almost unnerving. Here in the inner city, life poured out into every corner, scored with rap slang, vibrant yet chaotic. But as I moved along, I couldn’t help but think about what these differences meant for the people who lived here. A resident told me, “There’s hardly a day go by I don’t hear gunshots or big ol arguments. Then, there’s reckless drivers, you see that all over the hood.” He left me with, “Peace out, Brotha.”
What does it mean to grow up white versus Black in Milwaukee? The carefully curated ideal of safety, satisfaction and hope I’d seen earlier in Whitefish Bay felt like an unattainable dream here where the high school graduation rate is 60%, where this community might be classified as a food desert, healthy food choices miles away, where the poverty rate is nearly 32%. Walmart and Target are out of range. In the city, there are 3,000 city owned vacant lots and 100s of vacant houses. Most show their seclusion in the central city.
Experiencing these opposite street cultures, I could not shake the question: How do we make sense of a city so divided, where one neighborhood fills its lungs while another struggles to breathe?
Black Citizens Speak
Photo by Tom Jenz
Block Party in Milwaukee
I thought back to what Milwaukee Black activist Tracey Dent told me a while ago. “Basically, I believe we humans are all the same. We all want to live a comfortable life. We all bleed the same. We all die the same. I think it’s the fear of the unknown that fuels hatred between the races. We don’t understand each other’s culture.” Dent had formed the Coalition Against Hate to change the mindset of people when it comes to pre-judgements.
Then, there is Shantel Carson, long time inner city-resident. Tragically, violence has touched her own extended family. In the last several years, Carson has lost five close relatives to murder in four separate instances. She recalls her 1970s neighborhood as a village, neighbors taking care of each other, looking out for the children. “Everybody was my mother on 12th and Burleigh,” she said. “Seven of us in my family, and I’m the youngest.
I asked the Milwaukee Police Chief Jeffrey Norman, who is African American, “What’s the number one challenge of the police department?” He answered, “Is it violence, is it reckless driving? No, it’s trust. Trust is the biggest challenge for the MPD.” He was referring to getting inner city residents to trust the police. My thoughts wandered into the zone of getting whites and Blacks to trust each other.
Award-winning Black activist Vaun Mayes, now 40, talked to me about his youthful mistakes. “I had no sense of direction,” he said, “I was stealing cars and involved in gang fights. I had abandonment issues. My dad was in prison. My mom had drug issues. Nobody cared about me.”
Ed Hennings has a story, and it’s a hell of a story. Once the head of a Black gang, he spent 20 years in prison for murder and was released in 2016. Since then, he has turned his life around as a business owner and motivational speaker. He recently wrote, ‘The Ghetto/Hood/Poverty has produced not only the things that normally we associate it with, crime, violence, pain, and anger, but we often don’t give the ghetto credit for producing the music, fashion, food, scholars, and great athletes.’
WTMJ TV Black news reporter Gideon Verdin Williams lives in the inner city. He heads CleanUpMKE, a block-by-block cleanup undertaking by the residents. “We also try to get influential people involved and supportive,” he told me, “entrepreneurs, politicians, activists. It’s a community taking responsibility for itself. Hopefully this could create a culture shift, people taking pride in their community.” I couldn’t help but wonder who cleans up the Whitefish Bay neighborhoods if they need cleaning.
The two most important political leaders in Milwaukee are Black and share similar inner-city upbringings.
Mayor Cavalier Johnson once told me, “I spent my formative years in neighborhoods well known for poverty, violence and incarceration. As a teenager in zip code 53206, I’d walk North Avenue and think this area is dangerous, buildings boarded up, windows busted, and the businesses that are open aren’t run by Black people. As a young Black man, that experience seeps into your psyche.”
County Executive David Crowley started off behind the eight ball. Until the age of 10, he and his brothers were raised in an old house on 23rd and Burleigh. A master electrician, his father had paid the the city a dollar for the house and made repairs. But both his parents struggled from drug addiction and mental health issues. “There were times when we had no lights and gas or even water in the house,” Crowley told me. “Eviction notices became part of our family history.” His family later lived in a house on 22nd and Vine, then another on 24th and Lloyd, then a move to his aunt’s house on 11th and Locust, and finally to 29th and Walnut. But through all this instability, David learned responsibility. Summers, he did full time lawn maintenance. For moral support, young David turned to the streets. “You might say I found love within my community,” he said.
Lifestyle Differences
So what is the ideal family structure? I could argue for the Whitefish Bay model that embraces traditional family values: lifelong monogamous marriage, defined gender roles, extended family support, and prioritizing family responsibilities. Core principles include stressing honesty, fidelity, and faith; fostering the work ethic; respecting parental authority; and incorporating religion into daily life. Traditional values generally oppose divorce, same-sex marriage, and non-marital cohabitation - all threats to the family structure. A feel-good family movie often illustrates this paradigm, a married heterosexual couple, their happy children and a dog living on a suburban cul de sac.
However, the way these values play out differs significantly between racial and socioeconomic groups, especially when comparing traditional white families to urban Black families.
Traditional language to urban language.
History forms cultures. I thought back to my recent visit to America’s Black Holocaust Museum on North Avenue. There, I saw a huge display that divided three time periods in a kind of vast pie chart. SLAVERY 1619 to 1863, JIM CROW 1863 to 1965, CIVIL RIGHTS 1965 to the present. To comprehend the reality that one human group had to spend 250 years as slaves only because of the color of their skin, is appalling, one tribe treating another tribe worse than draft animals.
Family Structure
White families often live the nuclear model, with fathers as breadwinners and mothers handling childcare, even when employed. Children are raised to value independence. Urban Black families, however, often rely on extended family and community networks. Single-parent households, often led by mothers, are more common, with grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles providing support.
Parenting and Cultural Values
Parenting styles also differ. White families often stress organized activities and personal achievement, sometimes leaning into ‘helicopter parenting.’ In contrast, urban Black families emphasize collective responsibility and community ties. Black fathers, whether living with their children or not, are statistically more involved in daily childcare than their white counterparts.
Culturally, white families often follow WASP (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant) values, prioritizing individual success and material achievement, often portrayed as the societal ideal. The Protestant ethic—work hard and you go to heaven. Urban Black families emphasize resilience, mutual support and strong community bonds, shaped by historical and systemic challenges.
Economic Factors
Economic disparities substantially influence family dynamics. White families tend to have higher incomes, investments, more stable housing and better access to education, enabling greater financial security. Urban Black families face systemic challenges like discriminatory housing policies, unequal schooling, and job discrimination, leading to higher unemployment and fewer resources. These barriers contribute to lower rates of homeownership and college education, also higher rates of unemployment. Despite these challenges, urban Black families often develop adaptive strategies like pooling resources within extended family networks.
Societal Perceptions
In the mainstream media, traditional white families are often idealized as symbols of stability. Urban Black families, however, are frequently subject to negative stereotypes and misconceptions. Family structures that deviate from the traditional nuclear model are often pathologized, perpetuating harmful biases and ignoring the systemic inequalities that form racial bias.
The Denouement Has Not Been Resolved
Family life can look different depending on history, society and money. Research from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) shows that the city of Milwaukee has the highest poverty rate in the state, high unemployment for Black men and major education gaps. On top of that, only 25% of Black families own homes, the city having the worst infant mortality rate. Most Black children (73%) grow up in single-parent homes, which is often linked to poverty, school dropouts, and criminal conduct.
Yet all these struggles are not about personal choices or culture. They come from years of discrimination and unfair systems. Can community life in America evolve into compatibility? Milwaukee is a beautiful city and a safe place to live, depending on the color of your skin. Have we not evolved? Or maybe it is not possible for one culture to fully understand another culture.
