Locals Respond to Spike Lee’s Words on Gentrification in Fort Greene

A week after Spike Lee sounded off on gentrification in Fort Greene, locals have mixed reactions to his remarks.

At a Feb 25. appearance at the Pratt Institute, Lee said that newcomers had disrupted the culture of the neighborhood, adding that schools and public services have only improved after increasing numbers of white residents moved to Fort Greene. His full speech can be heard on Soundcloud.

“It’s the people with money that change things, it’s not necessarily white people or black people,” Chris Whitehead, 48, who had passed by the Spike Lee’s former home, where his father still lives, to check out recent vandalism left after Lee’s speech.

On Friday, vandals attacked the Lee residence and spray painted the words “Do the Right Thing” on the facade and on a neighboring brownstone.

Whitehead said she has lived in Fort Greene since 1996.

“I’m glad I came here before it changed, I couldn’t afford it anymore,” Whitehead said. “The bodegas with the bullet proof glass, they’re disappearing … The houses are definitely being renovated and the prices are are going way up.”

Whitehead said that the biggest change she had seen is in Fort Greene Park.

“I have friends who lived here in the ’80s and ’90s,” she said. “They never talked about the park with anything less than fear.”

Local resident David Richards, 60, said that he thought Lee was correct about gentrification in the neighborhood.

“He’s accurate, I guess, but his delivery was a little rough,” said Richards, who has lived in Fort Greene for 20 years. “

Scott Alexander, 43, has lived in the neighborhood for ten years. While he agreed it’s become more expensive to live in Fort Greene and the area has become safer, he added that changes are happening all over New York City.

“I don’t know that this is different from other neighborhoods in the city.”