Is Shreveport As Racially Divided Now as in the 1960’s?

All the buzz around town is about Shreveport-Bossier being named the fastest shrinking economy in America since 2011.

Could this be caused by racial divide in Shreveport? Demographer Elliott Stonecipher told Dennis Foley from 710 KEEL that racial divisiveness and that lack of a vibrant community are major reasons for Shreveport’s inability to establish a solidly growing economy.

“Shreveport is racially divided to a degree that maybe it hasn’t been since the ’60s,” Stonecipher explained.  ”Shreveport is now majority African-American.  The African-American political leadership is not looking at that task as a community-wide task.”

Stonecipher adds: “We are finding out that like the old ’30s, ’40s, ’50s white leaders who ignored the African-American community, African-American political leaders ignore the white community.”  Stonecipher continued, “All we’ve done is switched the players from one side to the other and net-net you still don’t get the community-wide response to anything.”