AFTER SIXTY YEARS OF MODEL CITIES AND THE GREAT SOCIETY.

A holiday honoring a prominent civil rights leader ought be occasion for taking stock of the reforms his movement called for.  Let's visit the North Milwaukee neighborhood.

It is deeply troubling that the only Black-owned grocery store on Milwaukee’s north side is now at risk of closing, just six months after Pick ’n Save shut its doors. Now residents are facing yet another blow: Aldi has announced the closure of its northwest side location, giving the community just a two-day notice. This is not an anomaly. It is a pattern.

Each closure widens the food access gap and deepens food apartheid across our city. When corporations exit neighborhoods like ours, they do so quickly and quietly, protecting their bottom lines, not community stability. Short notice is not accidental, it is strategic. It limits public response, avoids accountability, and leaves residents scrambling to meet basic needs.

The authors, urban lobbyists Melody McCurtis and Nateya Taylor, use language deeply troubling to Tyler "Zero Hedge" Durden.  "This go-round, the media is replacing their loaded 'food desert' term with 'food apartheid'. Because, hey, when there isn't a World War II or full blown civil rights style crisis on the media's hands to all them to argue their ideologies...why not just invent one?"  In his view, "Grocery stores operate on thin margins and avoid areas where safety is a liability."

None of Sherman Park Grocery or Pick 'n Save or Aldi, nor Wal-Mart a few years back, invoked inventory shrinkage as reason for closing, relying solely on corporate-speak about "underperforming locations."   Some years ago, Marginal Revolution's Alex Tabarrok linked to "The Geography of Poverty and Nutrition: Food Deserts and Food Choices Across the United States," a paper that questions the concept of a food desert (let alone food apartheid).

This is a good paper with a credible research design and impressive data from some 35,000 supermarkets covering 40% of the United States. Moreover, because of the widespread attention given to “food deserts” this paper probably had to be written. But color me un-surprised. The results are obvious.

Indeed, I feel that in recent years I am reading a lot of papers that aim massive firepower on weak hypotheses. As an explanation for obesity and poor eating habits, the idea of “food deserts” was absurd. The reasons are manifold. Even in food deserts it’s actually not that difficult to get healthy food and, contrary to popular belief, healthy food is not especially expensive. Try an Asian supermarket for plenty of cheap produce. Indeed, in any part of the United States you can find plenty of poor-people eating healthy foods and plenty of rich people eating unhealthy foods.

The food deserts idea was especially implausible for America because Americans spend less of their income on food consumed at home (6%) than any other nation. The Dutch, for example, spend (12%) of their income on food, the Italians and Japanese (14%), the Vietnamese (35%). There is plenty of room in the American food budget for healthy eating. Finally, Allcott, Diamond, and Dubé show that relative to unhealthy food, healthy food is actually a bit cheaper in low-income areas.

More importantly, just open your eyes. Walk into a fast food joint in a food desert and ask yourself, do the customers really want brussel sprouts but are reluctantly settling for Chips Ahoy? The idea is ridiculous and not a bit insulting in denying agency to the people who live in low-income areas. If what people living in food deserts wanted was brussel sprouts, they would get them.

The Whole Foods class think their kale and kombucha are so obviously superior to what the poor eat that the only possible explanation for poor eating is that poor people are denied choice. Yet put an inexpensive but colorful produce stand next to a McDonald’s and you can be sure that the customers will differ by class. Why the poor choose to eat differently than the rich is an interesting and important question but one more amenable to answers focusing on culture, education and history than price and income. The idea applies widely.

That dig at the "Whole Foods class" doesn't properly address the political economy of so-called food deserts, which is about having full-service groceries within walking distance of poor people.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) defines a food desert as a community where there is at least a 20% poverty rate and 33% of the residents of the community live more than 1 mile from the nearest grocery store in urban areas or 10 miles from the nearest grocery store in rural areas. Food deserts are roughly four times more likely in cities than in areas with lesser population density.

Instead of traditional grocery stores and supermarkets, the grocery needs of food desert residents are generally served by dollar and convenience stores. These outlets have limited shelf space, and their emphasis on highly processed foods with elevated sugar and sodium levels eliminates customers’ ability to opt for the fresh, healthy foods they may prefer.

Obtaining food in a food desert can be difficult. Getting high-quality food is even more challenging.

Cities might have proper grocery stores located along transit routes, mooting that "more than one mile" criterion.  But getting the food the policy advocates want into the deserts is all about tapping that public money.

Reducing or eliminating food deserts requires community action, government intervention, and the support of charitable organizations devoted to the cause.

Neighborhoods could establish and support community gardens and farmers’ markets to provide fresh produce. Creating this type of access unifies communities and empowers food desert inhabitants to take ownership in overcoming their challenges.

Governments can do their part by enacting policies that make opening locations in food deserts attractive to traditional grocery stores and supermarket chains. Opportunities include relaxing zoning regulations or providing subsidies and tax breaks for companies to operate in areas where they are so desperately needed.

Organizations like Feeding Northeast Florida are positioned to have the most immediate impact in combating food deserts. Our network of food pantries provides access to free, fresh, healthy food throughout the community, specifically in areas with limited options. We distributed over 30 million pounds of food last year, and due to rising food prices, we expect the need for food to grow.

That's what Mmes McCurtis and Taylor seek.

Across Milwaukee’s north side, there are abandoned and city-foreclosed buildings and lots along corridors and main streets, spaces with visibility, foot traffic, and street parking. Instead of allowing this land and empty buildings to be transferred to corporations that extract profit and eventually leave, leaving behind only memories of once-vibrant spaces, this land must be turned over to the community, with resources and support. When residents steward and cultivate land themselves, they create long-term care, stability, and accountability that corporate ownership has never provided.

And don't you dare suggest that those companies are leaving neighborhoods that are untenable.

This experience is mirrored at grocery stores still operating on Milwaukee’s northwest side: low quality food options and grocery shoppers being criminalized and met with aggression the moment they step in the door. Thus, eliminating food apartheid is much more than opening a grocery store. We need and deserve more than that.

Here's what "deserve" looks like.

Food access cannot be separated from land access. Without community control of land and buildings, neighborhoods remain vulnerable to sudden closures, speculation, and displacement. Community ownership ensures that essential resources are protected for the long haul, not treated as disposable assets.

Imagine if Metcalfe Park were known for walkable bakeries, butcher shops and quality meats. Imagine if Sherman Park were known for fresh fruit markets. Imagine if the northwest side were home to farmer- and maker-led markets, and Washington Park became a hub for vegetables and pantry staples. Each site would not have to do everything. Instead, they could specialize, collaborate, buy in bulk, store and support one another, strengthening the local food ecosystem rather than competing for survival.  Large-scale grocery stores still matter, but grocery store redlining is real. We need large and small grocery stores. We also need a network of smaller, community-owned markets to make larger chains redundant, while making local markets resilient and improve neighborhood access.

A scattered-site approach helps eliminate food waste by shortening supply chains and allowing stores to order more precisely. Smaller markets sourcing directly from local farms and producers can move fresher products faster and redistribute surplus across the network rather than discarding it. This strengthens local economies while reducing environmental and economic loss.

Just as important, this approach creates neighborhood stability and jobs. Community or public owned grocery sites generate living-wage employment, training opportunities, and pathways to cooperative ownership. Instead of profits leaving the neighborhood, dollars circulate locally, supporting families, stabilizing blocks, and anchoring commercial corridors.

That sounds a lot like Our President's tariff fetish, better to keep the money and the production in the country or in the neighborhood, which is an incoherent policy.  The residents of Metcalfe Park or Sherman Park might end up paying higher prices to defend their right to those walkable bakeries.  Never mind that the proprietors, such as the grocer who gave up not too long ago, or those community agencies, might lose custom rather than gain it by pricing to cover their costs.  Wishful thinking won't work.  "We need grocery stores that offer fresh food, culturally relevant options, and dignity, not shelves dominated by processed products at inflated prices. We need vacant land and buildings turned over to communities with the same resources often given to larger chains, not speculative developers chasing short-term profit."

It will not end well.  "Democrats make a food desert and call it social justice."