“Show me a hero, and I’ll show you a tragedy”
The quote was given above from F. Scott Fitzgerald was the quote that the producers of the HBO hit miniseries “Show me a Hero” drew inspiration for its name from. The ‘hero’ that is portrayed is Nick Wasicsko, the youngest elected mayor of a major city, Yonkers, New York, in U.S. history. The show tells the story of Nick Wasicsko and those who were affected by his tenacious behavior to push through a desegregation order that would have the city of Yonkers build two hundred low-income housing units east of the Saw Mill River Parkway, which acted at the time as the line between east and west Yonkers. This, however, was the ruling handed down by Judge Leonard Sand at the time for the housing units to be built in east Yonkers because that was the white side of the city. The city itself had succeeded in segregating neighborhoods and communities through policy and by initially condensing poverty with a focus of stacking minority groups in the ‘projects’, however, that will be touched on later, for now, we return to the premise of the show.
Nick Wasicsko was a newly elected mayor, who had promised to fight and appeal Judge Sand’s ruling on the matter and take the case to higher courts, before his inauguration as mayor, the cities lawyers called to state that the appeal would lose and would not have any constitutional grounds to use as leverage. Leaving the young new mayor lost before he could even begin. Due to the Judges lack of patience after allowing two whole years before the election of Wasicsko who had been serving on the city council during the wait, warned that if the low income housing act was not agreed upon for its location, distribution of housing units per district, that a fine of 100 dollars a day would be implemented and that every day after, the fine would double. Within 22 days, they found that the cities budget would be completely thrown away due to fines from the ruling. Wasicsko knew that he was not going to be able to fight the issue anymore and that it would be better for the city if the council were to comply with the court order. However due to every city council meeting being filled with shouting, white protestors, yelling at the officials to keep the low income housing ‘folk’ where they belong. They then would shout that they earned their homes and that their property value would plummet due to the drugs and crime that would come with the housing. This made things difficult for the Mayor as his fellow councilmen would see their constituents in front of them, threatening their re-election chances were they to vote in favor of the act. No councilman wanted to flip their original votes which was a 3-5 vote against the passing of the act, or let the housing units get dropped into their districts.
This is the situation that Nick Wasicsko is placed into as Mayor of a city that as far as he can see, is 100% against something he has to make possible. This is the call to action, this is the opportunity to do the right thing for the underprivileged communities of Yonkers. This is the chance to be a hero. During the show however, there are key factors as to how the process of Mayor Wasicsko’s efforts lead to the successful passing of the low income housing act. That’s right, he gets the job done, he does the right thing for the people of Yonkers and desegregates the communities of his city of which elected him to serve in their best interests. The process he goes through actually makes any viewer ask however, is he even a hero?
The show gives about six more people to pay attention to that are without knowing it, directly related to both Nick Wasicsko and the low income housing act that he eventually gets through the council and is implemented into the city. Three of which are directly related in culture and lifestyle, the three are all women, they are all African-American, all have children and all live in the projects of Yonkers. The first of note is the eldest, a woman by the name of Norma O’Neal. Norma is 47 when the show starts and is a resident of the Schlomo project. Norma begins experiencing issues with her vision that her glasses are unable to help with, she’s going blind due to complications with her diabetes. Due to becoming legally blind, Norma is unable to work, she is able after a long and strenuous process to apply for disability so she can live in her current housing. The next part she needs help with however is aide in life, she receives help from her two children who are now both adults and working, living their own lives so she needs a in-house aide to help her with daily activities around the house to sustain a life. However, due to the sheer fact that where she lives has been labeled as a ‘ghetto’ and dangerous, several government provided aides fail to show up to assist Norma as they were assigned to do out of fear for their own safety. By only being able to claim disability, Norma is unable to afford proper medications and treatments for a fairly common complication of diabetic citizens. Along with the fact that due to the location of which her disability checks allow her to live, she is unable to receive federal program house assistant aides. Liberties and rights as an American citizen that we are all promised growing up, being taken from this woman in need of support because of a complication she couldn’t control and the housing she can afford.
Second to make note of is Doreen Henderson, Doreen is portrayed as being in her later teens, perhaps eighteen or nine teen years of age. Her family lives across the Hudson in New Jersey, they seem to have a decent life, a house to their own, the parents work and make decent wages. The father before going to work in their lone scene at breakfast together, makes sure to ask about work, what her plans are for the day, how is work? Making sure to drive home the point that her going to work and having a sense of structure outside of the home is still maintained and present for his daughter Doreen. Doreen goes into Yonkers to visit her sister who is hanging out with her friends. This introduces the concept of a woman, who is living in a somewhat suburban life to be reintroduced to the projects lifestyle, she is introduced to Skippy, named after his love of Skippy peanut butter as a child. The two take a liking to one another and end up together and Doreen is found to be pregnant, Skippy tries to take the lead to become a good partner and a good father to the coming child. However, Skippy only knows one way of making money, by selling drugs, he says that he wants to quit the business and go back to school, a community college that would allow him to find a stable job that would support his new family. Before Doreen is able to give birth to the baby, it is found that Skippy has passed away due to complications with his Asthma. So there is Doreen, pregnant, alone, in an apartment in the projects to where she thought that she was going to raise this baby with her partner. She is now stripped of the opportunity to prosper due to something she could not control, the death of her partner.
The third is Billie Rowan, Billie is in her mid-teens, probably about fifteen years old. Billie has taken the decision upon herself to join one of her good friends and stop going to school, her mother, not being thrilled by the decision says that she is going to go to work if she doesn’t go to school. Billie protests saying that the work available isn’t ‘good enough’ for her or that she just does not want that kind of work. While she is away from her mother, hanging out with friends, she is introduced to John “Hot” Santos; the pattern from Doreen Henderson is repeated. Billie becomes pregnant, the news is also a signal to John to straighten up an act that has involved not working and just not being responsible for anyone besides himself. John promises to get his act together to become a responsible father for the baby, during the pregnancy John is sent to Rikers Island on 2nd degree robbery charges. Again, like Doreen, Billie is now alone, pregnant, living away from her family, this time, she does not have a high school education to become qualified for most available jobs, even if she didn’t have her baby to take care of.
Now, these three women all are related as different examples of the kind of people who wind up in project communities. Nora, who was raised during a pro segregation movement for the city she calls home, does not want to move away from the support system that she calls her own, meaning to be with the people she is associated with who are primarily located in the projects, she is unable to see that change is ever truly possible so she would rather sit at home and make due. With Doreen, we are shown a side that involves introducing people into the set up to fail lifestyle that condensed impoverished communities has created. Through mere association with her sisters friends in the area, and just a chance of what the profession of her partners involves sucks her into the environment and leaves her with a child, no support system and an environment she is unaware how to navigate without her now deceased partner. The case of Billie Rowan entails the efforts almost identical to Doreens situation aside from the fact that Billie was already in the projects and continued a cycle that was instituted by the effects of condensed poverty. Billie and Doreen are both left at least once, in Billie’s case multiple times, alone, trying to keep a home for their children with non of the requisite resources to support themselves.
Enter Oscar Newman, Newman is the appointed housing expert for the city of Yonkers project to install the low income housing units. He is the expert in housing theories on the matter and throughout the entirety of the city councils efforts towards the housing act to fight against just building two ‘tower’ complexes in two districts of one hundred units per tower. He states that his recommendation is for more of the houses to be spread out, trying to achieve a maximum of twenty eight units per location. This is because if he feels like there are any more that they will become isolated by the existing community by creating a focal point for the residents of the low income housing for support to come from one another rather than trying to integrate into the communities they are joining. Newman believes that if anyone is given property, a house, a lawn and back yard that they will fight like hell to protect and maintain it. So the efforts he pushed for are achieved by the housing units being spread out to seven different locations in east Yonkers and townhouses as the form of housing. By doing this it created the sense of self dependence, yes the occupants will still have friends and need help from others, but it would effect change, and by in comparison to their current life styles would help breath a new sense of life and culture into their lives and could break the cycle of that is caused by condensed poverty as a result of of false prejudices that have been instilled into the community by people like then Councilman Hank Spallone.
During the efforts to discredit the process of ‘folding’ to the commands of the judge who as Spallone put it, isn’t even from Yonkers. Spallone made an infamous attempt to tap into good ol’ fashion fear mongering, he does this by driving into the projects community and taking selective pictures of what his white constituents were afraid of, black people gambling, standing on street corners, disrespecting authority, homes with faulty appearances. This creates the idea that if any low income housing is to become a part of east Yonkers, that drugs, crime and a loss of property value will occur due to the ‘proof’ he provided with his pictures he presents at council meetings. However, in the scene he is shown having the pictures be taken in, it is shown that the photographer is more so deciding pictures are not incriminating enough to take rather than the ones that create the image of the poor black family that Spallone is wanting.
Now, throughout the show it is made clear of a few things, but one is most clear. The people who are in charge of enacting change for the communities who have been stripped of resources and opportunities in life as their white counterparts, are all white. The people protesting for or against the issue, are all white citizens. The councilmen and women, are all white. The Judge Leonard Sand, the lawyer Michal Sussman who is the lead on the case on behalf of the NAACP, are both white. The show is fairly split fifty-fifty between the families who are eventually given an opportunity to succeed thanks to the efforts of a pro-compliance mayor and a housing developer who actually wanted to enact change in this development by doing things differently through his theories. And the other half of the show is devoted to Nick Wasicsko and his efforts to try and continue his political career despite losing his incumbent Mayoral seat to the populist ideologies of Spallone, and Nick just trying to find out whether or not fighting for this housing initiative was worth putting his own political career in turmoil. One the side of Wasicsko, it goes through the previously mentioned efforts to try and implement the now successful low income housing act and later on making sure to the best of his abilities that it succeeds and was worth the personal and professional costs he paid. But for those who eventually are able to benefit from the program, through out the duration of the process, the court ruling, the appeals, the protests and even the construction of the homes. It is not until they are given a slip from the Housing and Urban Development saying that they can fill out an application to become eligible for the lottery to determine if they will be granted the chance to occupy the new homes. A process of over three and a half years that was taken, and coincidentally, as far as the show ever showed, only councilman Spallone took a a trip to view the western Yonkers area. No voting in favor of pro housing candidates, none of their own protesting for the initiatives.
The show finishes with using H.U.D. community programs that is used to integrate vocal members who opposed the initiatives with members of the communities that would be eligible for the housing being constructed. This involves the case of Mary Dorman, who initially watches the news regarding the cases on TV, however sees this as a chance to have her voice be heard. So, she attends council meetings and shouts with the crowd, she hears anti-Semitic and racist comments hurled at the Jewish and defendant lawyer. She tries to make her voice, which is unrelated to race or religion in her eyes, the one that is heard most. By being so vocal, she is introduced to Mr. Mayhawk, the community leader on behalf of H.U.D. who is trying to instill proper networking and community ideals into the new residents as to hoping that they will mesh with the existing members instead of isolate and make their differences more of a guard against the new neighbors. Mr. Mayhawk invites Mary to join the group of leaders on both sides in the process, so that she can have a real perspective of exactly what is the process of these initiatives. That the process includes interviewing, which she tags along for interview the eligible families. By doing this she is being exposed to the actuality of these people who have been structurally confined into these homes for their lifetimes. Not for just the pictures taken by Spallone ‘show and prove’ of the people who live in the projects. Her preconceived notions are absolutely obliterated, she gains a sense of respect for those making an effort to change their lives and eventually becomes an advocate for the programs and was found to work in pro public housing work long after the time setting the movie had taken place in.
This series shows that if the right issue, has just enough good people surrounding the cause, even if the mayor ran his mayoral campaign against it, that if there are people within projects who want to bring change and make a real difference with the opportunity provided to them. That change can and will happen. No matter the odds.
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