NEWS
A Statement by Clinton Brown, FAIA, Founder of Clinton Brown Company Architecture, pc, introducing the Session, “Telling a Fuler Story: Historic Preservation in Underrepresented Communities of Buffalo, New York,” at the 2025 New York State Preservation Conference in Poughkeepsie, NY, May 7, 2025.
Good morning and welcome. I am Clinton Brown from Buffalo, NY.
Thank you to our conference organizers and sponsors for gathering us here in the traditional territory of the Wappinger Peoples of the Lenape Nation today.
This is the 200th anniversary year of the opening of the Erie Canal, the eve of the 250th year of the beginning of the American Revolution and other recognition of greatness in New York.
Yet, three years ago next Wednesday, May 14, a young white man from the Southern Tier arrived at a supermarket in Buffalo he selected on purpose because of its location in a predominantly Black neighborhood, with the intent to murder as many African Americans as he could. He killed 10 innocent Black people and attempted to kill three others of our families, friends and neighbors.
This massacre slapped many of us the White community awake to the stark reality and extent of Buffalo’s racial segregation and how harmful it has been to African Americans historically and is to all of us today.
This panel is about equity and accessibility by conservation of African American Cultural Heritage buildings, sites and stories to honor our ancestors and to inform future generations.
As historic preservationists we know well how to heal damaged buildings. I believe we have a role to play in healing damaged relationships in our communities.
Our opportunity, our obligation, is to help our heritage communities, like we help our historic buildings, become places in which everyone of good will, no matter how they look, who they are and how they present themselves, can feel safe, live well and be inspired.
Let us listen, learn and then act.
Session panelists were Sharon Holley, President of the Board of Directors of the Nash House and Director, Michigan Street Preservation Corporation; Jomo Akono, Juneteenth Festival, Inc., Board of Directors Vice President; Scott Ruff, Co-Director of the Coles House Project; and Jill Nowicki, Historic Preservation Specialist, Clinton Brown Company Architecture, pc, Moderator.
