Now that all the police officers who had a hand in killing Freddie Gray are being properly dealt with, the city of Baltimore can focus on recovering from the riots that were prompted from the details of the murder.
That means several building–including that infamous burning CVS–will have money funneled back into their revival. As for the Baltimore liquor stores? That’s a different story.
“I do not believe it is appropriate for the city to provide money for these non-conforming liquor stores to rebuild as liquor stores in these locations,” Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said in a news conference in the Park Heights area, as reported by Reuters. City officials have pinpointed that neighborhood (one that is predominately populated by African-Americans) to have the highest concentration of liquor stores in all of Maryland, so the mayor’s choice of location was no coincidence.
Baltimore’s health commissioner, Dr. Leana Wen, concluded that the ratio of Black people per liquor stores was twice the per-capita number of liquor stores for other cities of the same size.
The mayor also noted that most of the inner-city Baltimore liquor stores failed to meet zoning laws and they’re already eyeing new grocery stores as a suitable alternative.
Widespread pandemonium swept the city on April 27 following the funeral of Gray. It is estimated that 400 businesses (roughly 10 percent of them being Baltimore liquor stores) were destroyed in the riots. Most are said have been owned by Korean-Americans.
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Photo: CNN Video Screenshot
