I have a love affair with older houses.

Victorian era homes (late 1800’s) hold a special place in my heart, along with a few shotgun houses from the 1920’s and 30’s that were repurposed into my homes growing up.

There’s a house in Pine Bluff called the Knox House. It looks like a dollhouse, painted pink and sculpted arches, a turret and a second story porch that runs the length of the house.

It’s falling apart now despite being on the National Register of Historic Places.

It’s on 6th street, next to a liquor store, a dilapidated commercial building built out of concrete blocks and across from a warehouse.

At some point in the past (70’s), 6th Avenue was bordered by homes.

They’re all gone now, replaced by well meaning business owners thinking of progress, thinking of cheap land and bring business back to the area.

It’s happening again today.

A hedge fund manager from Boston found Pine Bluff when he was looking for a place to build cheap fuel pellets made from Pine trees.

The city also has Opportunity Zones, which means capital gains made from one investment can be reinvested for tax purposes into it and hedge funds can make or keep more money.

He found another mansion on the country club side of town and bought it to minimize his tax gains.

It just moves the focus from one side of the railroad tracks to another, shifting money and investing away from areas with blight to places where the houses are older, but still nice.

I thought about this as I drove through a neighborhood on Saturday.

It was another long day of playing Santa’s little helper, and we hit a section of Sherwood that used to be a forest ridge.

Developers had come in and clear cut the forest, scraped out roads and were working on a hundred and something brand new homes that looked just like each other.

The sign at the entrance showed each lot was sold, marked with little red letters.

People moving out of Little Rock to get away from high crime areas and blight.

I bet this story plays out across the country, town after little town.

The numbers show it’s happening. Rural towns are dying slow deaths, and suburbs are expanding.

I can’t remember it not happening.

It makes me sad to think of some of the grand old houses that could be restored to glory, but the cost is high.

Or the empty weed covered lots that could use an influx of new homes.

I don’t really blame developers, though they are an easy target. It’s a cost measure. It’s cheaper to clear cut and build tract homes than it is to do infill homes.

I blame politicians and city councils. They make dumb decisions because they have no sense of the past.

And I see it play out on the truck I’m on.

The driver complains, makes a suggestion on how to improve his route, how to be more efficient, and the supervisor chalks it up to just bitching.

The City Council can brush off citizen complaints about blight and infill as just bitching, even though the problem is real.

Real in that neighborhood, and not necessarily where the politician lives.

How much do we brush off as just complaints when it could be an actual viable suggestion?