Charles,
“Redlining” for conventional mortgages, if used as a trigger for significantly reduced taxation, accelerated foreclosure and eviction of delinquent residents (the opposite of what ACORN advocates) and incentives for new residents to move in and contribute sweat equity (here school vouchers could prove key) could be part of a program for community revitalization. That is what the race hucksters and subsidy leeches (think Rezko) that back Obama condemn as “Gentrification.” The choice is between a natural cycle of capital reallocation and renewal and the politically entrenched effort to preserve pools of poverty as voting blocs attached to an unending stream of subsidies.