Why are smart city leaders concerned about equity? Because injustice has been a feature of many cities from the very beginning.

In what is now the county of Dallas, the first recorded commercial transaction took place on March 17, 1844, when an enslaved Black woman, named Jane, was sold to John Young for $400. The land that Young and other White settlers made their own belonged to Indigenous peoples who were resettled west of present-day Fort Worth in an 1843 treaty.

The history of Dallas is a history of displacement, segregation and structural inequality, according to a 2019 report by Dallas Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation (THRT), and it is a history that continues to shape life for the city today. Dallas has the highest child poverty rate among the nation's largest cities, the report states, and those children are disproportionally Latinx and African American.

Urban Institute research found Dallas to have the highest level of income inequality among the 570 metropolitan area commuting zones studied. The average income of those in the lower 10% of Dallas tracts by income declined $3,149 from 1990 to 2010, while the average income in the top 10% of tracts rose $31,769.

An initiative of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Dallas TRHT has partnered with the city to address structural equity issues, said Executive Director Jerry Hawkins. Its approach includes "sharing a more expansive history," racial healing circles and community healing events, which they hope will lead to changes in city policies and practices, said Hawkins.

Equity is a concern of Dallas' smart city efforts as well. "The City of Dallas has used historical data, environmental data, digital access data and a slew of other data sets to visualize and understand the current status of various inequities existing in our city," said Amanda Nabours, IT architect for the city of Dallas, in response to a Smart Cities Dive survey on smart city efforts.

Numerous survey respondents noted how their efforts to date, as well as the pandemic's impacts, have moved equity to the forefront of their concerns. These cities aim to help residents bridge the digital divide, providing better access to education, transportation and jobs, while ensuring they have a say in cities' use of technology.

Read the full article about equitable cities by Dan Zukowski at Smart Cities Dive.