Evanston, Illinois, wants to address its legacy of racist housing policies by providing 16 housing grants worth $25,000 to eligible Black residents for down payments, repairs, or existing mortgages. The city intends for the grants to be a form of reparations and hopes they will increase Black homeownership rates, property values, and restore its Black population. But some Black residents are skeptical. “The bank continues to be the largest beneficiary and perpetrator of housing discrimination. It really lays under the guise of a narrative that poor and/or African American people don’t know how to manage their money. Therefore, when the government gives them money, there are lots of parameters on how they can use it,” said alderwoman Cicely Fleming.