Hartford, the fourth poorest city in the country, is the capital of Connecticut, one of the wealthiest states in the country. Like other Northeastern cities, the economic, social, and physical infrastructure has not kept pace with the changing demands of the increasingly specialized service sector economy of insurance companies.

"Block 21", the subject of this report, lies in a neighborhood where both African-Americans and Puerto Ricans live. Tobacco farms first attracted African-American migrants from the south beginning in the early 1900's. As this population moved into the industrial sector, migrants from the Caribbean area (especially from Jamaica and the West Indies) also came to Hartford. Following World War II, new migrants arrived from Puerto Rico. Many of them later brought their families and settled in this area. Hartford experienced a brief decline in in-migration during the 1950's, but the decline reversed during the 1970's when foreign middle-class professionals, pushed by deteriorating conditions in their own countries, came large numbers to the U.S. The increased in-migration during the 1970's, suburbanization, the decline in tobacco agriculture, the proximity of Hartford to New York City and the growing dependence of the Hartford economy on the insurance service sector have all intertwined to create pressures on the inner-city residents of Hartford.