Well the Columbus homes were built for Italians displaced by urban renewal. The idea what's the Italians to live there and the wealthy Irish and Jewish (both groups by now financially successful and included in America's elastic category) would live in the fancy Colonnade Towers. When the federal government and the City took and demolished Little Italy with eminent domain claiming the area was dilapidated and in need of Redevelopment. Black and Italian neighborhoods were targeted for urban renewal because Italians were not considered white at the time. As Italians began moving into Belleville Nutley and other places nationally they became openly racist against black people as a way of asserting their whiteness. This culminated through the rights when the Italians form the human chain to keep blacks from the north Ward with Tony Imperiale becoming notorious figure. It would also kill ed the original Kawaida Towers

Of course that's not how it turned out. Thanks to the GI Bill all the youngsters of Little Italy wound up moving to the suburbs and Columbus homes /7th ave Lower Broadway became home to poor blacks and Puerto Ricans.