RECLAIMING THE COMMUNITY
They know it's not just a black - or Beatties Ford Road - problem, but community anxiety is high. Preachers preach about it on Sundays, and in community gathering places like McDonald's Cafeteria or on the bulletin boards at JCSU, flyers announce community forums.

"Stop The Killing," one proclaimed. "Nobody can save us from us but us." It was one of many signs the community is fighting back.

At Northwest Middle School, where bullet holes still scar the brick wall at the back of the gym, Principal Rosalind Rowe-Anderson moves ahead undaunted.

"It's a shame it happened here," she says, "but it really didn't have much to do with us. The kids weren't that bothered. I heard one of them say, "Well, I guess we'll have to fix the bullet holes."

Rowe-Anderson points with pride to Northwest's spotless, litter-free campus, its neatly trimmed lawns and freshly painted walls, devoid of graffiti. Some of Northwest's buildings are more than 50 years old, but the school staff works to keep them in shape. Rowe-Anderson says she owes it to her 500 students in grades 6-8 and to the area around her.

"In this neighborhood," she says, "it's so important how the school looks. We want to be a part of this community. It seems like everybody has come through here. This used to be West Charlotte High School."

She utters the last sentence with pride. West Charlotte, which has moved to a campus a half-mile north, was once one of Mecklenburg's elite black schools. For people such as Rowe-Anderson, who see great hope for Beatties Ford Road, the legacy of strong institutions is critical: the schools, the churches, the university, and a growing string of businesses intended to serve as models of success.

MCDONALD'S - A COMMUNITY INSTITUTION
Lunchtime approaches at McDonald's Cafeteria.

Already the parking lot is beginning to fill, as John McDonald moves through the kitchen to the clatter of pans and the smell of chickens beginning to cook - the first of 300 they'll prepare that day.

"It's going to be a good day," he announces to his staff, clapping. "We're gonna cook some good food today."

A gregarious, deeply religious man of 69, McDonald introduces himself to patrons as "the cook." But he is in fact the owner, and his business at I-85 and Beatties Ford Road is one of the most prominent in Charlotte's black community.

He tells his story unselfconsciously: He was running a successful dining hall in Brooklyn, N.Y. when God told him in a dream to go home.

"I did what he told me to do," McDonald says.

Now his cafeteria, which serves nearly 2,000 people a day from all over the city, and its adjacent 105-room hotel have become a westside community institution.

"It belongs to the people," he says. "It helps to give them a sense of belonging, creates jobs - and creates a role model for this community. All up and down, not just here, we see more new buildings on Beatties Ford Road. This is a sign of what people can do."

(John McDonald died October 26, 1995.)