> There are probably other factors too.

I always think the gangs and crack epidemic were major contributors too. This was also the era of drive by shootings and gangster rap/culture infiltrating the middle class and WASP folks homes via their children and popular media of all kinds. I also remember teenage pregnancy seemed like a bigger issue then and a reason parents controlled their daughters more closely. The nightly news was reporting on this stuff and many inner city areas were severely depressed. I think in a lot of those areas that have since been gentrified we probably forget just how bad it was for a time.