"Families receiving housing assistance become used to retreating into their units. They often choose unit quality over neighborhood quality, rarely considering, for example, such factors as the quality of local schools and recreational facilities in their home search. In effect, these families tend to select units, not neighborhoods."DeLuca raises some incredibly important points here around subsidized housing and offers a couple of recommendations that are of particular importance to those who work with individuals and families experiencing homelessness. Perhaps two of the most important of these recommendations, imho, are 1. extending the search times available to voucher holders so they are not forced into taking the first unit they find in order to ensure they don't lose the voucher; and 2. "providing families with the means to make fully informed housing choices, through up-to-date lists of available properties in safe neighborhoods with good schools and other community amenities."
This second recommendation literally shouts the need for some form of city housing coordinator who: A. works with landlords to maintain and update regularly lists of available units. B. Knows the bus routes, walking distances to units from the nearest stops, as well as distances and access (or lack thereof) to available grocery stores in the areas housing units are available in. C. Advocates for affordable housing procurement, rehabilitation and expansion. D. Collaborates across agencies to ensure key personnel (outreach, case managers, VA homelessness services providers, etc) and stakeholders have easy access to the coordinator and are kept updated regularly of changes in policies, rental unit availability, and new units coming online in their service districts.
One of the biggest struggles I've seen with folks is the challenge they face in transportation from the unit to everything else. If they cannot access a nearby grocery store without having to walk a half mile from the store to their home, they cannot really rent the unit, no matter how nice it or the neighborhood may be. If the individual suffers from a physical disability, it makes the issue of transportation that much more important, and frankly rules out a large number of potential units simply because of the challenges faced in caring for basic needs within the community. And by the way, a gas station convenience store is NOT an acceptable substitute for a grocery store.
Reflections on Recent Fieldwork in Mobile, Alabama, and Baltimore, Maryland
Researchers have offered several explanations for why voucher
families, who are free to rent units in the private market in
neighborhoods where greater opportunity for employment and education
exist, are concentrated in poor, segregated areas.
These include cost,
racial preferences, social ties, proximity to relatives, and fully
informed decision making. Dissatisfied with these explanations, Stefanie
DeLuca, associate professor of sociology at John Hopkins University,
designed a study to understand the social contexts that influence
low-income family mobility. DeLuca offered preliminary results from her
field research in a recent presentation, “How Housing Policy Intersects
With the Lives of Poor Families: Reflections on Recent Fieldwork in
Mobile, Alabama, and Baltimore, Maryland.” The presentation was part of a
speaker series hosted by HUD’s Office of Fair Housing and Equal
Opportunity.
Begun in 2009, the study tracked the
fortunes of 100 families in Mobile, Alabama. By fully immersing
themselves in the field and living among the families, DeLuca and her
team of researchers developed in-depth residential biographies of
participating families. Gathered through in-home interviews, community
meetings, and informal interactions, these biographies chronicle the
moves of each family. Although the study’s families used several types
of assisted housing (including vouchers and public housing), all were
low-income black families with children between the ages of 10 and 18.
The study was expanded in 2010 to include low-income black families in
Baltimore, Maryland.
A high percentage of participant
families were subject to reactive moves, and several factors influenced
the frequency of those moves and the families’ subsequent housing
choices. Reactive moves are those resulting from events outside of a
tenant’s control. More than 70 percent of study families had experienced
a recent reactive move, with approximately 80 percent experiencing a
reactive move at some point in their lives. The most common cause of
reactive moves is unit failure, in which the tenant is exasperated by
the landlord’s lack of proper maintenance or the unit fails a Section 8
inspection.
When a unit fails, the process of
finding another unit is both pressing and challenging. Families are
under intense pressure to find another unit before their voucher
expires. Adding to the time crunch are other difficulties, such as
those felt by single, employed mothers without a vehicle or the time to
search for new housing. Compounding these logistical challenges is the
high failure rate of units undergoing Section 8 inspections. In fact,
one family recounted viewing 20 houses before finding a unit which
passed the Section 8 inspection.
A family’s housing choice is also
affected by landlords, the lists of available properties supplied by
housing authorities, and their own low expectations for neighborhood and
housing quality. For many families, landlords and the housing authority
lists play a central role in their hunt for new homes. Landlord
practices vary widely; whereas some are accommodating and flexible, more
commonly, needed maintenance is not provided. Deferred maintenance
results in substandard housing and inspection failures. An additional
complication is that tenants often avoid reporting their landlords for
fear of eviction, the loss of their voucher, or having to endure yet
another move.
Although the lists housing authorities provide prospective tenants were
intended to help low-income families find homes, evidence presented by
DeLuca suggests that these lists actually channel low-income families
into low-income neighborhoods. This prospect is particularly troublesome
because many families view these lists as complete catalogs of
available properties and rely heavily on them for their housing search.
These lists, however, are often not updated and do not include all
available properties.
Low expectations stemming from a lifetime of exposure to poverty and
neighborhood violence affect how a family lives and participates in the
community. The end result is often isolation motivated by concern for
family safety. Families receiving housing assistance become used to
retreating into their units. They often choose unit quality over
neighborhood quality, rarely considering, for example, such factors as
the quality of local schools and recreational facilities in their home
search. In effect, these families tend to select units, not
neighborhoods.
DeLuca shared several policy recommendations to improve mobility
and housing options for low-income families. The first is to extend
search times for families, especially for those who are interested in
moving to low-poverty areas or are actively searching there. The second
is to reform counseling programs and tools to focus on deconcentrating
poverty. Her final recommendation is to provide families with the means
to make fully informed housing choices, through up-to-date lists of
available properties in safe neighborhoods with good schools and other
community amenities.
Although the voucher program was intended to increase mobility for
low-income families, its limited success speaks to the value of studies
such as DeLuca’s, which demonstrate how the voucher program actually
plays out in the lives of low-income families. Some of the unintended
consequences that perpetuate urban poverty might be preventable if the
right policy adjustments were made.
