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South Bend Tribune, Jim Rider
Residents of South Bend, Ind., stand in line to add their names to a Section 8
waiting list.
Residents of South Bend, Ind., stand in line to add their names to a Section 8
waiting list.
Small-City Crime: Is Section 8 to Blame?
July 03, 2008 09:03 AM
Some critics of the controversial federal housing assistance program cite it as a direct cause of high crime rates in small cities, but the data’s not so clear-cut.
30-Second Summary
In this month’s Atlantic magazine, journalist Hanna Rosin explores a recent trend of crime in large cities tapering off while crime in medium-sized cities climbed as much as 20 percent in a year.
At least one report blames the surge in small-city crime on Section 8, a program established in the late 1970s to move public housing residents into better neighborhoods.
Tennessee housing expert Phyllis Betts and her husband, Richard Janikowski, merged a map of crime locations with a housing map of Section 8 tenants and discovered a near-perfect match.
But when an April 2008 study of Section 8 at the University of North Carolina mapped crime locations and compared them to locations of voucher residents, the results didn’t match up. In Durham, N.C., high-crime areas in fact housed “relatively few Section 8 residents.”
Still, Section 8 beneficiaries are hardly welcome tenants in many places. A 2007 New York Times article discussed a local proposal obligating New York City landlords to accept Section 8 vouchers. Frank Ricci, of the independent Rent Stabilization Association countered that forcing landlords to take Section 8 tenants was unfair.
But crime isn’t the only issue. A Fannie Mae report from 1999 showed that having only a handful of Section 8 homes close to other homes “positively effected” real estate values in mostly white neighborhoods. However, having “high densities” of Section 8 sites did not.
At least one report blames the surge in small-city crime on Section 8, a program established in the late 1970s to move public housing residents into better neighborhoods.
Tennessee housing expert Phyllis Betts and her husband, Richard Janikowski, merged a map of crime locations with a housing map of Section 8 tenants and discovered a near-perfect match.
But when an April 2008 study of Section 8 at the University of North Carolina mapped crime locations and compared them to locations of voucher residents, the results didn’t match up. In Durham, N.C., high-crime areas in fact housed “relatively few Section 8 residents.”
Still, Section 8 beneficiaries are hardly welcome tenants in many places. A 2007 New York Times article discussed a local proposal obligating New York City landlords to accept Section 8 vouchers. Frank Ricci, of the independent Rent Stabilization Association countered that forcing landlords to take Section 8 tenants was unfair.
But crime isn’t the only issue. A Fannie Mae report from 1999 showed that having only a handful of Section 8 homes close to other homes “positively effected” real estate values in mostly white neighborhoods. However, having “high densities” of Section 8 sites did not.
Headline Links: Who’s to blame for small-city crime?
In Atlantic magazine’s article, Phyllis Betts and her husband Richard Janikowski presented their finding that Section 8 housing policies were responsible for the growth of crime in Tennesseee. Robert Lipscomb, the head of the Memphis Housing Authority, showed his frustration with their report: “You’ve already marginalized people and told them they have to move out, now you’re saying they moved somewhere else and created all these problems? That’s a really, really unfair assessment … that’s quote-unquote, criminal.”
Source: The Atlantic
The UNC study, which mapped crime locations and compared them with housing voucher demographics, contended that housing vouchers do not contribute to crime. However the report was called into question by some authority boards who said the 2000 census data student researchers used as a demographic resource was “out of date in a key respect.”
Source: Knowledgeplex (powered by Lexis Nexus)
Background: Section 8 and its effects
Under the Section 8 program, the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development enables low-income families to pay 30 percent of their monthly income towards housing, while it pays the remainder. According to HUD’s eligibility standards, the income for Section 8 “may not exceed 50 percent of the median income for the county or metropolitan area in which the family chooses to live.”
Source: Department of Housing and Urban Development
In response to a 1996 ACLU lawsuit, in December 2000, Baltimore began an initiative to move 40 families into subsidized homes in the suburbs, where less than 26 percent of residents were minorities. Baltimore resident Dawn Ponsi Miles, ironically a former Section 8 tenant, opposed the initiative because government programs were pricing homes at more than they were worth and shutting out potential buyers like Miles’s parents. “It was worth it for HUD to sit on it, because if they waited the city would pay them about $20,000 more than it’s worth,” Miles opined.
Source: City Paper (Baltimore)
A recent wave of well-heeled New Yorkers flocking to low-income neighborhoods has reduced landlords’ dependence on Section 8 vouchers, and arguably revived discrimination against voucher holders, mainly blacks and Hispanics. However, The New York Times reported that activists and experts had not yet found solid evidence to prove the tenants were turned away because of racial discrimination, and rejecting Section 8 vouchers is not illegal per se.
Source: The New York Times
Historical Context: History of pubic housing in America
According to the Minneapolis Public Housing Authorities, the United States Housing Act of 1937, which helped diminish the Depression-era problems of unemployment and slums, operated only on a local level.
Source: MPHA
In 1966, Dorothy Gautreaux and five other black residents, frustrated by the Chicago Housing Authority’s policy of building low-cost apartments for blacks in only poor, inner-city, mostly black neighborhoods, sued the CHA for institutionalizing racial segregation. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court. Though Gautreaux herself died in 1969, her attorney, Alexander Polikoff, and the remaining five plaintiffs won the case in 1976. The Supreme Court ruled that the Department of Housing and Development had sanctioned and supported CHA’s “discriminatory policies.”
Source: Vlex.com (legal research system)
Alexander Polikoff, Gautreaux’s attorney, admitted following the win, “The change is only potential.” Ultimately, however, his victory, along with his seminal book, “Waiting for Gautreaux,” was a catalyst for Section 8 and other advances in public housing policy.
Source: Time
Opinion & Analysis: Viewpoints on Section 8
Blogger Ta Nehisi Coates applauded the article in the Atlantic. However, Coates added, “[T]here was a subtle point in Rosin’s piece which I think deserves more attention—all black poor people aren’t the same. … Perhaps the most heartbreaking portion of Rosin's article was where she showed how Section 8 basically was destabilizing poor/working class communities where people weren’t rich, but were basically handling their business.”
Source: Ta-Nehisi
Logos, a blog written by Houston landlord Amitav Misra, also responded to the Atlantic article: “It might be more effective if vouchers were more easily transferred … or if people didn’t still tend to cluster in the poorest areas because of familiarity, family ties, or lack of other affordable housing.”
Source: Logos
Christina Harvell, an associate broker for real-estate giant Remax writes in Pennsylvania’s Pocono Record that, “A quality tenant is not determined by the source of the rental payment. A self-paying tenant could just as easily cause harm to your property, stop paying the rent, or break their lease agreement.”
Source: Pocono Record
Reference: Fannie Mae study
In addition to better screening of voucher recipients, and stronger supervision of program managers, a Fannie Mae study advocates increasing the freedom of voucher residents to choose their residence. The authors note that this freedom would improve voucher holders’ “prospects for economic self-sufficiency in the long run, by enhancing their access to employment and job information networks and better quality education.”
Source: Fannie Mae (PDF)
© 2009 Dulcinea Media, Inc.
