David P. Varady

Vouchering out distressed subsidized developments: Does moving lead to improvements in housing and neighborhood conditions?

Abstract When households receive Section 8 vouchers or rent certificates and moderate amounts of counseling, and have no program requirements dictating where they should move, how far will they go and how successful will the moves be? This article offers some answers to these questions by analyzing the experiences of households relocated from four distressed, privately owned subsidized developments in Baltimore; Newport News, VA; Kansas City, MO; and San Francisco. Although many of the residents chose to remain in the same area, most of them improved their situation by moving. However, the majority continued to live in racially segregated areas. The moderate relocation counseling that residents received had little impact on their housing search and on satisfaction with their new home. It may be unreasonable to expect households that are given certificates or vouchers to relocate to new or unfamiliar neighborhoods without support or without intensive counseling encouraging them to do so.

Toward a Better Way to Measure Customer Satisfaction Levels in Public Housing: A Report from Cincinnati

This paper proposes a more reliable approach to measuring public housing customer satisfaction than has been used in the past, that is, one that (a) looks at trends in customer satisfaction rather than satisfaction at one point in time; (b) looks at different components of satisfaction; and (c) combines qualitative and quantitative information. Cross-tabular and logistic regression analysis were applied to a dataset containing approximately 1300 telephone interviews with residents of Cincinnati Metropolitan Housing Authority (CMHA) housing, interviewed over four waves (1995, 1996, 1997 and 1998). In general the survey results parallel objective evidence from agency records showing CMHA to be one of the most rapidly improving local housing authorities in the USA. Levels of housing satisfaction remained high and levels of neighbourhood satisfaction rose significantly during the period. Nevertheless, the findings highlight continuing problem areas including a high level of dissatisfaction with CMHAs repair service.

Housing Vouchers and Residential Mobility

Existing research suggests that tenant-based subsidies (housing vouchers) can help to deconcentrate poverty and improve the quality of life of low-income families. The Gautreaux Assisted Housing Program and the Moving to Opportunity (MTO) demonstration program have been shown to help families move to safer neighborhoods and ones with better public schools. The regular Section 8 program has been successful in facilitating moves to low-poverty areas in places like Alameda County, California, but public housing families have had difficulties in Chicago. Research on mixed-income communities has provided little evidence that social mixing has any direct positive impacts through social interaction and/or social networks. However, the lack of research on the long-term impacts on children, such as future improvements in their employment circumstances due to better educational attainment, makes it impossible to offer conclusive assessments on the connection between income mixing and social mobility.

Determinants of Residential Mobility Decisions The Role of Government Services in Relation to Other Factors

Abstract This article is one of the first to test for the relative importance of concerns about public services in affecting residential mobility decisions over and beyond normal mobility factors. A secondary aim is to test for the validity of a residential mobility model formulated by Speare and associates. Multiple regression analysis was employed using 1974 to 1977 data from the longitudinal version of the Annual Housing Survey. Concerns about public services did not play a meaningful role in the analysis. This implies that efforts to hold middle income residents in declining neighborhoods, through improved services, will not succeed. The results supported the Speare mobility model; housing satisfaction acted as an intermediary variable between background characteristics and mobility behavior.

Scattered-Site Public Housing and Housing Satisfaction: Implications for the New Public Housing Program

Abstract Can public housing authorities (PHAs) raise the satisfaction levels of residents by pursuing a scattered-site policy, or by revitalizing existing “projects”? To address these and related issues, we apply both crosstabular and regression analysis to the results of 211 telephone interviews with residents of the Cincinnati Metropolitan Housing Authority (CMHA) family housing. The crosstabular results fail to support the hypothesis that those in single-family, scattered-site units are most likely to be satisfied. However, multiple regression analysis, with other variables controlled, shows that such housing indirectly promotes satisfaction through more neighborhood social interaction. The total effect on satisfaction is minimal, however, because of the indirect path of influence. Six other factors besides public housing type promote satisfaction, either directly or indirectly: age, housing cost burden, welfare recipiency, major housing problems (inversely), satisfaction with CMHA tenant involvement p...

Attracting Middle‐Income Families in the Hope VI Public Housing Revitalization Program

ABSTRACT: While the growing literature on HOPE VI emphasizes the presumed benefits of income mixing these benefits are most likely to occur if middle-income families with children are drawn to these sites. But is this feasible? Our comparative case study analysis of four HOPE VI sites in Cincinnati, Louisville, Baltimore, and Washington, DC, suggests that it will be difficult to achieve the mixing of lower- and middle-income families with children. None of the four developments explicitly sought middle-income families with children as part of their marketing. Louisville’s HOPE VI site was the only one involving close collaboration between the school district, the housing authority, and city government from the beginning of the HOPE VI process. Moreover, the Louisville site was the only one successful in attracting middle-income (and not simply subsidized moderate-income) families with children. Strategies for making inner-city HOPE VI sites more attractive for middle-income families are discussed.

Moving Out and Going Down? A Review of Recent Evidence on Negative Spillover Effects of Housing Restructuring Programmes in the United States and the Netherlands

Abstract Comparing USA and Dutch experiences, this paper seeks to determine whether the demolition of public or social housing results in negative spillover effects, i.e. the shift of crime and other social problems to nearby neighbourhoods, as a result of residential relocation patterns. Notwithstanding fundamental contextual differences, existing research shows that many relocatees do recluster in low-income areas not much better than the public or social housing sites they moved from. Furthermore, USA and Dutch research highlights concern among public officials, politicians and community activists that this clustering is resulting in higher crime, increased neighbourhood dissatisfaction (among existing residents), more conflicts between residents, lower school test scores, etc. Few researchers have, however, been able to go beyond correlations and establish cause–effect relations between the in-movement of public/social housing relocatees and increased social problems. Attempts to identify a statistical threshold for clustering, beyond which negative effects occur, have not been successful. Nevertheless, existing evidence regarding negative spillover effects is compelling enough to warrant expanded and improved monitoring of both relocation and neighbourhood change patterns and to initiate programmes to address the concerns of residents in destination areas.

Voucher Recipient Achievement of Improved Housing Conditions in the US: Do Moving Distance and Relocation Services Matter?

When householders are vouchered-out from distressed, federally subsidised private developments in the US and receive moderate relocation counselling, does that counselling lead to a more intensive housing search, longer-distance moves and higher levels of housing satisfaction ? Multiple regression analysis was applied to a data-set containing survey and geographical information (for example, distance moved, median neighbourhood income level) for 201 voucher recipients in 4 cities. The analysis was used to determine if the use of relocation counselling services (as well as the type of services utilised) and distance moved helped to explain variations in housing satisfaction. Those who used counselling services were in fact more likely to be satisfied with their new home than were those who were unaware of these services. However, those who were aware of the services but did not use them fared as well as householders who used them. Counselling to help in dealings with landlords was the most influential type of relocation assistance vas à vis housing satisfaction. The distance householders moved played an insignificant role in the analysis. This finding undoubtedly reflects the fact that voucher recipients sought to remain in or close to their original neighbourhood to be near friends and relatives and familiar bus lines, and the fact that better housing units offering a greater sense of safety were available in the same neighbourhood or in neighbourhoods adjacent to the vouchered-out development. Implications for HUDs vouchering-out policy are discussed.

Housing vouchers in the United States, great Britain, and the Netherlands: Current issues and future perspectives

Abstract We compare the current U.S. housing voucher program with the British housing benefit and the Dutch housing allowance programs. After presenting the theory behind income‐related housing support, which underpins both the U.S. and European systems, we compare the three programs with respect to their scope (the budgeted versus the entitlement approach), the relationship between housing support and rent levels, the poverty trap, moral hazards, and administrative problems. The United States can learn from Great Britain and the Netherlands that a full entitlement program can best promote equity, but given the present political and economic climate, it is unlikely that Congress will adopt such a program anytime soon. Great Britain and the Netherlands can learn from the United States how to design a more efficient tenant subsidy program, one that provides incentives to find less expensive units and promotes family self‐sufficiency through enhanced job‐seeking behavior.

Influences on the City-Suburban Choice A Study of Cincinnati Homebuyers

Abstract In this study, stepwise discriminant analysis was applied to a mailed questionnaire sample of 1,738 Hamilton County (Cincinnati, Ohio) homebuyers to identify characteristics that are most important in predicting city and suburban choices. The results confirmed the continued importance of family life cycle and life style, be it familial or cosmopolitan. Families with children that were seeking larger homes and trying to escape troubled city public schools bought in the suburbs. College-educated householders without children and those seeking neighborhood diversity and accessibility to employment chose the city. Other factors, such as race, income, and the desire to preserve neighborhood social relations also played an important role. In the short run, the most promising strategy for cities like Cincinnati is to try to identify “market niches” (e.g., highly educated cosmopolites without children) where the city already has a market advantage, and to develop programs to attract and hold a larger sha...