The Spillover Effects of HOPE VI Redevelopment on Neighborhood Income and Racial Composition

• In Event: 325 - Regular Session. Housing Choice, Neighborhood Quality and Doubling Up

Abstract

The federal HOPE VI program targeted distressed public housing projects for demolition and redevelopment between 1993 and 2010. HOPE VI aimed to improve the physical quality of housing, deconcentrate poverty, and revitalize neighborhoods. This paper asks whether HOPE VI spurred broader neighborhood change by using difference-in-differences and propensity score methods to examine changes in the racial and income composition of neighborhoods surrounding housing projects. Our results suggest that, on average, HOPE VI redevelopment reduced both poverty rates and non-white population shares by 4 percentage points between 1990 and 2010, relative to changes that occurred in other public housing over that period. These changes were driven mainly by loss in the number of non-white and poor residents, rather than by gains in the number of white and non-poor residents. We also identify considerable heterogeneity in the impact of HOPE VI across sites, with the greatest poverty reductions occurring in neighborhoods with the highest levels of initial disadvantage. We discuss implications for affordable housing policy and the spatial distribution of racial and economic inequality in metropolitan areas.

Authors

• Laura M. Tach, Cornell University

• Allison Dwyer Emory, Cornell University