Desegregation Lawsuits and Public Housing Dispersal: The Case of Hollman v. Cisneros in Minneapolis

Abstract

In recent years the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has settled several desegregation lawsuits across the country in ways that further the agency's current strategies of public housing redevelopment and housing mobility through tenant-based assistance. One of the chief motivations for these policies is the dispersal of subsidized housing as a means of deconcentrating poverty. This article examines the de-concentrating effects of one desegregation lawsuit, Hollman v. Cisneros in Minneapolis. The Hollman case incorporated three means of dispersal: (i) redevelopment of public housing and the relocation of displaced families, (2) a housing mobility program, and (3) development of scattered-site replacement housing. In this case, despite full implementation of the consent decree, a very limited amount of dispersal actually occurred. Marketing the mobility program and suburban replacement housing to inner-city families has proven very difficult, and most poor families remain in central city neighborhoods. These findings call into question the underlying assumptions of a deconcentration approach to alleviating poverty in the inner city.