Social Interaction in Mixed-Income Developments: Relational Expectations and Emerging Reality

ABSTRACT:

In many cities, public housing has come to exemplify concentrated urban poverty and the social problems associated with it. One major policy response to addressing these problems is the demolition and redevelopment of public housing complexes as mixed-income communities. Several theoretical propositions that lie behind this policy are based on assumptions about the ways in which living among higher-income residents can lead to relationships and interactions that may benefit poor people. Based on in-depth qualitative research in two mixed-income developments in Chicago, this paper explores the dynamics of social interaction in an effort to better understand the processes and factors that influence such interaction on the ground, the differential experience of residents from different backgrounds, and the factors that contribute to their decision-making about and interpretation of social relations with their neighbors. This analysis helps to better interpret the findings of earlier studies and craft more informed expectations about such interactions and their likely effects.

Notes

1 The concepts of social capital and social exclusion address some common concerns and invoke similar commentary in terms of the causes of marginalization and social isolation. However, the ways in which personal agency, state responsibility, and civil society roles are treated in discussions of social inclusion and social capital are sometimes quite distinct, with real implications for how they are differentially applied to the public policy making process in different states (see Daly and Silver, 2008).

2 The policy goals of mixed-income development schemes like those supported by HOPE VI funding go well beyond the potential impacts on low-income individuals that living in a mixed-income environment might lead to; they are also about, among other things, the reformation of public housing, neighborhood regeneration, the reclamation of the central city, and urban renewal more broadly (raising important critiques regarding the likely and intended beneficiaries; see, e.g., Fraser and Kick, 2007; Imbroscio, 2008; Smith and Stovall, 2008).

3 Unlike most neighborhoods, mixed-income developments are specific, contrived efforts to remake urban space and reintegrate low-income people into them, intentionally seeking to promote diversity that is meant to foster particular kinds of outcomes. In addition, as wholesale redevelopments they put into play dynamics of incursion and defense in unique and complicated ways.

4 “Housing tenure” refers here to a resident’s status as an owner or renter of a housing unit, and whether the unit in which s/he resides is subsidized or not. It does not refer to length of time in residence.

5 We use the term “relocated public housing residents” to refer specifically to those residents who moved from traditional public housing into mixed-income developments, whether they have returned to the development built on the site of the complex in which they lived prior to demolition or have moved to a mixed-income development from a different complex. They are thus distinct from residents of traditional public housing, in which buildings are owned and operated by the public housing authority, and from those who moved into the subsidized private housing market using Housing Choice Vouchers. There is some debate among stakeholders as to the appropriate language to describe these residents, since they are in some ways in a liminal position between the public and private spheres, living in units subsidized with public housing funds and remaining on the rolls of the public housing authority, but at the same time residents of developments that are privately owned and managed. Some argue that they should be referred to as “former” public housing residents, based on the aspiration that they are moving toward the status of residents in the private market; others argue that they are still public housing residents, for which the public housing authority continues to bear responsibility; others that they should be referred to simply as “residents,” making no distinction between them and other members of these new communities.

6 The affordable rental and for-sale units are financed with a combination of federal, state, and city programs, including the Low Income Housing Tax Credit, Affordable Housing Tax Credit, and tax-increment financing programs. The specific financing sources and stipulations vary by mixed-income site, depending on what was allocated to the developer. These programs have requirements that units be rented or sold to households earning a certain percentage of area median income, typically 50–80 percent of AMI for rental units and up to 120 percent for for-sale units. Property managers and others working on the developments refer to the residents of these units as “affordable renters and owners,” so we adopt that term here.

7 Summary demographic information for our random resident sample are provided in Table 2. We are unable to compare these statistics against those of the developments’ population as a whole due to a lack of data. Although developers do collect some demographic information on the renter population, little of it is comparable to the variables provided in the table, and for the most part such information is not collected at all for owners or market-rate renters.

8 Mixed-income housing is just one component of the Plan for Transformation, which also includes rehabilitation of family, senior, and scattered-site public housing units, the provision of Housing Choice Vouchers to those residents who wish to rent in the private market, and relocation and support services to public housing residents affected by the Transformation. Of the 25,000 units to be delivered for public housing residents under the Plan, about 30 percent are in mixed-income developments; about 38 percent are in senior buildings, and about 20 percent in traditional family public housing, with the remainder in scattered-site developments (CHA 2010). The lion’s share of financial investment, however (about two thirds or $2 billion, including CHA funds and those leveraged through private, public, and philanthropic sources), is targeted to mixed-income developments (CHA, 2009).

9 The eligibility criteria for public housing residents to return to mixed-income developments are significantly different than those that had established their eligibility to live in public housing prior to the Transformation. In most cases, they include being lease-compliant at the time of potential move, being employed (or engaged in an education program, employment training program, or community service activity) for at least 30 hours per week, being up to date on payment of rent and utility bills, passing a drug test, and passing a three-year criminal background check.