A Decade of HOPE VI: Research Findings and Policy Challenges

Urban Institutea nonpartisan economic and social policy research organizationA DECADE OF HOPE VI:Research Findings and Policy Challenges A DECADE OF HOPE VI:Research Findings and Policy ChallengesBy Susan J. Popkin, Bruce Katz, Mary K. Cunningham, Karen D. Brown, Jeremy Gustafson, and Margery A. TurnerMay 2004The UrbanInstituteThe BrookingsInstitution About the AuthorsCopyright © May 2004. The Urban Institute. All rights reserved. Except for short quotes, no part of this papermay be reproduced in any form or used in any form by any means, electronic or mechanical, includingphotocopying, recording, or by information storage or retrieval system, without written permission of the UrbanInstitute.The nonpartisan Urban Institute publishes studies, reports, and books on timely topics worthy of publicconsideration. The views expressed are those of the authors and should not be attributed to the Urban Institute,its trustees, or its funders.Susan J. Popkinis principal research associate in the Urban Institute’s MetropolitanHousing and Communities Center.Bruce Katzis a vice president and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution andfounding director of the Brookings Institution Center on Urban and Metropolitan Policy.Mary K. Cunninghamis a research associate in the Urban Institute’s MetropolitanHousing and Communities Center.Karen Brownis a research analyst at the Brookings Institution.Jeremy Gustafsonis a research associate in the Urban Institute’s Metropolitan Hous-ing and Communities Center.Margery A. Turnerdirects the Urban Institute’s Metropolitan Housing and Com-munities Center. In memory of our friend and colleague, Art Naparstek. vContentsAcknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii1Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12Severely Distressed Public Housing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73HOPE VI and the Evolution of Public Housing Policy in the 1990s . . . . . . . . . . . . 134Impact of HOPE VI on Public Housing Developments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195Impact of HOPE VI on Public Housing Residents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276Relocation and Supportive Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337Impact of HOPE VI on Neighborhood Conditions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418Implications for Public Housing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 viiAcknowledgmentsThe authors of this report wish to thank the many people who have made significant contribu-tions to it. In particular, we would like to thank several colleagues from the Urban Institute:Michael Eiseman helped facilitate symposium arrangements and made major contributions to thepreparation of this report, especially the literature review; Shawnise Thompson coordinated thesymposium arrangements; Jennifer Comey helped greatly with the early phases of planning forthe conference and report and helped draft the material on residents; and Tom Kingsley andArthur Naparstek made major contributions to our thinking and analysis, particularly on theimpact of HOPE VI on neighborhoods. We wish to thank Darren Walker of the RockefellerFoundation for his enthusiastic support for this project and for graciously hosting the sympo-sium. We also thank the other funders of the Urban Institute’s and Brookings Institution’s broaderwork on HOPE VI and public housing transformation, which has greatly informed this report,including the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the John D. and Catherine T.MacArthur Foundation, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Fannie Mae Foundation, the FordFoundation, the Chicago Community Trust, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Finally,we thank the symposium participants for the stimulating and thoughtful discussion that helpedto shape this report. However, the views presented in this report are those of the authors, and donot necessarily reflect those of our participants, the Urban Institute, the Brookings Institution,or our funders. 1Introduction1Launched in 1992, the $5 billion HOPE VI program1represents a dramatic turn-around in public housing policy and one of the most ambitious urban redevelop-ment efforts in the nation’s history. It replaces severely distressed public housingprojects, occupied exclusively by poor families, with redesigned mixed-income housingand provides housing vouchers to enable some of the original residents to rent ap