Housing Policy and Vulnerable Families in The Inner City by Brigitte Zamzow

Author:Brigitte Zamzow
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030428495
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

5.8 Open Questions Remain: Does Affordable Housing Deconcentrate Poverty?

Will the current public housing redevelopment efforts lead to a third collapse of a black community that is made possible by lingering racism that is reflected spatially in Harlem? After having contextualized how other cities have used the Affordability Scheme to actively disperse poverty and create mixed-income neighborhoods, it is not far-fetched to expect that similar things will happen in New York City, as stakeholders have the same intentions. This is why now, tenants and activists will be heard and then contextualized further by two housing scholars. In order to grasp this notion, three questions will lead me through my fieldwork. The first one is based on the white city paradigm discussed above: Will black low-income families be displaced or resegregated for the sake of building a ‘healthier’, mixed-income neighborhood?

As to follow the ‘white city’ paradigm, just as the neighborhood has been made into a ghetto, the black low-income families living there are now left with the decision that their ghetto is attractive to the ones who left it to decay earlier. The neighborhood is to be made safe and taken under control again. Following that thought, especially the screening practices can be regarded as a tool to control blacks or pick those families who are considered non-threatening to white lifestyles. This way, violence and crime will simply be shut out of the neighborhood without having to invest directly into relieving symptoms of poverty.

It furthermore fits to actually make public housing responsible for the neglect of work towards racial integration and the fight against poverty. Once a project is themed ‘dilapidated’, it becomes able to be revitalized and taken back into control. Which is also the case for screening-practices. For the sake of some tenants who might benefit from the new diversity in the buildings, others are neglected and left behind without even having to come up with a decent plan what will happen to them and how their well-being can be secured. That way displacement and evictions become legitimized as a ‘necessary evil’.

Black low-income families are unlikely to access the affordability levels which would fit quite well into Massey’s American Apartheid theory on racism segregating blacks and whites. According to Bullard, American Apartheid is still “part of national heritage” (Bullard 2007: 24). It will be interesting to find out how affordability levels are applied when Harlem’s income distribution contrasts starkly with overall New York City’s income distribution. If affordability levels are addressed at generally favoring whites who can pay for it, this will not benefit the black population, not to even speak of the average public housing family. Mobility of whites would be augmented, whereas blacks would be left to deal with the consequences even if that means that their livelihood is at stake. Based on the American Apartheid Theory the second open question that will guide me is: Will Affordable Housing be accessible to black low-income families?

Due to the focus on diversity it could lead to a reverse outcome of

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