Citation URL: http://www.urban.org/KadijaFerryman

One expected benefit of moving poor families from the concentrated poverty of some inner city neighborhoods to better, less poor neighborhoods, was that the children would attend better schools, with more resources and more advantaged peers who might be models for hard work and higher achievement. This brief looks at the schools MTO children attended after their move, how they did or did not differ from the schools in their pre-move neighborhoods, and what factors mattered to families choosing schools for their children.

The report presents the overall findings of Investing in Creativity: A Study of the Support Structure for U.S. Artists. A major contribution of the study is a new comprehensive framework for analysis and action, which views the support structure for artists in the U.S. as a system made up of six key dimensions of the environment in which an artist works. This builds on previous and ongoing Urban Institute work to measure characteristics of place that make a culturally vibrant community. The study provides information on the status of various dimensions of the artists' support structure--both nationally and in specific sites.

Under the HOPE VI program, many of the most distressed public housing developments in the nation have been demolished or substantially renovated, and the program had the challenge of successfully relocating vulnerable seniors in these developments. The question of how seniors handle relocation is an important one, and prior evidence suggests poor outcomes when older adults are involuntarily moved. This brief describes the relocation experiences of older adults in light of their special circumstances, particularly health, social support and social mobility. Findings are based on survey and interview information gathered from older adults in HOPE VI developments in five cities (Atlantic City, NJ; Chicago, IL; Durham, NC; Richmond, CA; and Washington, D.C.).

As Chicago's public housing is demolished to make way for new mixed-income communities, an unknown number of homeless squatters living illegally in vacant public housing units will also lose their housing. As illegal squatters, these residents have neither legal right to relocation services nor the right to return to revitalized developments. This study has two main research objectives. The first is to count the number of homeless people illegally living in Ida B. Wells, a public housing development slated for demolition. We hope that quantifying the extent of the homelessness problem at Wells will assist policymakers in developing an effective response. The second objective is to understand the squatters' current living situations, the factors that contributed to their homelessness, and their service needs.

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