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

Recipients of housing assistance under the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Public Housing and Housing Choice Voucher programs can keep their benefits as long as they remain income eligible and abide by program requirements. Under HUD's MTW demonstration, however, a small number of housing agencies that administer these programs chose to impose time limits on various program benefits, including housing assistance. This report documents their rationale for doing so, companion policy and programmatic changes they made in conjunction with time limits, their design decisions and implementation experiences and, to the extent knowable, effects on recipients and housing agencies.

Is there a correlation between exposure to racially integrated, low poverty areas and employment outcomes? Does moving from a poor, inner city neighborhood to a less poor area bring greater proximity to job opportunities, or contacts with new networks of neighbors who might steer movers to jobs? Does living in a community where more people work increase motivation to work or to increase income? In examining these questions for the MTO experimental movers, this brief finds that factors in addition to where people live affect their employment and earnings.

The HOPE VI program has invested over $6 billion in federal funds for the redevelopment of severely distressed public housing. Drawing on the existing research evidence, this study systematically compares the costs (both monetary and nonmonetary) of maintaining severely distressed public housing developments to the potential costs and benefits of effectively revitalizing them. An effective redevelopment strategy can dramatically improve living conditions for families, resulting in better physical and mental health and increased employment and earnings. Moreover, redevelopment can trigger the revitalization of previously blighted communities. These outcomes also save public resources. In fact, for a typical distressed public housing project, mixed-income redevelopment can save the public more than $20 million over 20 years.

Fear of crime has profound implications for residents, causing stress and social isolation; relocation has brought about a dramatic positive impact on residents’ life circumstances. Those residents who left traditional public housing—voucher holders and unassisted renters and homeowners—are now living in neighborhoods that are dramatically safer than their original public housing developments. These improvements in safety have had a profound impact on their quality of life; they can let their children play outside, they are sleeping better, and are feeling less worried and anxious overall. However, those who remain in traditional public housing developments are still living in extremely dangerous circumstances, little better than where they started.

A 2007 proposal to reauthorize HUD’s HOPE VI public housing revitalization program requires local housing agencies to establish partnerships with school superintendents. The purpose is to devise comprehensive educational reform and achievement strategies for improving schools serving HOPE VI neighborhoods. Five situations where HOPE VI revitalization and school improvement have already occurred, however, suggest wide variation; each was context-sensitive and tended to be an opportunistic experiment cut from different cloth. Absent a uniform model, there is a need to know more about what incentives, which local stakeholders, and what kinds of partnerships produce improved educational outcomes before establishing uniform requirements.

The HOPE VI program has invested over $6 billion in federal funds for the redevelopment of severely distressed public housing. Drawing on the existing research evidence, this study systematically compares the costs (both monetary and nonmonetary) of maintaining severely distressed public housing developments to the potential costs and benefits of effectively revitalizing them. An effective redevelopment strategy can dramatically improve living conditions for families, resulting in better physical and mental health and increased employment and earnings. Moreover, redevelopment can trigger the revitalization of previously blighted communities. These outcomes also save public resources. In fact, for a typical distressed public housing project, mixed-income redevelopment can save the public more than $20 million over 20 years.

Children in the HOPE VI Panel Study sample face enormous challenges in becoming successful adults. Despite these challenges, some children do surprisingly well and seem able to cope effectively with the challenges in their environment. This report reviews existing research from a range of social science disciplines to identify key factors related to resiliency and to understand how these factors protect children from negative outcomes. Then, using data from the HOPE VI Panel Study, we explore which of these factors are related to resiliency in our sample of children from HOPE VI developments.

The HOPE VI program can profoundly affect the lives of children, who are the most vulnerable residents of distressed public housing and particularly likely to suffer from the stress of relocation. However, some children in the HOPE VI Panel Study are doing surprisingly well, apparently succeeding in school and thriving despite the challenges they face. In this brief, we explore the factors that help make these children better able to cope successfully with the obstacles in their environment. We find that children of better-educated parents, children whose parents are highly engaged in their schooling, and socially competent children are more likely to be resilient, while children with depressed parents are less likely to be resilient.

The HOPE VI program can profoundly affect the lives of children, who are the most vulnerable residents of distressed public housing and particularly likely to suffer from the stress of relocation. This brief examines the impact of the program on children and youth. We find that children in the HOPE VI Panel Study have generally benefited from relocation. Relocatees live in better housing in safer neighborhoods, and their children attend schools that are less poor and, the parents believe, higher quality and safer than those in their original developments. Respondents who relocated with vouchers have benefited more than those who moved to other public housing. These findings suggest that families with children should be encouraged to select vouchers and receive ongoing support to help them adjust after relocation.

The Moving to Work (MTW) demonstration was launched by HUD in the late 1990s to permit a small number of local and state housing agencies (HAs) to experiment with limited deregulation. This demonstration was not designed with the rigorous controls or monitoring that would be required to definitively measure impacts, but it does provide valuable insights on the types of changes HAs make in response to regulatory flexibility, the implementation challenges they face, and implications for ongoing policy discussions about federal housing policy.

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