Urban across the Country

Urban’s researchers partner with state and local leaders to provide the evidence, tools, and support they need to improve lives and strengthen communities. This work includes strategic advising to translate research into action, program evaluations to measure effectiveness, and research and data analysis to inform decisionmaking. Our experts develop custom data tools and modeling to support equitable resource allocation and lead community-engaged research and convenings to ensure policies reflect local priorities.

Use this page to explore Urban’s work. Search by region to see examples of our research, and filter by evidence and products to narrow results by topic or type of work.

Dive deeper into your state and community with our data tools. View highlighted tools below, select “Data tools” under “Filter by Product Types,” or head directly to our data tools page.

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Explore our work by state
Research Report Privatization of Public Social Services
This report provides a general overview of the extent of privatization of public services in the areas of social services, welfare, and employment; rationales for privatizing service delivery; and evidence of effectiveness or problems. Examples highlight specific types of privatization and actual
Research Report Straying from Tax Policy Principles
Senior Fellow Eugene Steuerle discusses the challenges and necessity of following a set of principles in developing optimal tax policy.
Research Report Big, Big Postcard
The Congressional leadership that crafted the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 wants the tax system to be so simple that taxpayers can fill out a tax form on a postcard. Judging by some of the choices they made in the new law (with lots of help from the President), they had in mind a postcard the size of
Research Report Agency for Housing Mortgage Lending Business Preparation
The advisors prepared the first two phases of a systems plan for the Agency. The first phase focused on the automation targets, timeframes and requirements. The second phase compared software and vendors for their capability and experience. This was followed by the implementation requirements
Brief Restore Benefits to Legal Immigrants or Face a Poverty Dead-End
[Los Angeles Times California: Government policies and farm economics are creating a sub-population of trapped workers and families. The long-awaited final report of the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform released two weeks ago calls for stepped-up efforts to draw immigrants into our cultural
Research Report Building Community Capacity to Use Information
This paper focuses on building the capacity of leaders and residents of poor neighborhoods to enhance the community building process by using information effectively. Topics covered include the following: assessing community information capacity, strengthening social and technological communication
Brief The New Children's Health Insurance Program
States have a great deal of flexibility in how they design their new State Children's Health Insurance Programs (S-CHIP), enacted as part of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. This brief explores the implications of using the new matching funds to expand Medicaid or to develop or expand current
Brief Welfare Reform and the Devolution of Immigrant Policy
In this brief, the authors argue that the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) embodies a fundamental shift in the locus of immigrant policy from the federal government to states and localities. The new policy fragments what had been uniform national rules set by