Rachel Kleit - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Rachel Kleit

Cityscape, May 1, 2013

The notion of the dispersal of poverty was in some ways an argument about the power of place. Som... more The notion of the dispersal of poverty was in some ways an argument about the power of place. Some neighborhoods were places lacking social and economic opportunity. The people in such neighborhoods lived in concentrated poverty. If the problem was poverty concentration, then the answer must be dispersal. As Victoria Basolo (this symposium in Cityscape) points out, the policy world came to this answer in the early 1990s with little evidence that dispersal would really reduce poverty for people. At the time, the struggle to understand the causes of poverty was in earnest, as Basolo summarizes, "These arguments concerning the causes of poverty were not merely academic, because the persistence of poverty was a social problem without an effective policy." Concerns about poor places arose concurrently, especially concerns regarding what to do about dilapidated public housing (National Commission on Severely Distressed Public Housing, 1992).

Housing Policy Debate, 1999

Recently passed welfare reform legislation may have adverse impacts on the incomes of public and ... more Recently passed welfare reform legislation may have adverse impacts on the incomes of public and assisted housing residents and hence on the rental income of housing authorities. One way to dampen these impacts is to help welfare-reliant tenants find jobs. The Family Self-Sufficiency (FSS) programs sponsored by many housing authorities may be an important means of doing this. This article presents the findings of an early study of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's FSS program and explores the program's potential for dampening the impacts of welfare reform. The study involved a mail survey of the coordinators of 564 FSS programs. The survey results indicate a surprising lack of interest in the early FSS program among potential participants. The results also indicate that these programs are inadequately staffed, and that the programs' potential to dampen the effects of welfare reform are limited by the relatively small percentage of welfare-reliant residents enrolled.

Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, Jun 1, 2010

Public housing redevelopment has the potential to disrupt resident social support social networks... more Public housing redevelopment has the potential to disrupt resident social support social networks. In reaction to Curley’s (2009) finding that some relocated residents from the Maverick HOPE VI site were able to slough off non-reciprocal social support ties — ”draining ties” — this paper hypothesizes that relocation does not alter patterns of interaction. That is, if someone depended on neighbors for social support, they continued to do so; if someone was avoidant, they continued to do that. A promising direction for social interventions to support residents in their relocation may be to more deliberately help relocated residents maintain social support networks, so that those who were avoiding “draining ties” in public housing do not lose out on potentially beneficial social ties in their new settings.

Urban Studies, May 9, 2011

Because poverty in rural and urban areas of the US often has different causes, correlates and sol... more Because poverty in rural and urban areas of the US often has different causes, correlates and solutions, effective anti-poverty policies depend on a thorough understanding of the ruralness or urbanness of specific places. This paper compares several widely used classification schemes and the varying magnitudes of poverty that they reveal in the US. The commonly used ‘metropolitan/non-metropolitan’ distinction obscures important socioeconomic differences among metropolitan areas, making our understanding of the geography of poverty imprecise. Given the number and concentration of poor people living in mixed-rural and rural counties in metropolitan regions, researchers and policy-makers need to pay more nuanced attention to the opportunities and constraints such individuals face. A cross-classification of the Office of Management and Budget’s metro system with a nuanced RUDC scheme is the most effective for revealing the geographical complexities of poverty within metropolitan areas.

Housing Policy Debate, Jun 2, 2015

ABSTRACT

Journal of Urban Affairs, Feb 1, 2009

Marilyn M. Thomas-Houston and Mark Schuller, Homing Devices: The Poor as Targets of Public Housin... more Marilyn M. Thomas-Houston and Mark Schuller, Homing Devices: The Poor as Targets of Public Housing Policy and Practice (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2006).The role of government in public policy is...

Economic Geography, Nov 8, 2013

ABSTRACT Industrial clusters are widely understood as a worthwhile target of local economic devel... more ABSTRACT Industrial clusters are widely understood as a worthwhile target of local economic development resources. Nevertheless, most of the work on cluster development has asserted benefits that accrue to a regional economy as a whole, with little or no focus on specific links between clusters and poverty alleviation. This article seeks to understand the degree to which economic clusters are associated with lower poverty rates. Specifically, using spatial regression analysis techniques, we examine patterns that link clusters to poverty rates while controlling for the presence of other factors that shape the distribution of poverty in the United States. When controlling for other economic and demographic factors in a multivariate framework, the presence of industrial clusters is associated with lower poverty rates. Moreover, regions with a higher share of employment in clusters, and with that employment dispersed across many industries within the same cluster, fare even better than those where employment is concentrated in a single industry. Furthermore, while there is evidence that particular clusters are associated with significantly altered poverty rates, not all of these associations are beneficial.

Social Networks, May 1, 2011

Do mixed income housing programs increase the poor's social network diversity? Using unique, long... more Do mixed income housing programs increase the poor's social network diversity? Using unique, longitudinal, egocentric social network data, this research investigates changes in social network homophily for both Vietnamese and English-speaking original residents of a public housing redevelopment site. Changes in mixing occur for both those who return and those who moved away, but only increases in ethnic mixing were associated with returning to the new site. Thus, changes in social networks may be associated with disruption rather moving to a mixed-income site. Vietnamese residents also experienced increases in ethnic diversity compared to English-speaking respondents. The results raise questions about the social mixing intent of such programs. The high expectations for social network benefits of income mixing housing programs should be tempered.

Housing Policy Debate, 2006

This article is a replacement of the previous edition article by T.N. Clark, volume 4, pp. 2374–2... more This article is a replacement of the previous edition article by T.N. Clark, volume 4, pp. 2374–2378, © 2001, Elsevier Ltd.

The Encyclopedia of Housing, Oct 11, 2012

Housing Studies, 2005

In the United States since the mid-1980s, self-sufficiency programs have sought to transform publ... more In the United States since the mid-1980s, self-sufficiency programs have sought to transform public housing developments from permanent housing into way stations for low-income people. This article presents exploratory research on the predictors of success in these programs. Statistical analysis of longitudinal survey data from participants in an early public housing selfsufficiency program points to lack of previous welfare experience and the presence of prior vocational training as being predictors of program success. In-depth interviews suggest that having a high-school education is important for success, and any additional education prior to participating in a self-sufficiency program is helpful. Interviews also indicate that successful program graduates alienate themselves from social groups that discourage self-sufficiency.

Housing Studies, Oct 7, 2014

Public housing authorities (PHAs) in the U.S. have transformed from entirely public endeavors-usi... more Public housing authorities (PHAs) in the U.S. have transformed from entirely public endeavors-using federal funds-to public-private hybrids that must respond to market forces. As the recession began, PHAs were just beginning to experience the full effects of this transition. Using 13 cases studies of the largest PHAs in the Pacific Northwest, this paper outlines activities PHAs undertake in this devolved, market-based context. PHAs make trade-offs among paths that emphasize agency survival, producing housing for the poorest households, identifying as a non-profit housing provider, poverty alleviation, merging with another public agency, or closing. This diversity of responses points to the under-valued attribute of public housing authorities as local organizations with diverse mandates. Dependence on HUD, local charter, and the degree of integration with local government contributed to PHAs' propensity to develop non-HUD-assisted affordable housing. Even with this creativity, adequate resources are necessary to meet the demand for affordable housing for the poorest households as market conditions change. Rachel Garshick Kleit is Professor and Section Head of City and Regional Planning in the Knowlton School of Architecture at OSU. Her work has focused on the social impacts of housing on the lives of poor people, especially on the relationship between housing location, neighborhood composition, social networks, and access to opportunity. She has written on the social network impacts of housing programs that mix incomes, the HOPE VI public housing redevelopment program, housing self-sufficiency programs, housing choice processes for low-income people, immigrant and minority experiences of assisted housing programs in the US and on the role of the public housing authorities in the future of affordable housing. Additionally, she has been working on a stream of research addressing poverty more broadly, including the equity impact of economic development policies and the dynamics of fringe banking. She has published in a variety of journals, including Environment and Planning A, Housing

Journal of The American Planning Association, Jan 31, 2008

... Kleit a & Stephen B. Page a pages 34-44. ... Popkin, SJ, Buron, LF, Levy, DK and Cunningh... more ... Kleit a & Stephen B. Page a pages 34-44. ... Popkin, SJ, Buron, LF, Levy, DK and Cunningham, MK 2000. The Gautreaux legacy: What might mixed-income housing and dispersal strategies mean for the poorest public housing tenants?. Housing Policy Debate , 11(4): 911–942. ...

Housing Policy Debate, 1997

This article presents a longitudinal evaluation of the Gateway Transitional Families Program, an ... more This article presents a longitudinal evaluation of the Gateway Transitional Families Program, an innovative self-sufficiency program designed to help public housing residents leave public housing for their own homes. The evaluation followed participants and a comparison group over six years to isolate program impacts on employment and receipt of Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), food stamps, and housing assistance. Many participants dropped out of the program. Difficulty in juggling educational and child-rearing responsibilities, noncompliance with program or public housing regulations, low wages while in the program, impatience with the length of the program, and staff shortages and turnover contributed to the dropout rate. Those who finished the program experienced modest increases in income, decreases in receipt of AFDC and food stamps, and reduced reliance on housing assistance relative to comparison group members. Furthermore, graduates were more likely than comparison group members to have bought a home.

Journal of Regional Science, Aug 5, 2014

Journal of Urban Affairs, Sep 1, 2001

How does the level of dispersion of suburban public housing influence lowincome residents' neighb... more How does the level of dispersion of suburban public housing influence lowincome residents' neighborhood relations? An in-person survey of 253 public housing residents in suburban Montgomery County, Maryland, provides the data to address this question. Controlling for factors that predict neighborhood interactions as well as differences between scattered-site and clustered residents, the findings suggest that residents scattered among nonpoor households know their more diverse neighbors. Scattered-site residents know no fewer neighbors and are no less embedded in their neighborhoods than their counterparts who live in small clusters of public housing. They differ very little in the amount of aid received from their neighbors. However, they feel less emotionally close to their neighbors. The implications of these findings for the provision of housing for the poor in nonpoor areas are discussed. Over the past 20 years, poverty has increasingly become concentrated in metropolitan areas. Between 1978 and 1996, the poverty rate in nonmetropolitan areas grew by 18% compared to 27% in metropolitan areas and in central cities alone (Institute for Research on Poverty, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1998). Central cities also have higher poverty rates than nonmetropolitan areas: in 1996, the poverty rate in nonmetropolitan areas was 16% compared to 20% for central cities alone (Institute for Research on Poverty, 1998). Furthermore, the construction of public housing in only low-income areas prior to the Civil Rights movement additionally concentrated poverty (Burby & Rohe, 1989; Coulibaly, Green, & James, 1998). The intensifying concentration of poverty in the central city has been associated with numerous social problems such as high teen pregnancy rates, high rates of school dropout, lack of job attachment among adults, and high involvement in criminal activity (Ellen & Turner, 1997; Jencks & Mayer, 1990; Wilson, 1987). Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 laid the foundation for decreasing poverty concentration by making both housing integration and housing choice a legislative priority (Gal

Housing Policy Debate, 2001

... Furthermore, living in a poor neighborhood does not necessarily mean that all neighborhood ti... more ... Furthermore, living in a poor neighborhood does not necessarily mean that all neighborhood ties are local or close ... The geographic location of the social network does not in general necessarily influence an individual's ability to find 546 Rachel Garshick Kleit ...

Environment and Planning A, Aug 1, 2005