The CHA's Plan for Transformation
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Program on Neighborhoods and Youth Development Overview, August 2010 CHA Families The CHA’s Plan for and the Plan for Transformation Transformation How Have Residents Fared? Susan J. Popkin, Diane K. Levy, Larry Buron, Megan Gallagher, and David J. Price This series presents findings from the tious effort to transform the agency’s dis- Chicago Panel Study, a follow up to the tressed public housing developments, “The goal of the Plan Urban Institute’s five-site HOPE VI Panel replacing most with mixed-income com- for Transformation Study, the only national study of outcomes munities and comprehensively rehabilitat- for families affected by HOPE VI revitaliza- ing the remaining properties. The ultimate was to convert tion (Popkin et al. 2002). The HOPE VI goal of the Plan for Transformation was to distressed public Panel Study tracked resident outcomes demonstrate that it was possible to convert across a broad range of domains from 2001 distressed public housing into healthy com- housing into healthy to 2005.1 The Chicago Panel Study is con- munities that would provide residents with communities.” tinuing to track the 198 sample households opportunities for a better life.2 from the Chicago Housing Authority’s The challenges the CHA faced in (CHA) Madden/Wells Homes. attempting to transform its public housing The CHA’s Plan for Transformation, were immense. The agency was one of the launched in October 1999, was an ambi- largest housing authorities in the country and had an extraordinary number of dis- tressed units—its plans called for demol- HOPE VI stands for Housing Opportunities for People Everywhere. Created by ishing or rehabilitating 25,000 units in all. Congress in 1992, the HOPE VI program was designed to address not only the The CHA’s troubles were the result of bricks-and-mortar problems in severely distressed public housing developments, but the social and economic needs of the residents and the health of surround- decades of neglect, poor management, and ing neighborhoods. The program was reauthorized in 2009 as part of the Choice overwhelming crime and violence. Further, Neighborhoods Initiative Act. Between 1993 and 2008, 247 distressed public CHA’s residents were especially disadvan- housing developments located in 130 communities in 34 states, the District of taged: because of the terrible conditions in Columbia, and Puerto Rico have received HOPE VI grants to effect redevelop- CHA’s family developments, many tenants ment. Chicago is the largest recipient of HOPE VI funds. who had better options had left long ago, The Chicago Panel Study research was supported with a grant from the John D. leaving behind a population dominated by and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Information on crime rates was used by extremely vulnerable families (Popkin et al. permission from Professor Wesley Skogan of Northwestern University. 2000). And, like most housing authorities, when the CHA began implementing its Urban Institute a nonpartisan economic and social policy research organization 1 Program on Neighborhoods and Youth Development revitalization plans, the agency had little Further, despite their improved quality of experience in providing case management life, most CHA families continue to live in or relocation counseling and struggled poor, predominantly African-American with developing adequate services. The communities that offer limited access to agency negotiated a Relocation Rights economic and educational opportunity. Contract with its resident leadership in 2000 that formally spelled out the CHA’s Chicago Panel Study obligations to leaseholders during the The Chicago Panel Study tracks the living transformation, including the services to be conditions and well-being of residents offered to residents while they waited for from Chicago’s Madden/Wells homes. permanent housing. By the time the CHA Built between 1941 and 1970, Madden/ moved into the later phases of relocation in Wells was one of the CHA’s largest public Madden/Wells, the agency’s relocation housing complexes, made up of 3,000 pub- and supportive service system had evolved lic housing units in four developments: the to become unusually comprehensive, and Ida B. Wells Homes, a low-rise develop- included both relocation counseling and ment first opened in 1941 to house black case management (Popkin 2010). war workers; the Wells Extensions; In October 2009, the CHA marked the Madden Homes; and the high-rise Darrow 10th anniversary of the Plan for Transfor- Homes (Bowly 1978). The complex was mation. The changes that the plan has located on the near south side of the city, wrought over the past decade have been dramatic and have changed the city’s land- close to Lake Michigan on the east and to “After 10 years, the scape. Most striking is the absence of the the sites of the former Robert Taylor and Stateway Gardens Homes on the west. story for CHA families massive high-rises that dominated some of the city’s poorest neighborhoods for half a The U.S. Department of Housing and is far more positive century. These developments have been Urban Development (HUD) awarded the CHA a $35 million HOPE VI grant in 2000 than we would have replaced with new mixed-income commu- nities that represent the best current think- to convert the Madden/Wells site into a predicted in 2001.” ing on how to create affordable housing mixed-income community. The CHA used without creating pockets of concentrated a staged relocation process for the develop- poverty. But while the physical impact of ment, closing sections as new units came the CHA’s transformation is evident, the on line; in 2005, 40 percent of the Chicago impact on the families that had lived in Panel Study sample were still living in the CHA’s distressed developments—and partially demolished site. Over the next endured its worst days—has been less several years, rapidly deteriorating condi- visible (Popkin 2010). tions led the agency to accelerate the relo- The purpose of the Chicago Panel cation process and close the development Study is to track the circumstances of CHA in August 2008. All of the public housing residents to assess how they are faring as on the site is now demolished and a new the Plan for Transformation progresses. mixed-income community called Oakwood Overall, as this series of briefs documents, Shores is gradually rising in its place. we find that, after 10 years, the story for For the HOPE VI Panel Study baseline CHA families is far more positive than in summer 2001, we surveyed a random many observers—including ourselves— sample of 198 Madden/Wells heads of would have predicted at the outset.3 household and conducted in-depth, quali- Regardless of where they have moved, tative interviews with seven adults and most families in our study are living in seven children. We followed up the sample considerably better circumstances. in 2003 (24 months after the baseline), sur- However, the study also highlights the veying 174 heads of household (88 percent serious challenges that remain, most signif- response rate) and interviewing six adults icantly, residents’ extremely poor health and six children. At the second follow-up and persistently low rates of employment. in 2005 (48 months after the baseline), we 2 Program on Neighborhoods and Youth Development surveyed 165 heads of household (83 per- eight years. The majority of former resi- cent response rate) and interviewed eight dents were using vouchers to rent a unit in adults and seven children. For the Chicago the private market (54 percent), nearly a Panel Study, we conducted a third follow third were living in public housing (29 per- up in 2009, completing surveys with cent), and the rest were no longer receiving 136 Madden/Wells heads of household housing assistance (17 percent). More than (69 percent response rate) and interviews half the residents that relocated to public with nine adults and nine children. The housing (18 percent of all respondents) largest source of attrition between 2005 were living in one of the CHA’s new and 2009 was mortality; we were able to mixed-income developments, mostly in locate, if not survey, nearly all sample Oakwood Shores. Less than 1 percent had members.4 become homeless. The biggest and most striking change 2005: A Glass Half Empty? since 2005 is that residents’ circumstances have improved, regardless of the type of hous- At the final round of the HOPE VI Panel ing assistance they have. In 2005, we found Study in 2005, we concluded that in that residents who were living in the pri- Chicago, as in the other four sites, the rede- vate market were faring far better than velopment effort had had some important those who were still living in public hous- successes—most residents living in the pri- ing. But in 2009, those differences have dis- vate market with vouchers were living in appeared, and nearly all Madden/Wells better housing in safer neighborhoods. respondents—even those who have moved Relatively few had returned to live in the to one of CHA’s remaining traditional pub- “Residents’ new mixed-income housing development, lic housing developments—report living circumstances have but those who had were faring well. in better quality housing in safer However, there were reasons for concern: neighborhoods. improved across residents’ health was extremely poor, mor- the board.” tality rates were worryingly high, and Ⅵ More than three-quarters of many former residents living in the private Madden/Wells respondents now say market were experiencing material hard- that their housing is in excellent or good ship, particularly difficulty in paying their condition and, in sharp contrast to 2005, utilities. Further, 40 percent of the respon- no public housing residents rate their dents were still living on-site in housing as “poor.” 5 Nearly all (84 per- Madden/Wells and enduring rapidly dete- cent) rate their housing as better than riorating conditions as building systems where they lived in Madden/Wells.