Tag: segregation

Magazines on wooden table on bright background.

Citational Racism: How Leading Medical Journals Reproduce Segregation in American Medical Knowledge

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Gwendolynne Reid, Cherice Escobar Jones, and Mya Poe

Biases in scholarly citations against scholars of color promote racial inequality, stifle intellectual analysis, and can harm patients and communities.

While the lack of citations to scholars of color in medical journals may be due to carelessness, ignorance, or structural impediments, in some cases it is due to reckless neglect.

Our study demonstrates that the American Medical Association (AMA) has failed to promote greater racial inclusion in its flagship publication, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), despite an explicit pledge to do so.

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FLINT, MICHIGAN January 23, 2016: City Of Flint Water Plant Sign In Flint, January 23, 2016, Flint, Michigan.

Digging Deep to Find Community-Based Health Justice

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Melissa S. Creary

Public health interventions aimed at Black and Brown communities frequently fail to recognize that these communities have, over and over, been made sick by the systems that shape their lives.

When we fail to recognize that these problems are happening repeatedly, we are likely to address the most recent and egregious error, ignoring the systemic patterns that preceded it. Public health and technological policy responses that do not address these underlying structural and historical conditions are a form of bounded justice, i.e., a limited response sufficient to quiet critics, but inadequate to reckon with historically entrenched realities.

By only responding to the acute crisis at hand, it is impossible to attend to fairness, entitlement, and equality — the basic social and physical infrastructures underlying them have been eroded by racism.

To achieve health justice, we must move beyond bounded justice. Rather than simply recognizing the existence of underlying social determinants of health, we must do the hard work to create and re-create systems, interventions, policies, and technologies that account for that erosion and offer high-grade reinforcements.

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Housing Equity Week in Review

Temple University Center for Public Health Law Research 1 Comment

An update from the world of housing law and equity, for the week of October 30-November 3, 2017

  • New viewpoint article in the Journal of the American Medical Association, from Megan Sandel, MD, MPH and Matthew Desmond, PhD, says investing in housing for health improves mission and margin.
  • An analysis from the Seattle Times asks, “Will allowing more housing types in some single-family zones make Seattle’s whitest neighborhoods more racially diverse?”
  • As sea levels rise, wealthy people can more easily afford to move to high ground, making gentrification worse, via Yale Climate Connections.
  • A new study finds a correlation between the number of patents a city produces and economic segregation within its limits, via the Atlantic.
  • Benjamin Somogyi argues in the Regulatory Review, to solve the next foreclosure crisis, look to Sacramento
  • New York, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., have approved funding to provide legal defense to low-income tenants at risk of eviction. A look at how free legal help could prevent evictions, via Huffington Post.

Housing Equity Week in Review

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Here’s the latest news from housing law and equity, from the week of August 21-28, 2017:

  • Economists from the Federal Reserve of San Francisco show the enduring negative effects of redlining on communities of color, via the New York Times.
  • The Atlanta Black Star published a review of the impact and persisting health effects of segregation on communities of color.
  • A new report by the Urban Institute shed light on the costs of segregation for metropolitan regions. Read a review of the report on How Housing Matters: https://howhousingmatters.org/articles/what-are-the-costs-of-segregation/
  • New York Magazine ran an expose about HUD under the leadership of Ben Carson
  • As relief efforts continue in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, we are reminded by the July 2016 piece on privately owned subsidized housing in flood areas in Houston, via the Houston Chronicle.

Housing Equity Week in Review

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Here’s the latest news in housing law and equity, for the week of August 15-21, 2017:

  • The Urban Institute has released a new tool about using fair housing data. The report contains details on data sources related to demographics and segregation, housing, land use, disability, education, employment, environment, health, and public safety.
  • The Washington Post reports that California lawmakers are planning on putting housing as a top priority after the summer.
  • Richard Rothstein, author of the critically acclaimed book The Color of Law, writes an op-ed for the LA Times about the role law plays in maintaining racial segregation in Los Angeles.
  • From the Brookings Cafeteria Podcast: How past racial segregation predicts modern-day economic (im)mobility.
  • Durham County, the county with the highest eviction rate in North Carolina, is taking on the eviction crisis by launching an eviction diversion program. Story via IndyWeek.
  • Bill de Blasio signed the first law in the nation to establish a right to counsel for the poor in housing cases. Story via CityLab.
  • New York Magazine and ProPublica collaborate on an in-depth look into Ben Carson’s HUD.

Housing Equity Week in Review

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Below is our weekly review of news and publications related to housing law and equity. This week — July 17-23, 2017 — included news about zoning, segregation and lead poisoning:

  • Dr. Herbert L. Needleman died on July 18. Dr. Needleman was a pioneer in the study of the impacts of lead on children’s cognitive ability. Dr. Needleman’s research was a catalyst for wide ranging safety regulations. His obituary appeared in the Washington Post.
  • Jake Blumgart of PlanPhilly writes for Slate on the neighborhood that he grew up in, the persistence of microsegregation, and the importance of continuing to push for diversity in neighborhoods.
  • ThinkProgress published a series of articles about lead poisoning.
  • Toledo considers Rochester, NY and its success in reducing the incidence of lead poisoning as a model, via the Toledo Blade.
  • The National Apartment Association and the National Multifamily Housing Council released a new report on the need of affordable housing units to meet demand in US metro areas by 2030.
  • After a long battle between the Westchester, NY, and HUD, the department decided that zoning in Westchester is not exclusionary, although similar data was rejected multiple times in the past. Story via the Journal News.

Housing Equity Week in Review

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We’re back after a few weeks’ hiatus because of summer holidays. There was much ado this week about the Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC), spurred by an article in the NY Times (third bullet down). Some of the conversation circling that article are captured in the subsequent bullets.

Here are the latest news stories in housing law and equity for the week of July 2-10, 2017:

  • Given the local context of housing policy, it is hard to find “one glove fit all” solutions. There is a growing consensus that zoning and  land use regulations have made the affordability crisis in booming cities such as New York City and San Francisco worse. Could the policy that harmed one area saved another? Richard Florida of CityLab argues that land use regulation saved the Rust Belt.
  • Suburbia is still largely thought of as white and affluent, while inner cities are thought of as poor and black. A new book by Scott Allard of the University of Washington, called Places in Need, debunks misconceptions about suburban poverty. The author was interviewed by CityLab.
  • The United States spends $8 billion each year in tax credits to provide more affordable housing. A The New York Times article on the Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) suggests the program entrenches segregation on the lines of class and race.
  • On the other hand, the Washington Post covers a Stanford study (originally published in NBER in April 2016) that shows that building LIHTC affordable housing developments into low income neighborhoods can increase property values and lead to income and racial integration.
  • Daniel Hemel, an assistant professor at University of Chicago school of Law, responds to the New York Times article, in his own post here.
  • In May 2016, Daniel Hertz of City Observatory responded to the Stanford study, pointing at methodological issues and challenging the study’s conclusion, here.

Housing Equity Week in Review

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It was a busy week in housing equity and the law! Here’s the news from the week of June 5-11, 2017:

  • The National Low Income Housing Coalition published Out of Reach 2017, a comprehensive report and tool to assess housing affordability in the U.S. The tool assess the rent-wage needed for a two bedroom unit in every county in the United States.
  • The National Fair Housing Alliance, along with other groups, is circulating an open letter the Senate to reject the CHOICE Act that was passed by the House of Representatives last week. The act, which the Alliance refers to as the “Wrong CHOICE Act,” is a deregulation attempt that strips elements of consumer and investor protection from Dodd Frank. These protections, the Alliance argues, had a significant impact mainly on consumers and borrowers of color. Read their statement.
  • Meanwhile, Senate Democrats led by Tim Kaine (D-Va.) introduced the Fair and Equal Housing Act of 2017, which will add sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes under the Fair Housing Act. The Act will be introduced soon and is accompanied by H.R. 1447: Fair and Equal Housing Act of 2017 that was introduced to the House of Representatives earlier this spring. Coverage via Housing Wire.
  • Mapping Inequality: Redlining in New Deal America is a tool by created by Robert K. Nelson et al. It allows users to explore credit worthiness maps in American cities of 1935-1940.
  • “The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America” is a new book by Richard Rothstein that explores the role of law in creating and maintaining racial residential segregation. He sat down last week with Ted Shaw at UNC-Chapel Hill and Rep. Gwen Moore (D-Wis.) to discuss his book. Watch a recording of the event here.
  • A report by New Jersey Future assesses changes New Jersey has made to their Low Income Housing Tax Credit Qualified Allocation Plans (QAP). The changes to the QAP are meant to move LIHTC developments away from concentrated poverty areas. The adjustment proved successful in locating LIHTC developments in high opportunity areas. Read more about this from New Jersey Future.