"Does City-Subsidized Owner-Occupied Housing Improve School Quality?"

[Pamela Ann Cameron]

     In an article from the Spring 2011 Journal of the American Planning Association, the authors poised this interesting question: "Does City-Subsidized Owner-Occupied Housing Improve School Quality?"  The five authors begin by noting that many city planners are interested in "increasing subsidized owner-occupied housing as a mechanism to improve urban neighborhoods."  However, they explain that not much research has been done to validate the benefit of this proposed policy. So they purposed to do the research.  They used data from the New York City Department of Education and the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development.  The group of authors investigated "student characteristics, school resources, and school outcomes."  I believe that their conclusions at least deserve some thought.  They found that "the completion of subsidized owner-occupied housing is associated with a decrease in schools' percentage of free-lunch eligible students, an increase in schools' percentage of white students, and controlling for these compositional changes, an increase in scores on standardized reading and math exams."  When they looked at "investments in rental housing" they found "little, if any, effect."  The authors explain that they feel that their quantitative results in this study should encourage local governments to promote policies that encourage "the construction of subsidized owner-occupied housing.  They believe that their research "suggests that benefits from investments in owner occupancy may extend beyond the individual level, with an increase in subsidized owner-occupancy bringing about improvements in neighborhood school quality."

 

What do you think?

 

All of the quotes come from the following source:

Authors:    Chellman, Colin C.1
Ellen, Ingrid Gould 2
McCabe, Brian J.3
Schwartz, Amy Ellen 4
Stiefel, Leanna 4   

Source:    Journal of the American Planning Association; Spring2011, Vol.
77 Issue 2, p127-141, 15p