Sharply rising rents in the District have led to the virtual disappearance of low-cost private housing across the city, according to a new analysis by the DC Fiscal Policy Institute. Yet the District’s economy has left nearly half of its residents with stagnant incomes. As a result, a growing number of residents are forced to spend the majority of their income on rent and utilities, struggling each month to maintain stable housing and afford other necessities like food and transportation.
The new DCFPI report, Going, Going, Gone: DC’s Vanishing Affordable Housing, highlights the urgency of finding solutions to the District’s housing crisis. The Mayor and DC Council need to greatly increase investments to preserve the affordable apartments we have and to add new affordable housing to maintain the city’s economic vitality.
The number of low-cost apartments dropped nearly in half. The number of apartmentswith monthly rent and utilities below $800 fell from 58,000 in 2002 to only 33,000 in 2013, according to the report’s analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data.
It now appears the private market has very few, if any, low-cost units. The number of apartments with monthly costs below $800 roughly matches the number of federally and locally subsidized housing units. This suggests that subsidized housing is now virtually the only source of inexpensive apartments.
Rents have risen rapidly for virtually all residents. The impact has been greatest on low-income households who have not benefited from DC’s recent economic growth. Increasingly, moderate-income households also struggle to afford rent and utilities.
Two-thirds of low-income households – with incomes under $32,000 for a family of four – spend more than half their income on housing.
Even renters with incomes up to $54,000 are struggling, as one in three of these households pays the majority of its income towards rent.
The lack of affordable housing affects the ability of residents to thrive and the city to remain economically strong. Families that spend the majority of their limited budget on housing costs are forced to cut other necessities like food, health care, and transportation. The high cost of housing leads families to live in substandard housing, with problems like mold or rodents, and forces many to move frequently. Unstable and unhealthy housing puts stress on families that makes it hard for children to focus at school and for parents to keep a job, and leaves many at risk of homelessness.
The District’s leaders need to actively pursue policies that keep the few affordable apartments that remain available, while also adding to the supply of low-cost rental options. This includes funding important programs like the city’s local rent supplement program and the Housing Production Trust Fund. This could also mean strengthening Inclusionary Zoning rules so that new housing developments include more affordable options for low- and moderate-income residents.
Every year, District government lays out a plan for how much money it will take to meet our residents’ diverse needs—and keep the city running. It’s not just how much money, but where the money should go. Everything under the sun is in the budget, from street repairs to the police force to school lunches.
I say budget season because the whole process will go on for a number of months. Don’t be intimidated! It’s going to be fun!
Here are some of the important parts of the process:
Agency oversight hearings. Yesterday marked the start of agency oversight hearings. Between February and March, City Council committees will get to ask D.C. government agencies questions about their programs and how they use their funds. These hearings are one tool Councilmembers use to make decisions about what funding streams are effective and whether they are serving their purpose.
The Mayor’s budget proposal. While the council is holding oversight hearings, the Mayor will be preparing her own budget proposal, which she will release on April 2. Every year the Mayor sends the City Council a budget proposal outlining how she’d like to see all the services and programs the city provides funded. Mayor Bowser has indicated she is committed to putting resources behind fighting homelessness, and her budget proposal will send a clear message on whether she intends to stand by that commitment. One way to keep reminding her that it matters to us is by attending one or more of her three budget engagement forums this month.
Public hearings. Members of the City Council have another way of gathering information—public hearings. Through April and May, public hearings will be an opportunity for the citizens of D.C. to weigh in on the budget. By testifying, organizations and individuals can illustrate how budget decisions have a real impact on Washingtonians’ lives. As just one example, Hyacinth’s Place testified before the Committee on Housing and Economic Development last year about the Housing Production Trust Fund, one funding stream that makes permanent supportive housing programs like ours possible.
Mark-ups. Now that the committees have gathered information from government agencies, reviewed Mayor’s budget priorities, and heard input from real Washingtonians, they hold mark-ups, where they will craft the actual budget and vote to approve it. These mark-ups also take a number of weeks! But once the council has agreed on and passed a full budget in the form of a bill, they send it to the Mayor, who also has to approve it.
Hyacinth’s Place has hit the ground running, and we’ll be active throughout budget season. Like last year, we’ll advocate for the Housing Production Trust Fund and the Local Rent Supplement Program. We’ll also lend our support to our diverse partners who advocate for the many other programs that fight poverty in the District.
Here are some ways you can be involved.
– Check out the Fair Budget Coalition’s (FBC) budget priorities. Hyacinth’s Place worked with FBC to craft this comprehensive list of funding recommendations. It’s a great primer for all the important programs we’ll be fighting for this budget season.
– Tweet using the FBC’s hashtag #WeAreALLdc. You can also retweet us!
– Like us on Facebook for an easy way to get updates and see our latest blog posts.
– Come to the Mayor’s budget engagement forums over the next month. Email Vanessa@hyacinths.org if you’d like to attend.
– Attend council hearings or, if you can’t be there in person, stream them online.
– Testify at the public hearings! We’ll let you know when the time to sign up comes closer.
– Check out these other great resources: the Fair Budget Coalition, the Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development the D.C. Fiscal Policy Institute
It’s going to be a long haul, but we’re excited to be a part of the effort to make D.C. a safe and healthy place for all its residents to thrive!
How much longer will you be able to afford to live in Washington, DC? The Coalition for Nonprofit Housing & Economic Development believes all District residents deserve decent, quality housing at a price they can afford. Join them at this Saturday’s Housing For All Rally and find out what you can do to stop your impending displacement, because DC is our home.
As many of you know, there is much discussion about the future of the DC General homeless shelter. This morning, the Post’s Petula Dvorakstated, “Developers are salivating over D.C. General. It’s a huge property with plenty of potential. So there’s no question that it will be shut down and sold. That part of the plan no one is worried about.” Mayor Gray is rightly calling to rehouse those at the DC General shelter before closing it, but his plan is based on an unfounded belief that private apartment owners will now come forward and house the hundreds of families at DC General at rents far below market rates. Thus, in the interests of “salivating” developers, hundreds of homeless people are going to be displaced again? DC General is District property and could be renovated, maybe even employing homeless or near-homeless workers, if the District wanted to do so. However, developers and homeowners in the area are working hard for the “revitalization” of the DC General area, which they see as requiring the removal of their homeless neighbors. The deterioration of DC General is required as proof of the need for “revitalization.”
A few weeks ago, I went to a great panel discussion, “Racism in the New DC,” organized by Empower DC, which spoke to these issues from a very refreshing perspective. The speakers were three public housing residents working to maintain public housing and public schools in DC (Marlece Turner, D. Bell, and Shannon Smith), as well as Dr. Sabiyha Prince (the author of African Americans and Gentrification in Washington, DC), Ron Hampton (a former police officer and activist against police abuse), and Post columnist Courtland Milloy.
The main takeaway from the panel discussion was that institutional racism (not individual racist people but a racist system) works based on the idea that brown and black people do not deserve as good things as white people do. Improvements in the city are made for white people both because they often have more money and also because they are seen as deserving better things, like better schools and better services.
I asked the panel about a recent Post article that had said that, “Almost 10 years after the District vowed to assure low-income residents in four areas that they wouldn’t be displaced if their neighborhoods were revitalized,” the District decided that this was “overly optimistic.” The District was considering a policy change to “no longer guarantee that residents have a right to stay in their neighborhoods, and the promise that existing public housing won’t be demolished until a new building is constructed to replace it would be abandoned.” Empower DC and others have been warning people about these false promises for some time.
So, I asked the panel, is this a new policy? or is this a statement of what the District was already doing? Courtland Milloy immediately said, “They do what they can get away with.” He explained that, when District officials made these promises, they had to to make their redevelopment plans and the destruction of public housing palatable. Earlier, Milloy had stated that we need to acknowledge institutional racism and that these “revitalization” policies are in the interest of property owners and not in the interests of the homeless and other poor DC residents.
How can we change the situation in which “They do what they can get away with”? As a start, we might recognize that the journalist’s statement “So there’s no question that it [DC General] will be shut down and sold. That part of the plan no one is worried about” is not a statement of fact but rather a statement supported by those who are interested in this outcome and “can get away with” it. It is a political statement in the battle over space in the District. The next step would be to support a range of policies, including permanent public housing and permanent affordable housing in the District.
Johanna Bockman is a sociologist and curator of the blog Sociology in My Neighborhood: DC Ward Six. She has been working with Grassroots DC and the Potomac Gardens Community on the production of the documentary Potomac Gardens Inside and Out (which you’ll soon hear more about on this site and beyond). Below is a post from her site of particular relevance to DC’s public housing communities and anyone interested in increasing the amount of affordable housing in the District of Columbia.
My Gentrification Talk & Video
By Johanna Bockman
Last week, I gave the annual presidential address to the DC Sociological Society about gentrification in DC. You can view a video of my address below. I start with a bit of history about the DC Sociological Society, which has its own connections to gentrification in DC. I then define gentrification, show some historical trends and maps, and discuss four myths/narratives about gentrification.
The fabulous discussion afterwards covered a wide range of topics, but there were two that I found particularly interesting.
First, we talked about looking beyond the economic motivations behind gentrification to its political motivations. What are the political motivations behind gentrification? How is DC as a whole threatened by gentrification? As discussed in the talk, one former resident of the Arthur Capper public housing project told me: “It [Arthur Capper] was part of the District of Columbia…like a finger or an arm in the body of the District of Columbia…You just cannot destroy a community and expect the city to thrive and survive.” His comment was surprising to me at the time. What is the nature of this District he is talking about? How is it being destroyed?
Second, we talked about renters. Many amazing community organizers in DC are working to increase low-income home ownership, especially through limited-equity cooperatives. I argued that we should also work to support renters, including by maintaining and expanding public housing, because about 41% of DC residents are renters and those in low-income jobs can barely afford to pay rent, let alone to buy a place. What would have to change in DC and nationwide to create a good environment for renters, especially low- and very-low-income renters? How might we create a positive “renter nation“?
