Exclusionary Housing Policies Revealed in Housing Database
The most comprehensive database of Massachusetts’ affordable housing inventory spotlights the use of age-restricted housing to maintain racial segregation, its creators say. In 44 cities and towns, not a single unit of non-age-restricted affordable housing has been built despite state laws such as Chapter 40B that make it easier for developers to build income-restricted projects.
Homelessness in US cities and downtowns
A rare bipartisan consensus is emerging in many U.S. cities on one key issue: the need to address homelessness, particularly in downtown central business districts. Many on both the right and the left are calling for strategies such as encampment sweeps, increased enforcement of quality-of-life offenses, and even scaling back federal dollars for evidence-based “housing first” policies to quell rising fears of public disorder, homelessness, and crime in “hollowed out” downtowns.
Gentrification & Displacement: An International Dialogue
In an era marked by rapid urbanisation, shifting demographics, and evolving socio-cultural urban spaces, gentrification has emerged as a process of transforming neighbourhoods. It is a complex and multifaceted urban phenomenon characterised by the influx of higher-income residents, more educated people, and investment or new green development in residential areas.
Can We Stop the Gentrification of Cities?
Gentrification is happening in cities all around the globe: an influx of more affluent residents and rising housing prices pushes out existing tenants, changing the character of a neighborhood or community. The process can be driven by a host of factors, from the economics of development to climate change. Thursday, October 26, through Saturday, October 28, the Initiative on Cities and BU’s Department of Sociology are hosting “Gentrification & Displacement: What Can We Do About It? An International Dialogue.”
High prices, years-long wait lists: Massachusetts needs more senior housing
Nearing 70 years old, Mary McPeak had long had a stable home in Greater Boston. But after a breakup four years ago, she suddenly found herself unmoored, couch-surfing at friends’ homes or renting a room while she faced years-long wait lists for affordable senior housing.
Then a break: McPeak “won the lottery,” figuratively and quite literally, when she was selected in 2020 by lottery for a new senior housing complex, the Brown Family House in Brookline run by 2Life Communities.
BU’s 5 NSF Grant Winners Are Changing Conversations in Robotics, Computing, Mass Incarceration, Neurology, and More
Behind their research on topics ranging from mass incarceration to the brain and lungs to delivery robots, five experts and scientists at Boston University have received Faculty Early Career Development Program (CAREER) awards from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to advance scientific research in their fields. The researchers receiving the awards are also laying the foundation for the next generation of scientists by using the funding to support students and youth educational programs and to diversify STEM.
Alice Coleman Obituary: Geographer who championed the idea of ‘defensible space’ in order to improve on the problematic designs of some high-rise estates
The geographer Alice Coleman, who has died aged 99, set out to prove that British modernist high-rise council estates were failing because their layout lacked “defensible space”, and that their problematic design reduced social interaction while encouraging crime and anti-social behaviour. In her book Utopia on Trial: Vision and Reality in Planned Housing (1985) Alice condemned such estates as failed idylls, criticising authoritarian and paternalistic planners within the Ministry of Housing, local government and the Department of the Environment. As an alternative she promoted modifications that she believed would tackle some of the problems inadvertently created by poor design.
Katharine Lusk Named Executive Director of the Planning Advisory Council
Mayor Michelle Wu today announced Katharine Lusk as the inaugural Executive Director of the Planning Advisory Council, which was created by an Executive Order signed by Mayor Wu in January and will establish a coordinated Citywide vision for Boston’s future and create accountability for delivering on that vision. The council will be composed of Cabinet officials, including those overseeing housing, parks, equity and inclusion, arts, and transportation, to ensure that long-range City planning includes those perspectives. Lusk began working in her role on May 1, 2023.
Most mayors say housing is the biggest challenge in U.S. cities, survey finds
After a tumultuous year in the housing market amid inflation and soaring interest rates, local governments of major U.S. cities are facing a slew of economic challenges. According to the Boston University Initiative on Cities’ 2022 Menino Survey of Mayors, which polled 118 mayors from U.S. cities with more than 75,000 residents, housing costs are at the forefront of those challenges, with 81% of mayors indicating that the issue is among their cities’ top economic priorities.
Report: Concern among mayors over housing costs dwarfs other issues
Soaring housing costs and rising inflation are driving up the cost of living in communities across the United States. Mayors are very concerned. More than 80 percent of mayors interviewed in the latest report from the Boston University Initiative on Cities’ annual 2022 Menino Survey of Mayors—which is based on interviews conducted last summer with 118 sitting mayors leading cities with populations greater than 75,000 people, representing 38 states—ranked housing costs as their top concern. The latest report covers economic, health and safety challenges faced by American city leaders.