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Neighborhood Change
As community demographics shift and there’s neighborhood change, what are the issues affecting longstanding and new residents alike? When is change desirable, and when is it undesirable? How can it be turned to the benefit of those who need it most?
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Black Congregations Are Developing Housing on Church Land
Many Black churches in the U.S. are developing housing on their property, and becoming stronger activists in the fight for affordable housing.
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Demolishing Buildings, and Political Communities
Signs like the one above went up at Chicago’s Lathrop Homes a few Fridays ago. In 1999, the Chicago Housing Authority, in step with other housing authorities throughout the country, began […]
Engaging the Public Schools: Are You Ready?
Many community development organizations approach the issue of public education with trepidation. Too many public schools have been entrenched in mediocrity for too long. The politics are messy. Public schools […]
The Best Thing I Didn’t Hear All Week
I’m in Lexington, Ky., this week for the National Community Land Trust Network conference, hosted by the Lexington Community Land Trust. The Lexington CLT had an unusual start—it was created […]
Fighting Gentrification Through Collective Bargaining
For the past two years, the Crown Heights Tenant Union of Brooklyn has turned collective bargaining strategies on landlords—and policymakers.
Community Development and School Reform: Odd Bedfellows?
In my couple decades hanging around the community development field, I can’t count the number of times conversations about what’s needed to really bring back a struggling neighborhood or move […]
Interview with Richard Baron, CEO of McCormack Baron Salazar
It still surprises many people that Richard Baron, the CEO of one of the largest for-profit affordable housing developers, got his start in the field supporting public housing tenants in a rent strike.
Conflict and Placemaking in Humboldt Park: La Crucifixion
It took 10 years, but a local Chicago activist managed to save a mural that portrays Pedro Albizu Campos, the leader of the movement for Puerto Rican independence.
It’s Not Actually About Ownership
Private Property and Public Power: Eminent Domain in Philadelphia,
by Debbie Becher. Oxford University Press, 2014. 334pp. $30.50 (paper)
Purchase here.
Conflict and Placemaking in Humboldt Park: Paseo Boricua
The area surrounding Paseo Boricua is not exclusive space, but in a gentrifying part of the city, it is undeniably—and perhaps unavoidably—contested space.
The Gentrification Vaccine
Can a neighborhood be immune to gentrification? If so, can local governments and community organizations work together to build up that kind of immunity over time? We’ll soon find out […]
Do Developers Know They’ll Get Old, Too?
Mid-July marked the 20th anniversary of more than 700 Chicagoans dying in a heat wave. When the temperature peaked at 106 degrees on July 13, 1995, it was mostly the […]
Seattle Eyes Zoning’s Third Rail–Single Family Neighborhoods
My city of Albany, N.Y., is currently going through a rezoning process. Mostly this entails cleaning up a fragmented, inconsistent code that hasn't really been overhauled in 50 years to […]