Changes in Federal Public Housing Policy Since 1990, Essay Example

Public housing is available in over 3500 communities nationwide and assists 2.3 million Americans. Two out of every three people in public housing is elderly or has a disability. Almost a half a million families with young children receive federal housing assistance. Over the past decade, significant changes have taken place.

Pubic housing for the poor as been an option of last resort for the past thirty years. Historically, the federal housing policy of the United States has favored the neediest citizens. Drastic policy changes came about twenty years ago. At about that time, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the $5 billion HOPE VI program began promoting mixed-income housing. Families received relocation assistance as vouchers for housing in the private housing sector were exercised. The goal for this was to spread out poverty so that neighborhoods might know decreases in concentrations of poverty. Traditional housing projects were notorious for perpetuating the cycle of poverty and for sheltering criminal behavior.

For many people, HOPE VI seems to have met its basic goals. Most voucher recipients have moved to places where they report safer, less poor conditions. Public housing, however, generally has failed to address the needs of those hardest to house. The people in this group are also the hardest to relocate. Many of these people need more assistance than the standard relocation package allows. Typically, the hardest to house are grandparents who care for grandchildren and those with disabled members. Outside of public housing there are few options for many of these people.

For one thing, housing projects have been systematically dismantled. Most high rise project buildings have been demolished. Most of the ones remaining are in large urban centers such as New York. Now, a much smaller percentage of public housing resides in poorer neighborhoods. Outside of New York City, only 11 percent of units across the country are general-occupancy units in high-poverty areas. Public housing dwellings are structurally more sound than they were 10 years ago.

Over the last two decades, federal policy has not yielded sufficient funds to maintain units that require routine maintenance. If 10 percent, or about 100,000 of existing units were to be torn down and replaced, it would take in excess of 30 billion dollars to do it. If, year after year, funding shortfalls continue, then recent overall progress with public housing will be threatened.

Conversations persist about giving vouchers to families to be used in the private rental market. Vouchers, it is argued, increase available options for needy families. Those opposed to housing vouchers do so for three primary reasons. First, they say, public housing serves disabled people groups better than do voucher plans because of their mobility issues. Second, it is believed, some geographic areas do not have sufficient numbers of affordable housing to meet the needs of those currently in public housing. Third, some claim that actual costs to operate federal housing, over the long run, would be more if vouchers remain and proliferate than it would be to stay the course with properties that have already been purchased and developed for the purposes of public housing.

More money needs to be put into the renovation of existing public housing. Existing developments need to be revamped so that different communities can emerge over time. In some cases, vouchers might be a good thing. Large, low-opportunity developments need to be transformed into mixed-income communities. Policy makers say that the most common solution for large failed projects today is the demolition and reconstruction of fewer units on a smaller scale.