"Slumburbs?"

http://www.citylab.com/2015/01/minorities-and-the-slumburbs/384680

Suburbia at night
Maureen Still via Flickr
citylab.com

Hello Everyone:

The problem of suburban poverty is not unique to Caucasian middle class families hit hard by rising property taxes and the collapse of the home mortgage crisis.  Minority families in suburbia have been severely affected as well. Today we are going to look at minorities in the suburbs.  Specifically, minorities in suburban areas following the collapse of the global economy.  To help us begin to understand this subject is Kriston Capps's article for CityLab titled "Minorities and the 'Slumburbs.'"

History tells us that Caucasian families left the inner cities in droves during the fifties and sixties, seeking the promise of larger homes, safer schools, and generally better lives then ones their ancestors experienced.  Minority families remained in the inner cities until they heeded the clarion call of a greener pastures.  Instead of the promise of a brighter future, minority families found a place decimated  by the "...subprime mortgage crises and the collapse of the global economy."

Slumburbs by day
gawker.com

Kriston Capps writes, "That's the theory behind 'slumburbia,' the notion that dark conditions that once characterized the inner city are following minorities as they pursue the American Dream to the suburbs."  The term "slumburbs" was used by Gawker's Hamilton Nolan to explain the rapid rise in suburban poverty and Timothy Egan of the also used the word in an opinion piece for the New York Times (opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com)  While the tempting knee jerk reaction would be to blame minority suburbanites, Mr. Capps suggests that there is a flaw in the current theory of growing suburban poverty and "the notion that the suburbs are contributing to the ever downward social and economic mobility for minorities relative to whites."

Post Civil Rights suburbs versus central city 2000-12
census.gov
citylab.com

In a new study, finds, in fact, minority households are doing better in some suburbs then others, referring specifically to the suburbs that have "matured" following the 1968 Fair Housing Act.  Most of the gains are in places the study refers to as "post-civil rights suburbs," with growing low-income and African-American residents.  The lead researcher for the study, Deirdre Pfeiffer of Arizona State University, used data gleaned from the 2000 Census and the 2013 American Community Survey to compare neighborhood conditions over time in eighty-eight American regions.  Ms. Pfeiffer compared the central cities (CC) and older suburbs, the housing markets in the "post-civil rights suburbs" (PCS) presented distinct features.  In the key factors: neighborhood poverty, college education attainment, and homeownership, the PCS communities worked better than the CC and older suburban communities.

Mother and daughter in a suburban kitchen
huffingtonpost.com  

In her study, Ms. Pfeiffer writes,

Living in the post-civil rights suburbs during the 200os and early 2010s usually meant having better and more racially equatable neighborhood conditions than living in the central city or older suburbs...Gains were greatest for African American and low-income households and smallest for whites and higher-income households.  With few exceptions, they persisted over time.

In cities such as: Houston, Texas; Richmond, Virginia; Tulsa, Oklahoma PCS neighborhoods presented more racial equality than the CCs or older suburbs in a startling 100 percent of the indicators, incomes, and periods, studied by Ms. Pfeiffer.  This was also true of Latinos living in PCS neighborhoods in Los Angeles and Asians living in Minneapolis, Minnesota.  In short, in fifty-seven out of eighty-eight regions, "neighborhood conditions in the post-civil rights suburbs were more racially equitable for minorities the majority of the time," elucidated the study.  Further, "Nine regions had more racially equitable conditions in the post-civil rights suburbs close to or fully 100 percent of the time."

Average gains in racial equity in neighborhoods
census.gov
citylab.com

While shedding light on how minorities are faring in suburbia, Kriston Capps writes, "This study doesn't dispel every fear associated with 'slumburbia.'  It dos help put those fears in proper context though: Controlling for housing age is key in assessing racial dynamic and suburbanization."  Deirdre Pfeiffer also writes, "The newer the housing and the greater the residential integration and income parity among racial groups in the post-civil rights suburbs as compared to the central city and older suburbs, the greater their racial equality."

Therefore, it would be safe to surmise that all is not bleak for suburban development, in terms of racial parity.  As Kriston Capps writes, "Indeed, newer suburbs demonstrated better parity and lasting equality than other neighborhood typologies over a difficult decade."  Sounding an optimistic note he continues, For black families and other minority households who have only ever been hurt by U.S. housing policy, post-civil rights suburbs may be the dream right now."  While yours truly concurs with Mr. Capps in not describing suburbs like Irvine, in Orange County, or Palmdale in Los Angeles County as "slumburbs."  What Palmdale, Irvine, Tinley Park and Bolingbrook near Chicago are good examples of what fair housing can be and serve as possible models for the future.