Deconcentration: What Do We Mean? What Do We Want?

Jill Khadduri, Abt Associates Inc.

Abstract

The term deconcentration has become central to Federal housing policy, with a variety of meanings:
  • Creating income diversity within public housing developments that continue to be owned and operated by public housing authorities under the rules of the public housing program.
  • Creating income diversity in new or redeveloped housing projects, including former public housing projects redeveloped under the HOPE VI program.
  • Encouraging the use of tenant-based housing vouchers for families to locate in neighborhoods that will improve the life opportunities of family members.
But what neighborhoods should we encourage families using vouchers to move to, and what do we actually mean by income diversity within a housing development? Neither policy nor research has yet provided clear answers to these two questions, which will be the focus of this article.

Deconcentration: What Do We Mean? What Do We Want? (*.pdf)