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Poverty Moves To The Suburbs

Posted by: Chris Steins
Thanks to: The Practice of New Urbanism
7 September 2004 - 5:00am

Peter Dreier discusses the growing poverty in America's suburbs and its possible political consequences.

"Both the number and proportion of the poor living in suburbs has increased steadily. In 1970 only 20.5 percent of the nation's poor lived in suburbs. By 2000, that had grown to 35.9 percent. And those trends have continued.

...As the affluent move to upscale enclaves, they bring expensive shopping malls with them, leaving behind older retail districts and abandoned industrial parks. The older housing stock in the troubled suburbs--built in the 1950s and '60s--now requires substantial repairs but many residents can't afford them, and many banks won't make loans anyway--a new kind of 'redlining.' "

Full Story: Poverty in the Suburbs
Source: The Nation, September 4, 2004
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“
The decision to abandon a property is a symptom of the loss of confidence. And while abandonment certainly affects confidence among surrounding homeowners, the most important question to answer is not "how do we deal with abandoned properties?" but "what is the most cost-effective way to restore market confidence, and how do abandoned properties fit into that picture?"
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