Sprawl, Inequity and Economic Opportunity in Ohio

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Sprawl, Inequity and Economic Opportunity in Ohio
Presentation to The McSweeney Ohio Land Use
Conference The Ohio State University Extension
Land Use Team September 14th 2007

• Jason Reece, AICP
• Senior Researcher
• Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race
  Ethnicity
• The Ohio State University

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Todays Discussion

• How does land use and sprawl impact inequity in
  Ohio?
• What is the societal cost of inequity and poor
  land use decisions in Ohio?
• Urban and rural Ohio
• Shared challenges and linked fates
• Producing Change
• Regional equity, cooperation and opportunity

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Whats at Stake

• Ohio is at a crossroads it can either embrace a
  bold new commitment to regional cooperation,
  sustainable land use policy, fairness, and
  opportunity for all, or continue on a path of
  inequitable growthand risk being left behind in
  the 21st century global economy

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The States Economic Challenges 2000 to 2005

• Unemployment rate is sixth highest in nation
• Significant job loss
• Ohio leads the nation in foreclosures and is
  second in personal bankruptcies

• Population in poverty increase from 12 to 17
• Ohioans receiving food stamps rise 29
• Economic growth rate ranked 45th in the nation

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Comparative Regional Socio-Economic Health
Great Lake States
Many Ohio regions fare poorly in respect to
socio-economic health when compared to other
large Midwestern regions.
Ranking calculated from a 8 indicator index
measuring various economic, population and
socio-economic conditions for the metropolitan
regions.
Index Factors Business Starts, Job Change,
Poverty, Educational Attainment, Unemployment,
Population Growth, Housing Development, Vacancy
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Urban Ohios Problems are Everyones Problems

• The health of Ohio is intricately tied to the
  health of its metro regions rural areas
• .and the health of its regions and rural areas
  are impacted by sprawling land use patterns and
  racial/social inequities
• The fate of all Ohioans are linked together and
  we must collectively address Ohios urban
  challenges
• We will not have a healthy Ohio without equitable
  and vibrant cities/regions and sustainable rural
  areas
• You can not save Ohios farms without saving its
  cities

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How does land use and sprawl impact inequity in
Ohio?
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Land Use and Inequity

• What is sprawl?
• Uncoordinated, disjointed, low density and
  inefficient development/land use policy
• Sprawl is not natural but a reflection of poor
  and outdated policy
• A disorganized movement of the states investment
  from existing communities to a few select
  communities
• The favored quarter
• A government subsidized/supported redistribution
  of Ohios wealth and resources

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The Side Effects of Sprawl

• Sprawl has many documented side effects
• Environmental degradation
• Displacing agriculture
• Quality of life impacts
• Segregation and inequity
• By pushing good jobs, stable housing, and
  educational opportunities further into the
  suburbs, sprawl creates segregated, impoverished
  areas

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Segregation, Inequity Sprawl

• Sprawl actively works to disconnect marginalized
  communities from opportunity
• Pushing limited resources away from existing
  communities
• Segregating people from opportunity
• Space is how race plays out in American
  society-and the key to solving inequities in
  housing, transportation, education, and health
  careSprawl is the new face of Jim Crow. -- john
  powell
• This is not a natural phenomena or just the free
  market in action, it is a result of policy

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Policies Enforcing InequityHistorical
Government Role

• If a neighborhood is to retain stability, it is
  necessary that properties shall continue to be
  occupied by the same social and racial classes.
  A change in social or racial occupancy generally
  contributes to instability and a decline in
  values.
• Excerpt from the 1947 FHA underwriting manual

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Policies Enforcing Inequity Contemporary
Government Role

• The exclusion and segregation produced by sprawl
  is not natural or neutral it results from
  government policies, such as
• Zoning laws prevent affordable housing in many
  growth areas
• Housing policies concentrate subsidized housing
• Municipalities subsidize the relocation of
  businesses out of the city
• Transportation and infrastructure spending
  favoring highways, metropolitan expansion and
  urban sprawl
• Court decisions prevent metropolitan school
  desegregation
• School funding is tied to property taxes
• These factors support racial/social segregation
  and isolation from opportunity

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Why Care About Segregation?

• Because neighborhoods conditions impact our lives
  in significant ways
• Where you live is more important than what you
  live in
• Housing, in particular its location, is the
  primary mechanism for accessing opportunity in
  our society
• Housing location determines the quality of
  schools children attend, the quality of public
  services, access to employment and
  transportation, health risks, access to health
  care and public safety
• For those living in high poverty neighborhoods
  these factors can significantly inhibit life
  outcomes

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Housing location determines access to schools.
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jobs
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neighborhood amenities
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How Does Sprawl and Segregation Impact
Marginalized Populations?

• Sprawl and segregation cause detrimental impacts
  to urban marginalized communities in multiple
  ways
• Education
• Disinvestment neighborhood quality
• Economic Opportunity
• Producing opportunity deprived neighborhoods

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Sprawl, Inequity Education
Produces Dysfunctional Schools
Sprawl
Segregation
50 years after the Brown Decision, Americas
schools have re-segregated into affluent white
districts and poor under-funded African American
and Hispanic districts
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Economic Segregation and Racial Segregation in
Public Schools Cleveland and Akron High Poverty
Schools (Red and Yellow) are Concentrated in
African American Neighborhoods (Areas in Gray)
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Cycle of School Segregation
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Sprawl and Disinvestment in Urban Communities

• Decades of suburban flight have drained low
  income inner city neighborhoods of people,
  business and investment
• High vacancy rates and poor investment harms the
  quality of life for inner city residents and
  limits the resources (tax base) for low income
  communities

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Sprawl without Growth

• Ohio is developing rapidly without the population
  growth to justify the rapid expansion
• This creates too much surplus housing and further
  exacerbates the vacancy problem

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Measures of Ohios sprawl
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Disinvestment and Abandonment

• In Ohios 6 largest regions the average African
  American neighborhood has approximately 2x the
  amount of vacant housing than the average white
  neighborhood

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Sprawl, Inequity and Economic Opportunity

• Jobs have moved away from the labor pool in many
  metropolitan areas, making connecting job-seekers
  with jobs a challenge which is compounded by poor
  public transportation
• 40 of all suburban jobs cannot be reached by
  public transportation
• Public investment disproportionately favors
  highways over public transportation
• Over half of the African American population is
  physically segregated from employment
  opportunities

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Projected Job Growth Franklin County Area
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Quantifying and Mapping Communities of Opportunity

• We understand what is indicative of a high
  quality community or neighborhood
• Employment opportunities
• Stable, safe environments
• Good schools
• We can also look at this with data and map out
  areas of high and low opportunity in our State

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Similar Trends Can Be Seen in the Columbus Area
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What is the cost of inequity and poor land use
policy in Ohio?
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Inequities Impact Everyone

• The health of our cities, the sustainability of
  the regions/rural areas, and the wellness of its
  people are all related
• Gaps in educational attainment impair the States
  competitiveness in the new global skill-based
  economy
• Unjust policies and racial and economic isolation
  deplete opportunities for residents in our cities
• The competition between cities and suburbs
  produces an economically dysfunctional State

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Inequities Impact Everyone

• How do disparities harm our State?
• Wasted Creative Capacity. The wasted creative
  capacity associated with a lack of social,
  economic and educational opportunity drags down
  the competitive strength of the entire State
• Fragmented Economic Voice. To attract investment
  in the global economy, regions/States must act
  collectively to promote themselves, and they must
  align key infrastructure and assets to be more
  innovative, efficient and competitive

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Inequities Impact Everyone

• How do disparities harm our State?
• Paying for Exclusion. The residential segregation
  in our metropolitan regions is fueled by
  exclusionary housing policies, but these policies
  come at a price for all residents
• Inefficient Infrastructure and Government
  Services. Regions that are highly fragmented into
  hundreds of local governments are often
  inefficient with respect to infrastructure and
  government services

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Inequities Impact Everyone

• How do disparities harm our State?
• Sprawl and Quality of Life. As the State becomes
  more polarized between opportunity-rich and
  opportunity-poor communities, residents keep
  moving in order to chase the elusive
  opportunities left in the State
• The environmental impact of greenfield
  development, and increased traffic congestion
  (and fuel cost) impairs the quality of life for
  everyone in the region
• The Central Citys Untapped Potential. Urban
  areas are often our cultural, educational and
  medical centers and a signpost of regional health
  and identity

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Urban and Rural OhioShared Challenges and
Linked Fates
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Rural and Urban Ohio

• Rural and Urban Ohio
• Different symptoms, shared challenges
• Urban communities are not the only areas dealing
  with disinvestment or being disrupted by the
  dynamics of sprawl (examples)
• Growing rural areas which are being disrupted by
  growth and development
• Rural areas facing disinvestment and limited
  access to opportunities such as jobs, high
  quality education, infrastructure
• This presents a unifying theme to build
  coalitions to address the States dysfunctional
  land use and development patterns

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Shared Challenges Viewing Areas of Educational
Opportunity in the State of Ohio
The following map presents areas of high (dark
colors) and low (light colors) educational
opportunity in the State. (Based on index of
school quality and assessment of barriers to
educational attainment). Note that many rural
and urban communities face similar education
challenges.
Map Prepared by the Kirwan Institute for The Ohio
State Economic Access Initiative
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Education

• Better educational attainment can benefit all
  Ohioans by increasing the states ability to
  attract and retain economic investment and
  spurring innovation from Ohios population
• Structural impediments (funding, concentrated
  school poverty) reduce the educational outcomes
  for many Ohio students, impacting the entire
  state
• A diverse coalitions will be needed to create the
  political will needed to reform Ohios
  educational structure

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Producing ChangeAn Opportunity Oriented Model
of Land Use Policy and Community Development
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What is the Alternative?

• A number of policies and models could improve the
  future of Ohio by addressing racial/social
  inequity and guiding growth and development
• Expanding our view of the problem
• Understanding the linkage between Ohios urban
  and rural areas
• Understanding the linked fate of all Ohio
  communities
• Looking at factors outside of land use (ex.
  Education)
• Regional cooperation and regional equity
• An opportunity oriented model of development

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Regional cooperation and growth

• Regional efforts must be fair advocate for
  equitable investments in all people, in all
  communities
• Combat segregation, isolation, disconnection from
  opportunity
• Regionalism does not require regional government
  (municipal consolidation) but requires regional
  foresight and cooperation
• What is the opportunity cost of doing nothing?
  Continued sprawl, disinvestment, economic and
  educational disparities all of which make our
  State unattractive to knowledge workers and
  companies

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Principles for Equitable Regionalism

• The success of equitable regionalism for
  Cleveland rests on the following principles
• Create and grow communities of opportunity in
  distressed areas
• Work to reduce the destructive, inefficient
  competition among communities in the State
• Cooperatively manage sprawling development so as
  not to subsidize dysfunctional growth patterns
• Improve the educational outlook for all of the
  States children

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Examples of Smart Growth or Regionalism that
Promotes Racial and Regional Equity (1)

• Housing Initiatives
• Inclusionary zoning, opportunity based housing,
  workforce housing
• Growth Control Initiatives
• Growth management (that preserves affordable
  housing in areas of opportunity)
• Tax Sharing Initiatives
• Tax base sharing, income tax strategies
• Public Infrastructure Initiatives
• Reinvestment in existing communities
• Removing subsidies associated with sprawl

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Examples of Smart Growth or Regionalism that
Promotes Racial and Regional Equity (2)

• Transportation Initiatives
• Equitable transportation spending, public transit
  investments
• Public Education Initiatives
• Regionalized school districts, economic
  integration, magnet schools, school mobility
• Reducing reliance of property taxes for schools
• Inner City Redevelopment
• Land bank programs, increasing homeownership,
  minority and small business development

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