Clear all

3 results found

reorder grid_view

CHA Residents and the Plan for Transformation

January 1, 2013

This series of policy briefs presents findings from more than a decade of research on the people who lived in Chicago Housing Authority properties when the agencylaunched its Plan for Transformation in October 1999. The ongoing, multiyear effort sought to improve resident well-being by renovating or demolishing decaying public housing properties and replacing them with new, mixed-income development.

Chronic Violence: Beyond the Developments

January 1, 2013

As part of its ambitious Plan for Transformation, the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) demolished thousands of distressed public housing apartmentsin high-rises that all but defined entire neighborhoods on Chicago's South and West sides. As the CHA moved forward with the Plan, it encountered serious challengeswith resident relocation. In response to these issues and pressure from advocates and researchers, the agency established relocation and case management services for residents, first through the Service Connector and then through FamilyWorks.As it became clear that some residents would require more help than its basic programscould provide, the CHA began collaborating with the Urban Institute and two service providers to test the feasibility of a more intensive case management program. The Chicago Family Case Management Demonstration began in 2007 and provided residents from two of CHA's remaining developments with wraparound services, including case management, transitional jobs, literacy training, and relocation counseling. After five years of tracking participants, many have experienced employment and health gains, improved housing and neighborhood conditions, and reduced levels of depression, worry, and anxietyAlthough CHA families' overall quality of life has improved and the Demonstration showed promising improvements for even the highest risk adults, none of these changes appear to have affected the life trajectories for their children and youth. This brief reports the long-term outcomes for participants in the Chicago Panel Study (Panel Study) and the Chicago Case Management Demonstration (Demonstration). In each study, we asked parents about one or two "focal children" per household.

An Improved Living Environment, But...

January 1, 2013

In 2000, the CHA received a HOPE VI grant to revitalize the Madden/Wells community by demolishing the nearly 3,000-unit dilapidated development and replacing it with a new mixed-income community named Oakwood Shores. Another development, Dearborn Homes, was slated for revitalization a few years later and was often used to house residents from other CHA developments targeted for demolition who were reluctant to leave CHA housing or had not qualified for mixed-income housing or vouchers.The plan for Dearborn Homes was to substantially rehabilitate its buildings.For over 10 years, the Urban Institute has been researching the outcomes of residents from these developments. This brief examines whether and to what extent the original residents of these distressed developments ended up in an improved living environment 3 to 10 years after relocating from Madden/Wells (the Panel Study sample) or 1 to 3 years after relocating from either Madden/Wells or the Dearborn Homes (the Demonstration sample).In general, these CHA families live in better housing in substantially safer, but still very poor, neighborhoods. Yet these gains are fragile; relocatees experience significant material hardship, and too many of those who have moved with vouchers live in neighborhoods where drug traf?cking and violent crime remain significant problems.