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]]>Isaiah J. Poole: Communities can do more than just put a Band-Aid on the problem of gentrification and displacement, and a panel of researchers who held a forum at the Democracy Collaborative’s offices in Washington discussed the best thinking and work happening on both sides of the Atlantic to keep housing affordable for everyone.
In a panel entitled “The Politics of Land and Housing,” The Democracy Collaborative’s Jarrid Green and Peter Gowan were joined by Laurie Macfarlane, who is based in Edinburgh, Scotland and is co-author of The Economics of Land and Housing and editor of openDemocracy. (Watch the full panel discussion below.) Together, they discussed the financial-sector-driven processes that keep housing costs spiraling upward and how we can move toward a world in which housing is a social good for all rather than a profit center for a few.
“The place that we’ve landed in is suboptimal for a whole range of reasons, and inequality is growing between those who own property and those who don’t; those who are facing higher rents and higher costs versus those who are riding the wave of increasing asset prices,” Macfarlane said.
Macfarlane stressed that “there is no single-bullet solution to what we do about this,” but the two speakers that followed laid out a set of strategies that are beginning to bear fruit either inside or outside the United States.
Gowan drew a contrast between the housing market in Ireland, which mirrors the United States in that it is driven largely by borrowing and rent-seeking, and Austria, where 40 percent of the residents live in “social housing” that is publicly owned and regulated. While in Ireland housing prices soared in the early 2000s before entering a crash that paralleled the U.S. financial crash in 2008, Austrian housing prices have remained stable throughout the past 20 years. One reason, Gowan said, is the attraction of good-quality affordable social housing to middle-class as well as lower-income households, who therefore don’t feel compelled go to into 15-to-30-year-debt to buy a home.
To Gowan, Austria’s example suggests that the US should overcome the negative stereotype of “public housing.” He concedes “there were legitimate issues” with the low-income housing built in decades past, but “that’s not to say that we can’t do better in the future. It’s not to say we can’t have a democratic community- or publicly controlled housing sector that is racially integrated, socially just and fit for the future.”
Green discussed work he did with the Alliance for Housing Solutions to help community leaders in Alexandria, Va., just outside Washington, to grapple with a market that has become increasingly inhospitable for low-income people.
The set of solutions that are being discussed around community control of land and housing, through such strategies as community land trusts, limited equity co-ops, land banks, resident ownership communities and community benefit agreements – together make up less than one percent of the housing economy in the United States, Green said. “It’s a mix of things that are approved by voters at the ballot box as well as some things that agencies can do on their own” with state or local funding. The challenge is to scale-up these solutions in the midst of what is increasingly acknowledged as an affordable housing crisis.
The strategies to address gentrification and displacement discussed in this panel will be explored more deeply in a report by Green that the Democracy Collaborative plans to release in August.
Originally published on The Next System
Photo by Ted’s photos – For Me & You 
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]]>The post Sustainable cities need more than parks, cafes and a riverwalk. They need equity, too appeared first on P2P Foundation.
]]>Originally published on The Conversation
Trina Hamilton, Winifred Curran: There are many indexes that aim to rank how green cities are. But what does it actually mean for a city to be green or sustainable?
We’ve written about what we call the “parks, cafes and a riverwalk” model of sustainability, which focuses on providing new green spaces, mainly for high-income people. This vision of shiny residential towers and waterfront parks has become a widely-shared conception of what green cities should look like. But it can drive up real estate prices and displace low- and middle-income residents.
As scholars who study gentrification and social justice, we prefer a model that recognizes all three aspects of sustainability: environment, economy and equity. The equity piece is often missing from development projects promoted as green or sustainable. We are interested in models of urban greening that produce real environmental improvements and also benefit long-term working-class residents in neighborhoods that are historically underserved.
Over a decade of research in an industrial section of New York City, we have seen an alternative vision take shape. This model, which we call “just green enough,” aims to clean up the environment while also retaining and creating living-wage blue-collar jobs. By doing so, it enables residents who have endured decades of contamination to stay in place and enjoy the benefits of a greener neighborhood.
‘Parks, cafes and a riverwalk’ can lead to gentrification
Gentrification has become a catch-all term used to describe neighborhood change, and is often misunderstood as the only path to neighborhood improvement. In fact, its defining feature is displacement. Typically, people who move into these changing neighborhoods are whiter, wealthier and more educated than residents who are displaced.
A recent spate of new research has focused on the displacement effects of environmental cleanup and green space initiatives. This phenomenon has variously been called environmental, eco- or green gentrification.
Land for new development and resources to fund extensive cleanup of toxic sites are scarce in many cities. This creates pressure to rezone industrial land for condo towers or lucrative commercial space, in exchange for developer-funded cleanup. And in neighborhoods where gentrification has already begun, a new park or farmers market can exacerbate the problem by making the area even more attractive to potential gentrifiers and pricing out long-term residents. In some cases, developers even create temporary community gardens or farmers markets or promise more green space than they eventually deliver, in order to market a neighborhood to buyers looking for green amenities.
Environmental gentrification naturalizes the disappearance of manufacturing and the working class. It makes deindustrialization seem both inevitable and desirable, often by quite literally replacing industry with more natural-looking landscapes. When these neighborhoods are finally cleaned up, after years of activism by longtime residents, those advocates often are unable to stay and enjoy the benefits of their efforts.
Tools for greening differently
Greening and environmental cleanup do not automatically or necessarily lead to gentrification. There are tools that can make cities both greener and more inclusive, if the political will exists.
The work of the Newtown Creek Alliance in Brooklyn and Queens provides examples. The alliance is a community-led organization working to improve environmental conditions and revitalize industry in and along Newtown Creek, which separates these two boroughs. It focuses explicitly on social justice and environmental goals, as defined by the people who have been most negatively affected by contamination in the area.
The industrial zone surrounding Newtown Creek is a far cry from the toxic stew that The New York Times described in 1881 as “the worst smelling district in the world.” But it is also far from clean. For 220 years it has been a dumping ground for oil refineries, chemical plants, sugar refineries, fiber mills, copper smelting works, steel fabricators, tanneries, paint and varnish manufacturers, and lumber, coal and brick yards.
In the late 1970s, an investigation found that 17 million gallons of oil had leaked under the neighborhood and into the creek from a nearby oil storage terminal. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency placed Newtown Creek on the Superfund list of heavily polluted toxic waste sites in 2010.
The Newtown Creek Alliance and other groups are working to make sure that the Superfund cleanup and other remediation efforts are as comprehensive as possible. At the same time, they are creating new green spaces within an area zoned for manufacturing, rather than pushing to rezone it.
As this approach shows, green cities don’t have to be postindustrial. Some 20,000 people work in the North Brooklyn industrial area that borders Newtown Creek. And a number of industrial businesses in the area have helped make environmental improvements.
Just green enough
The “just green enough” strategy uncouples environmental cleanup from high-end residential and commercial development. Our new anthology, “Just Green Enough: Urban Development and Environmental Gentrification,” provides many other examples of the need to plan for gentrification effects before displacement happens. It also describes efforts to create environmental improvements that explicitly consider equity concerns.
For example, UPROSE, Brooklyn’s oldest Latino community-based organization, is combining racial justice activism with climate resilience planning in Brooklyn’s Sunset Park neighborhood. The group advocates for investment and training for existing small businesses that often are Latino-owned. Its goal is not only to expand well-paid manufacturing jobs, but to include these businesses in rethinking what a sustainable economy looks like. Rather than rezoning the waterfront for high-end commercial and residential use, UPROSE is working for an inclusive vision of the neighborhood, built on the experience and expertise of its largely working-class immigrant residents.
This approach illustrates a broader pattern identified by Macalester College geographer Dan Trudeau in his chapter for our book. His research on residential developments throughout the United States shows that socially and environmentally just neighborhoods have to be planned as such from the beginning, including affordable housing and green amenities for all residents. Trudeau highlights the need to find “patient capital” – investment that does not expect a quick profit – and shows that local governments need to take responsibility for setting out a vision and strategy for housing equity and inclusion.
In our view, it is time to expand the notion of what a green city looks like and who it is for. For cities to be truly sustainable, all residents should have access to affordable housing, living-wage jobs, clean air and water, and green space. Urban residents should not have to accept a false choice between contamination and environmental gentrification.
Header photo: Small tankers unload along New York’s Newtown Creek in 2008. Jim Henderson
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]]>The post Errekaleor Bizirik Crowdfund: A Little Light In The Darkness appeared first on P2P Foundation.
]]>Errekaleor Bizirik
Errekaleor Bizirik is a project based in Gasteiz that is founded on the ideals of self-determination and communal life. It is a neighborhood that we have reclaimed from gentrification and real estate speculation and is now called home by over 150 people.
We organize ourselves using an assembly process, which allows us to build the overarching ideas of the project and to coordinate the many activities that are taking place in the neighborhood. Our project is based on the fundamental principles of self-management (autogestion), food sovereignty, feminism, Basque cultural reinvigoration, horizontal organization, and emancipatory culture. We regularly have concerts, movies, workshops and lectures, art expositions, and much more in order to encourage and create space for free cultural expression in Gasteiz.. All these events take place in the spaces we have built together in the neighborhood, such as a concert hall, theatre, social center, and more.
We have a 5-acre community farm and a bakery where we grow produce and bake sourdough bread, both for ourselves and for individuals who live in other parts of Gasteiz who want to know the true quality of their food. We also have free Basque language classes in our social center and a sports center where anyone can come to play pelota (a traditional Basque sport), participate in our boxing classes, or try out acrobatics. To build ties with other cooperative organizations, we have a printing shop where we create various types of pamphlets and books in collaboration with other organizations in the region.We have built a recording studio for local bands, where they can record for free and not tie themselves to labels or contracts. In Errekaleor Bizirik we have created these spaces, and many more, in order to continue to bring life into an abandoned neighborhood, creating a neighborhood full of life for all.
Energy Sovereignty
We are immersed in a system that requires a constant consumption of energy in order to propel constant economic growth. In an era where we have proven ourselves incapable as a society of rejecting fossil fuels, we have also reached the limits of our possible oil production. Peak oil will arrive in the coming decades, and we expect the same for uranium. As climate change effects clearly show, we are nearing the physical and biological limits of the planet, destroying the global ecosystem. The symptoms of this crisis go by many names: the energy crisis, the social crisis, the ecological crisis. But these are just symptoms, and the disease remains the same: capitalism.
In Errekaleor we work towards a different way of living. In a world where things are meant to be thrown away, we have spent four years turning rubble into homes, weed-filled land into gardens, and empty streets into a community. We have done this under the broad banner of self-determination and self-management. Now the time has come for energy sovereignty. Luckily, in Errekaleor the sun always shines! To accomplish this new task, we want to install around 550 solar panels in order to cover the energy needs of our 150 inhabitants, a process that will be accompanied by a large decrease in our consumption of energy overall and the use of alternative systems of refrigeration and water heating. We will do this in our communal way, which is to say that these solar panels will be accessible equally to all residents of Errekaleor Bizirik, and will be accompanied individual and DIY projects such as our new solar showers and bicycle machines that generate extra electricity for our communal living spaces.
This plan is organized to centralize the solar panels in the space that has the most sun, and to equally provide energy to all residents. With this, we will create the largest energy self-sufficient and off-the-grid space in both Basque Country and Europe. We want a renewable and ecologically-friendly neighborhood. We believe in creating a new model for energy independence. Will you help us accomplish our dreams?
Click here to support this crowdfund
Want to know more?
Webpage: www.errekaleorbizirik.org
Facebook: Errekaleor Bizirik
Twitter: @Errekaleor – Errekaleor Bizirik
Youtube: Canal Errekaleor Bizirik
Email: [email protected]
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]]>The post The Favela as a Community Land Trust: A Solution to Eviction and Gentrification? appeared first on P2P Foundation.
]]>Though areas facing eviction threats may be safer if they hold land titles, with regards to gentrification, favelas with land titles are those most at risk. This is because by titling, favelas effectively enter the formal, market-rate, market (informal property markets are quite dynamic in Rio, but effectively create a parallel affordable market to the completely unregulated formal one that dominates the city). With rising property prices, poorer residents, even those with title, are forced to the outskirts of the city as they can no longer afford the rising cost of living generated around them. Though gentrification and displacement have slowed with the current economic crisis, they are expected to continue to exert pressure on favelas in the long-run.
In a city that lacks adequate quality public housing infrastructure, keeping favela neighborhoods affordable as they develop is thus crucial to the overall success of the city. Market-rate housing by definition does not meet the affordability demands of the bottom socio-economic tier (normally 20-30 percent) of a city’s population, so transferring favela housing to the formal market will not address the needs of that group — it will only displace them, causing new favelas to form. Socio-economic segregation leads to increased conflict, as we witness daily in Rio. And tension and unhappiness lower the quality of life.
So how to protect the desire of low-income favela residents to remain on their land, while giving them access to the benefits of owning property and the ability to accumulate wealth and access credit? Giving out individual land titles has long been the assumed method to gain these benefits, following this strategy’s popularization by Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto in the 1990s.
However, much has been learned since then and this “consensus” is today subject to debate and exceptions. Though titling and documentation are incredibly helpful, the assumption that individual titles are the solution can be questioned, since with them comes a single-pointed focus on the individual inhabitants’ benefit, which may not align with maintaining neighborhood qualities and community benefits and may negatively affect other individuals, or him or herself, if consequences to community that impact individuals are not contemplated. Titling also causes local costs to rise and often forces existing residents — even those with title — out.
Aware of the affordability value and other benefits of favelas, Brazilian federal legislation was proactively passed to ensure these benefits persist through the federal Areas of Special Social Interest (AEIS) policy. Unfortunately, like many of Brazil’s well-intended policies, implementation has been largely ineffective in Rio. Locally implemented as Special Zones of Social Interest (ZEIS), the program is supposed to bring favela land into compliance with the law while preserving affordability and the built blueprint of these communities. Although this process had brought nearly 171 plots of land into compliance for nearly 120,000 people as of January 2014, if a favela is located in a highly desirable area, individual titling does not protect a community from being eroded by real estate speculation. Further, if property rights are not adequately enforced, there is a risk residents can be taken advantage of as they adjust to being title holders.
Another policy option available is the Community Land Trust, or CLT. A brief history of this policy option can be found here, but this text will focus on the specific logistical measures that could make CLTs a reality. In the United States, CLTs have been shown to be the most robust affordable housing policy solution in both market extremes — those of foreclosure and of speculation.
Communities must acquire land or designate it as a land trust
The first step in creating a CLT is to acquire the land. In most places introducing CLTs, this is the most difficult step because of the large capital costs of buying up private land. In favelas, however, this step is actually easier, since the land is already occupied, owned by the state, and at least in theory constitutionally protected for favela residents’ use based on need, through adverse possession after five years. And since the Special Zones of Social Interest are intended to help facilitate land compliance, Rio has at least some experience designating favelas in unique ways to guarantee they maintain their qualities including affordability. So one might be hopeful these conditions lead to a consideration of a CLT policy to maintain the affordability of favela homes and right to remain of favela residents. This would start with the transfer of state-owned land harboring favelas, to community-managed Community Land Trusts.
Residents in CLTs lease the land in the trust, but own the buildings
Having the land in a trust means the community owns the land as a whole. However, in order to allow residents to accumulate wealth, a CLT gives them ownership over the improvements they make to the land. This arrangement not only allows the community as a whole to benefit from increases in land value, but also lets individual homeowners benefit from investments and upgrades they make to their homes. Again, this arrangement shares some similarities with most favelas’ current situation: Residents don’t technically own the land they live on (even the “titles” given today are actually leases, often for 99 years, such as the ones given to Vila Autódromo in the 1990s which, unfortunately, we have all attested to their precariousness) and the primary form of investment is in the individual home. Under a CLT residents might thus be even more protected from forced eviction than through individual titles, because the land would be owned by the community and not the state or individuals, and thus could be protected by the community. And through a CLT model residents would also be kept safe from market speculation because the land is not owned by individuals and thus its value does not affect house price.
CLT membership and leadership
Leadership in a CLT is unique and important to its success. CLT community residents elect the leadership council for the trust. These volunteer boards may vary in size, but are entrusted with managing the day-to-day activities of the trust. CLT trusts are usually divided into thirds, where one-third of the trust leadership is residents from the CLT community, one-third is people from the neighborhood surrounding the CLT, and one-third is made up of technical experts and municipal officials who provide particular expertise (legal, architectural, engineering, political, etc.) and speak in the general public interest. This allocation is not set in stone for every CLT and a special policy could be designed specifically for favelas based on their needs. A CLT policy could mandate the addition of housing advocates to the trust, a requirement Rio already uses in its official housing policy.
Key to the CLT’s success is its mission. Each CLT establishes a mission which includes protecting the assets of their community. Traditionally, affordability and guaranteeing affordable housing is the number one goal of a CLT, meaning that new members are screened based on need. To guarantee this, it is the CLT that determines who buys into the community. This is done by mandating that residents selling their property do so to the CLT. The CLT has access to capital and buys the property at an agreed-to rate based on established tables. It then offers the housing to those on a waiting list who have passed its criteria (again, all established by the community). But a favela-based CLT may add other factors — beyond need — to determine who can buy in. For example, those with ties to the community, born and raised there, may have priority. Or those with strong cultural work in the community or other ties there. Or, for example, a favela with a strong vocation for funk may prioritize funk culture; one with a strong vocation for sustainability may prioritize those engaged in developing sustainable practices. And so on.
Key components to incorporate in CLTs
Community Land Trusts have been implemented around the world with structures that vary in many ways. However, there are some characteristics that must be included in order for a model to actually be considered a CLT model. These characteristics include:
- Community control and ownership: Land and other assets must be managed, bought and sold in a way that benefits the overall community. There must be a high level of trust among members within the CLT for it to be successful.
- An open and democratic structure: People who live and work in and around the area designated as a CLT should have the ability to join. The leadership of the CLT must also make an active effort to engage all relevant stakeholders in important community discussions.
- Permanent affordability: CLTs, by definition, are a means of preserving a long-term community structure. Affordability must be preserved since it is a crucial component of a CLT.
- Not-for-profit status: Any profits from the management of assets in a CLT should be reinvested in the CLT for the betterment of the community.
- Long-term stewardship: A CLT continues regardless of whether individual homes that make it up are sold or rented.
Limitations to the CLT in favelas
The CLT has many beneficial features to protect the autonomy and affordability of favelas . However, there are key considerations to keep in mind if this option is considered as a policy in Rio. Assuming full ownership (which again, is rare in Rio’s favelas where instead leases are the preferred “titling” option), creating a CLT means giving up some of the autonomy of owning one’s own piece of land. This means some of the transactions that can normally be made with private land are unavailable to people in CLTs. It is important that CLT membership is voluntary and that residents are not forced into this arrangement.
Furthermore, CLTs are very different than traditional land titling methods that are currently more common in favelas. With this growing trend of titling, there is a greater likelihood that a community will already have some residents that have received a lease to their land. For residents who do have individual titles, it is important that they are compensated for their land if the land is incorporated into a CLT.
Article and images re-posted from RioOnWatch. This is the second in a series of three articles summarizing reports on Brazilian housing law, organized by the Cyrus R. Vance Center for International Justice at request of Catalytic Communities.
The second report, summarized in part below, with additional information compiled by Catalytic Communities’ team, was produced by Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer US LLP. To read the actual report, click here. Full Series: Brazilian Housing Law Memos
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