A PRRAC-Charles Hamilton Institute for Race & Justice Report (January 2009). By Philip Tegeler, Susan Eaton, and Westra Miller.
Excerpt: Research and on the ground experience in our urban areas demonstrates that it is time to more deliberately link school and housing policy in efforts to reduce concentrated poverty, promote school diversity and revitalize communities that have historically been disenfranchised. The history of housing discrimination, and of increasing poverty and segregation in our public schools today, makes this all the more urgent. One sensible route toward such collaboration is combining magnet school efforts and the HOPE VI program to deconcentrate poverty in neighborhoods and schools. The programs share a common goal and have established infrastructures and generally positive reputations. Such an effort is compatible with the Justice Reinvestment movement, which seeks to assist communities of concentrated disadvantage, which have long been overlooked and marginalized. Examples of similar cooperative efforts show considerable promise as road maps in moving such collaborative efforts to scale. Our roundtable in Tampa allowed us to move from an idea toward more concrete proposals for policy reform, as spelled out in the Appendix that follows.
