July 2026

New Paper in Housing Policy Debate: Where did they go after HOPE VI?

Our HOPE VI paper came out in Housing Policy Debate. Using individual residential histories from 1980 to 2021, we follow displaced Chicago public housing residents to see where they actually ended up — and whose promises of "better" neighborhoods held up over time.

"Where did they go after HOPE VI? A longitudinal study of long-term neighborhood attainment outcomes in Chicago" was published in Housing Policy Debate in July 2026. Using individual residential history data from 1980 to 2021 and administrative data on subsidized housing, we track displaced Chicago public housing residents into their new neighborhoods and compare them to matched voluntary movers. On average, HOPE VI displacement pushed residents into neighborhoods with higher Black population shares, lower incomes, and lower educational attainment than the control group. Fewer than 10% of relocatees ended up in mixed-income redevelopments — those who did saw the most sustained gains in neighborhood conditions. Private-market movers saw short-term gains in income and racial integration that dissipated over time. Coauthored with Yeonhwa Lee, Yining Lei, Zihao Zhou, Yucheng Zhang, and Lance Freeman.