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Historically, the poor and ethnic population were priced out of prosperous neighborhoods with good schools, jobs, parks and other services, or banned from them by court-supported neighborhood covenants which until the late 1940s restricted sales of homes to minorities. Postwar suburbanization siphoned jobs, wealth and middle-class residents from urban areas to exclusive suburbs that enjoyed high sales and property tax bases. Left behind were inner city, and inner-ring suburbs, now home to concentrations of poverty. The loss of wealth and middle-class residents left these areas with few job opportunities or social and professional networks that provide ladders to success. Struggles with crime and social problems that their local governments had no funds to address ensued. Other historic inequities include the disproportionate location of polluting factories near the neighborhoods of those with the least political muscle and organizing skills, while inner city residents must frequently pay high prices for milk and other staples at corner stores because of the lack of full-service groceries in their midst. Public transit to enable inner city residents to reach jobs in suburban office parks and other distant job centers has been lacking. In California today, there is a housing crisis in many regions due to the lack of affordable housing. Smart growth principles including transit-oriented development, and more compact, and potentially affordable housing, could address some of these chronic issues. As community and regional leaders define smart growth, in some areas they are discussing other progressive principles, such as creating neighborhoods with mixes of housing types, and so, mixes of incomes, or requiring all cities in a region to provide affordable housing to deconcentrate poverty. Tools such as land trusts are being used to insure there will be affordable housing in poor and ethnically diverse neighborhoods where property values are skyrocketing. Brownfield reclamation and urban infill are other tools. Low-income advocates are challenging public subsidies in the tens of millions of dollars that are made in the name of economic development to real estate developments or future employers when there is no provision for good jobs for local residents, and other benefits for the surrounding neighborhoods. As metropolitan regions take their place as the most important economic unit in the global economy, low-income advocates are capitalizing on research that show that regions with efforts to decrease concentrated poverty have the largest increase in regional income. As the importance of providing an educated work force and high quality of life becomes more and more important to attracting high-tech business to a region, low-income advocates point out the drain that social tension and lack of human capital can have on a regional economy. As smart growth theories and practices evolve, the challenge is for community and regional leaders to include minority and low-income leaders in regional visioning, planning and debate so that development, redevelopment, transit provision, economic development, and other growth reflects their needs and interests. This is especially challenging because private sector and government leaders might not have ties or a history of working with low-income leaders, and visa versa. Resources
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