Two Oak Cliff City Council representatives, who also serve on the Housing and Homelessness Solutions Committee, are troubled by findings in an analysis of our comprehensive housing policy (the primary tool for addressing housing segregation and concentrations of poverty in Dallas).
Committee chair Casey Thomas, D3, last January requested a comprehensive housing policy racial equity audit report, and the City hired TDA Consulting to conduct it. The firm presented its findings this week to the committee.
Under close scrutiny, our City’s housing plan looks pretty pathetic, especially when it comes to addressing the impact of our history of racist housing policies and practices.
Thomas said at the presentation that the audit is one step in a larger process of realigning policy with the goal of furthering racial equity.
Chad West, D1, calls the audit a “blockbuster indictment” of the “lack of racial equity goals” in the City’s housing policy.
“The report makes it clear that the City is in a really bad place right now in our quest to close the affordable housing gap,” West said to the committee. “As TDA has pointed out, the CHP is not a plan, it is largely a codification of housing programs done to address past regulatory compliance concerns.”
West went on to lament Dallas’ woefully inadequate attempts over the years at implementing a strategic housing plan, noting a lack of personnel as a significant obstacle.
“Numerous strategic plans have been created by housing task forces and consultants over the years but when staff and council are left to their own devices to implement them little has occurred and goals were not met.”
West suggests input and funding from the private sector is a missing component in our city compared to others. He points to Austin, Seattle and Atlanta’s harnessing of private funding as examples.
“We need others outside of City Hall to help us build the housing policy and programs,” he says.
The audit lists almost a dozen “critical choices [Dallas] leaders must make if they are authentically committed to tackling its daunting array of housing disparities.”
It also calls for building affordable housing in every neighborhood, not just poor ones, an end to NIMBYism and policies to thwart displacement.
Policymakers at the top have promised to address the not-in-my-backyard issue and we can expect changes now or in the future that will reflect that.
West has recommended that the TDA repeat its findings and present its 39 page report to the full City Council ASAP.
Thomas wants to launch a series of community town hall meetings for resident input.
