Incoming: Heavy use of scare-quotes to emphasize I don’t agree with certain framings which nonetheless get my point across.
It’s hard not to be suspicious of any new housing built in an American city. A new apartment building intended for low-income tenants was opened in the “poor side” of town in an area I used to live.
For op sec, I won’t share which city, but consider a typical American town with rich neighborhoods and poor neighborhoods, and guess where most of the crime and policing is.
Is this a progressive move?
On the one hand, lowering housing costs is always a good thing, especially when it helps people who have less.
On the other hand, it could be a cynical ploy to continue quarantining “the poors” somewhere far away from the “nice” neighborhoods.
My gut feeling is that some sort of mixed-income housing would be the best progressive stepping stone because, gradually, middle class (ie white) people would have an increasing stake in this neglected part of town. But then again, that could also become a form of gentrification which ends up displacing the poorer tenants, so this solution would have to include some sort of rent control to work.
The best thing is a requirement to have low cost units in all housing complexes throughout the city. There are many examples of all-low-income housing projects that are set up to fail by limiting maintenance funding to the rent from people who can't afford to pay, so you really do have to look at the details.
Another option is publicly owned flats on social rent, based on a percentage of income instead of a fixed price.
Or keeping the prices universally low because a majority of people are poorer and so a majority will end up renting them just by chance, but also with the inclusion of people from all wealth ranges.