GENTRIFICATION ANALYSIS

Gentrification Analysis

Gentrification Analysis

Project Summary

In order to understand the gentrification process and its effects on the residents of Columbia Heights, we engaged in interviews with residents and workers in the neighborhood, and analyzed census and real estate data. Although tenant organizing was largely successful in one of our partnering buildings (Trinity Towers), we have been unable to support tenant organizing in another of our targeted buildings (Clifton Terrace) due to management opposition. As we move forward, we seek new means of developing relationships with the community members in at-risk buildings in the hopes of stopping the gentrification process from displacing low-income residents from their neighborhood.

I. Project Goals:

To analyze the gentrification process within the Columbia Heights neighborhood utilizing a participatory action research process involving community residents and Georgetown University students and faculty.

To understand how low-income residents cope with gentrification and the strategies they use to maintain affordable housing.

To share the results of the research project with community members, and to use this as a tenant and community organizing tool for resisting displacement and maintaining diversity in Columbia Heights.

II. The Collaborative Research Process:

The first step towards achieving the goals of the project was to conduct interviews (or sharings) and focus groups with current and former residents in three apartment buildings. These buildings are:

Trinity Towers, an example of a building which has coped relatively successfully with the gentrification process and maintained economic and racial diversity;

Clifton Terrace, an example of a building where many residents have already been displaced; and

Columbia Heights Village, an example of a building in the midst of gentrification but which has not yet resulted in a complete turnover of residents.

III. Key Findings:

Analyses of the interviews with residents varied considerably among the buildings. The interviews with residents of Trinity Towers reveal their overall satisfaction, as well as a general consensus that the Tenant Association was what made their ability to stay in the community possible. Tenants generally believe that they would not have been able to accomplish this individually, and that their mobilization and community organizing were necessary to create change. Thus, Trinity Towers can be deemed a “success story” which leads to one of the major accomplishments of the project. Residents are confident of their own ability, but have also formed relationships with students and community and scholar activists, with all parties recognizing that this would not be possible without the other partners.

The analysis of real estate data suggests that the proposed assessed values of all types of residences will increase between 2003 and 2004, and the number of low-income units will decrease. Of the available data on 194 housing units that sold over the last four year, the proposed property values for 2004 have increased in 134 of them. The £26,430 average difference between the 2003 median land value (£58,850) and the proposed 2004 land value (£85,280) is significant at the .05 level. Thus, when these buildings are rented, landlords are able to raise the rent and drive out the lower income ...