Uncategorized – Page 8 – Cities, Suburbs & Schools Project at Trinity College

Scheff 2008 Settlement

September 22, 2013Emily Meehan

On April 4, 2008 defendants and plaintiffs of the lawsuit Scheff vs. O’neil met to discuss plans to increase progress in “reducing racial, ethnic, and economic isolation in Hartford Public Schools until June 2013” (1). Due to the failure of Stipulation 1 in 2007, the court held this settlement to introduce Stipulation II.

This second Stipulation contained new goals to reduce educational isolation in Hartford. The first goal was to increase the number of Hartford minority students placed in reduced isolation settings. A reduced isolation setting is an “educational setting with reduced racial, ethnic, and economic isolation”(3). Simply put, the goal of the Stipulation was to desegregate the schools.

A second goal was to create a five-year plan. At the end of 5 years, 80% of the demand for Hartford minority students needing seats in reduced isolation settings was to be met. To achieve this goal, the state would provide sufficient resources needed to implement “Voluntary Interdistrict Programs”, which are tools to reduce racial, ethnic, and economic isolation. An example of such tools may be a Magnet School.

A problem with previous stipulations was that the goals were not met by the end of the allotted time period. To try and prevent this from happening, this Stipulation set forth goal measurement plans. For example, in April of the year three the state would examine the need for seats in reduced isolation settings by minorities. Next, in November of year 4, the state would evaluate waiting lists for voluntary interdistrict programs, and evaluate how many programs meet this demand. If the original goal of 80% was not met in 5 years, this party would reconvene (6). The Stipulation also set up benchmarks to ensure that progress was being made. For example, after year one 19% of the total goal needed to be met. Guidelines for calculating these percentages, and monitoring success were also established (6).

To accomplish these goals, the party announced the implementation of a few programs. The first program is the Comprehensive Management Plan which was designed to oversee all Voluntary Interdistrict Programs. Goals of the program included, the CMP must establish and track annual strategic targets of progress, it must contain a process for evaluating demand for each Voluntary Interdistrict Program, and include training programs for all teachers within the Scheff Region (8). In total there were 21 objectives for the CMP that acted as statements guide lining the duties of the plan.

A goal that stuck out to me was one that stated, “The CMP shall ensure that there are clearly defined opportunities for students to enjoy a continuous K-12 education in reduced isolation settings”(10). I thought this was interesting because it is a goal that is created to ensure the long-term well-being of individuals, not just entire school districts.

Discussion Questions:

1 Do you believe that this plan covers all the bases or do you think there are gaps in the Stipulation?

2 Is the CMP an adequate way to evaluate progress of the schools?

3 How does this differ from previous Stipulations and how might these differences prevent this Stipulation from failing?

Some Real Estate Agents Discriminate Against Black Home Buyers

September 15, 2013Veronica Armendariz

The article I examined was “Some real estate agents discriminate against black home buyers” which is an article in the Hartford Courant published on May 21, 1989 (1). In 1989, the Courant conducted a random test in which two potential home buyers of different race would enter a real estate agency with the same financial backgrounds and attempt to buy homes. Both the results and reactions towards the random testing proved something very significant to future home buyers in the Hartford metropolitan area: there was a plethora of evidence demonstrating that there was discrimination between each buyer in each of the 15 real estate agencies investigated.

When investigating each agency, the “home buyers” were each treated differently. The African American home buyer would constantly be under scrutiny because of their financial status and never told about the type of education that would be received in the neighborhoods when asking the realtors. Moreover, the African American buyers would only be shown a couple of houses in the suburbs, but steered towards predominantly African American towns and cities (such as Hartford and Bloomfield). However, the white home buyer would not be questioned about their financial status and would be shown a number of homes in suburbs such as West Hartford. Also, white buyers would be taken to see the homes, and they were told all of the success schools have been having in the area. This practice of “steering” home buyers to a certain area had been practiced before he 1980’s with the start of the Great Migration leading a large number of African Americans to Hartford in 1910 (2). Having the ability to sell these people homes in the Hartford metropolitan area gave real estate agents the advantage to change the reputation of a city or suburb through the buyers’ “anxieties about racially mixed schools” (3).

Similarly the same prejudiced that African American home buyers experienced, African American real estate agents would experience when working at a predominantly white real estate agency. In the article “Black agents learn to deal with the real world”, the article exposes the hardships of African American real estate agents in the Hartford Courant. When showing a house to a potential African American buyer, the white real estate agent always scrutinizes the capability in which the buyer can afford the house even though the previous agent (who is African American) has already concluded that the buyer can afford the home. The only way for African American realtors to make sure racial discrimination does not happen is by “threatening them with the rules”(4).

Sources:

(1) Bixby, Lyn, Brant Houston, Jeffrey Williams, and Larry Williams. “Some Real Estate Agents Discriminate against Back Home Buyers.” The Hartford Courant 21 May 1989: n. pag. Print.

(2) Tuckel, P., K. Schlichting, and R. Maisel. “Social, Economic, and Residential Diversity Within Hartford’s African American Community at the Beginning of the Great Migration.” Journal of Black Studies 37.5 (2007): 710-36. Print.

I found this citation through JSTOR by searching under “Hartford”, “real estate”, and “discrimination”.

(3) Dougherty, Jack. “Shopping for Schools: How Public Education and Private Housing Shaped Suburban Connecticut.” Journal Of Urban History 38, no. 2 (March 2012): 205-224. America: History & Life, EBSCOhost (accessed September 15, 2013).

I found this journal through America:History and Life by searching the key words “Hartford”, “discrimination”, “1989”, and “real estate”.

(4) Williams, Larry. “Black Agents Learn to Deal with the Real World.” The Hartford Courant 21 May 1989: n. pag. Print.

(5) Beeching, Barbara J. 2005. “Reading the Numbers: Census Returns as Key to the Nineteenth Century Black Community in Hartford, Connecticut.” Connecticut History 44, no. 2: 224-247. America: History & Life, EBSCOhost (accessed September 15, 2013).

I found this article by searching through America: History and Life by searching “Hartford”, “discrimination”, and “real estate”.

Discussion Questions:

1). The accounts given from the real estate agents all claim to have said that they were keeping the best interest in mind for each buyer when choosing to show them houses. Do you think there was a different between whether an African American real estate agent or white real estate agent was dealing with a buyer with the opposite race? Why or why not?

2) In considering the different options given from each real estate agent, do you think a buyer that was African American could receive more options from consulting with numerous real estate agents? Why or why not?

3) Some real estate agents chose to show some African American home buyers a select couple of houses in suburbs in West Hartford and suburbs similar to it. Why do you think real estate agents did this? What kind of conditions do you think these homes were in?

Housing Barriers Exercise

September 13, 2013September 13, 2013Emily Meehan

“West Hartford Zoning: Report to the Zoning Commission on the Zoning of West Hartford” was written by Robert Whitten, a commissioner of the Zoning Authority. This source reports guidelines regarding the purpose of zoning, zoning regulations, and how the commissioners believed zoning was going to benefit West Hartford.

The report begins by explaining why zoning codes were necessary. In the 1920’s Hartford was becoming congested so people began to move out of the city to West Hartford. Many were also attracted to the “comfort…of the open residential sections” (Whitten 6) that West Hartford offered. Zoning was created to preserve this aspect of West Hartford, as well as to secure the safety from dangers such as fires, and to provide welfare in living and working conditions.

Under the Zoning Authority, commissioners could regulate the size, height, and number of buildings in a specific area. Commissioners could also regulate plans and materials used to build such structures, as well as where they could be located and the amount of space they could take up.

Zoning divided West Hartford into three districts: residence districts, business districts, and industrial districts. In residential districts, only structures such as houses, parks, schools, and a other non-business or industrial strustures were permitted. In the business district, buildings such as retail businesses, offices, and restaurants were all that were permitted. Finally in the industrial district, only manufacturing and storage structures were allowed. Within each district, certain boundaries indicating how large a garage could be, or the minimum area of a backyard could be, existed. These rules were put in place with a goal in mind: to keep West Hartford safe, and from overcrowding. Housing barriers, such as zoning, at this time were extremely restrictive, and because of this only certain people, who could afford the regulated homes, were allowed to live in areas that enforced zoning codes.

Other sources:

Exclusionary Zoning Litigation by David H Moskowitz. I found this book by conducting an advanced search on Trincoll.WorldCat.org. (Moskowitz, 1-5).

Zoning and Diversity in Historical Perspective by Emily Talen. I found this academic journal by doing an advanced search on the America: History and Life database.

Fiscal Zoning in Suburban Communities by Duane Windsor. I found the Trincoll.WorldCat.org database to be the easiest to use, so I used that again to find this source.

Discussion Questions:

1) In what ways was did zoning contribute to unequal housing barriers?

2) Do you believe the real goal of zoning was to secure safety of the inhabitants of West Hartford, or do you think it was designed to ensure only certain types of people could occupy West Hartford (for example, those who could afford to abide by the restrictions?)

Moskowitz, David H. Exclusionary Zoning Litigation. Cambridge, MA: Ballinger Pub., 1977. Print.

Talen, Emily. “Zoning and Diversity in Historical Perspective.” Journal of Planning History 11.4 (2012): 330-47. Print.

Whitten, Robert Harvey. West Hartford Zoning. Report to the Zoning Commission on the Zoning of West Hartford,. West Hartford, CT: Zoning Commission, 1924. 6+. Web.

Windsor, Duane. Fiscal Zoning in Suburban Communities. Lexington, MA: Lexington, 1979. Print.

Home Buying Simulation

September 6, 2013September 6, 2013Emily Heneghan

My annual gross income was $24,000, I had no debt and I had $5,000 in savings, which allowed me to spend a minimum of $51,397.94 and a maximum of $71,725.63 on an apartment or house. Since my price range for houses was so low, I had to eliminate the options of living in West Hartford, Wethersfield, and Newington because I could not afford even the cheapest houses in those areas. When looking for houses I was searching for areas with good district schools rather than good magnet schools for two reasons: 1) Since magnet schools work on a lottery based system there was no guarantee that my 3^rd and 6^th grade children would be accepted and 2) even if my children did get accepted there would be a very likely chance that their magnet school would be pretty far away and since I did not have a car I would not be able to assist in driving my children to and from school. My options were pretty limited but after doing research the three houses I would be willing to buy were 8 Wade Ave in Bloomfield, 470 W Wolcott Ave in Windsor, and 29 Edgerton St in Manchester. The house I would be most likely to buy would be 470 W Wolcott Ave in Windsor.

This house was $59,000 with a $242 monthly mortgage, which is within my price range. The house comes with 3 beds, which would be good because my two children would have their own bedrooms. My 3^rd grader would attend the district school Poquonock Elementary, which is pretty racially balanced with 73% of students reaching the CT test goals and a +1 test gain. My 6^th grade child would go to Sage Park Middle School, which has 69% of its students achieving test goals with a +5 test gain. The quality of education at these two schools seems to be above average plus both schools are over 2 miles away which would mean that neither child would have to walk to and from school because they would be provided with bus transportation. Although I was able to find a house that seems suitable for my family’s situation, it was not easy at all. I was really only able to find three acceptable options after doing much research and two of the options were not exactly ideal. I’ve learned about how difficult it is to find a home and that there are many factors that need to be accounted for in order to find a place that fits your family’s needs.

Home Buying Simulation

September 5, 2013Christina Raiti

Throughout this exercise I learned a number of lessons. My annual gross income was $42,000 which allowed me to spend a minimum of $136,774 and a maximum of $167,265 on a house and or apartment. I found there was a wider variety of buying options as opposed to renting. I could afford 1320 dollars of rent per month, which made it extremely difficult to find a house/apartment that had more than two bedrooms. Keeping in mind, I had a third grader and a sixth grader, their schooling options needed to be within acceptable distance to the house. I didn’t chose a house or apartment that did not have a public school system to fall back on. There were plenty of magnet schools which would fulfill both of my children’s needs however, since a lottery is necessary for placement, they could have spent over an hour on the bus to and from school. With that being said, I was also lucky enough to have a car which would assist with my children’s transportation and with my route to work. However, necessities were not particularly close so while choosing a house to buy/rent I went a little under my budget making sure to set aside extra money for gas. The four houses I was willing to buy were 167 Hillcrest Ave in West Hartford, 1047 Boulevard in West Hartford, 178 Cooper Street in Manchester, and 69 New street in Manchester. Out of those four I personally felt my best buy would be 1047 Boulevard in West Hartford. Below is a picture of the front view of the house. This is because the location allowed for three schools in very close proximity. My children would be able to attend Bristow Middle School, Environmental Sciences Magnet, and the Smith School of Science all which were close enough for myself to get to incase of an emergency. The house was on the pricier end of the spectrum with a total cost of $160,000 and a thirty percent year fixed price of $656. However, it was the most centrally located in terms of schooling which I felt was an asset that was invaluable. It also was one of the few houses with three bedrooms and two baths.

From our class standings, I was under the impression that my yearly/monthly salary was towards the top of the spectrum. However, I found just the opposite when I looked into renting houses. I could barely afford to rent a house in a nice suburban area. I found many condos but most of them were one or two bedrooms which would not accommodate a third grader and a sixth grader. I also found four places to rent within the inner Hartford area. I figured the best choice would be 20 Otis street in Manchester. That was listed for $1,200 and my limit was $1320. 17 Ellsworth Street, 98 Washington Ave, 123 Williamstown, were all good choices however the square footage was significantly smaller than the houses and from my final rental choice. Overall, I think this exercise was an eye opener. I was not aware how expensive houses were and how difficult it would be to rent a house. I also did not realize all the excess responsibilities that go into picking the perfect place to live.