The Housing Initiative at Penn
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COVID-19 AND HOUSING


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America's housing landscape is deeply inequitable. Unsafe housing conditions, restricted housing choices, and unaffordable housing costs are overwhelmingly concentrated among low-income, non-White households. COVID-19 has severely exacerbated these existing inequities. Infections are disproportionately concentrated among Black and Brown residents, and COVID-19-related job losses have hit the service industry particularly hard, leaving many low-income families without income to pay for necessities - including housing.

In May of 2020, HIP convened a group of six cities across the country in order to facilitate a discussion about housing responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. This convening revealed the depth of need among cities for additional capacity to design, implement, and evaluate their emergency housing responses. Over the course of the summer, we have engaged in deep partnerships with housing and community development officials in six cities—Atlanta, Baltimore, Cleveland, Oakland, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia—to provide housing policy expertise and data analysis to inform rent relief program design; to analyze applicants vis-à-vis the pool of eligible households to ensure equity and targeted outreach as programs roll out; and to embed evaluation instruments into the programs themselves.

OUR CITIES

​Click on one of our partner cities below to learn about their COVID-19 Housing Response, access city-specific data, and more.
Click here to learn about our work in Atlanta.

ATLANTA

Click here to learn about our work in Los Angeles.

LOS ANGELES

Click here to learn about our work in Baltimore.

BALTIMORE

Click here to learn about our work in Oakland.

OAKLAND

Click here to learn about our work in Cleveland.

CLEVELAND

Click here to learn about our work in Philadelphia.

PHILADELPHIA

RESOURCES

Click here to download an introduction to rental assistance programs in HIP's partner cities.
BRIEF | An Introduction to Rental Assistance Programs and Program Context in HIP's Partner Cities
Click here to download slides from a meeting with housing leaders about their responses to COVID-19.
SLIDES | COVID-19 Response Meeting with Housing Leaders | April 29, 2020
Return to the Housing Initiative at Penn homepage.

CONTACT US

Whether you're a policymaker, researcher, journalist, student, funder, or just someone who cares about housing - we would love to hear from you. Email us at housinginitiative@design.upenn.edu.

Visit PennPraxis' website.
Visit the Weitzman School of Design website.
  • Home
  • About
    • People
  • Our Work
    • COVID-19 and Housing
    • Housing Plans & Studies
    • Academic Research
  • Publications
  • In the News
  • Contact