Campaign Releases New Podcast Episode on Affordable Housing and Heat Resilience
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| The campaign released a new podcast episode, “Exploring the Connections Between Housing, Heat Morbidity, and Climate Resilience.” The episode, hosted by Opportunity Starts at Home intern Ella Izenour, features a conversation with Professor Victoria Kiechel, a practicing architect and faculty member in American University’s School of International Studies’ Environment, Development, and Health department.
Professor Kiechel discusses the mounting health risks associated with rising temperatures and underscores the essential role of affordable housing in mitigating heat-related illness. Research shows that low-income households experience disproportionate exposure to extreme heat, placing them at a heightened risk of heat-related morbidity and injury. The episode explores a range of strategies to address this challenge—including cooling centers, reflective “white roofs,” and buildings designed for passive cooling.
The conversation further explores policy and development approaches that prioritize meaningful community engagement to ensure new climate-resilient housing solutions meet residents’ needs while preventing displacement or “green gentrification.” The episode also highlights the urgent need to increase public awareness of heat-mitigation resources for low-income and marginalized communities, who often face the greatest risks with the fewest tools for protection. The discussion reinforces that affordable, accessible, high-quality housing is central to long-term climate resilience, particularly as extreme heat events become more frequent and severe.
Listen to the episode on Spotify, Apple, and Soundcloud. |
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Center on Budget and Policy Priorities Publishes Report on Federal Rental Assistance and Neighborhood Choice
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| The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a campaign Steering Committee member, recently published a report, “Where Households Using Federal Rental Assistance Live.” The report examines how effectively federal rental assistance programs enable people receiving assistance to live in economically diverse neighborhoods. The findings are based on the locations of households using federal rental assistance and compare them to the locations of all rental units and of rental units that are affordable to people using a Housing Choice Voucher. The authors find that households relying on rental assistance frequently live in high-poverty neighborhoods, reflecting persistent patterns of economic and racial segregation as well as limitations in rental assistance programs’ ability to provide true neighborhood choice.
The report uses data from the 100 most populous metropolitan areas across the United States. The accompanying interactive mapping tools and data tables allow individuals to explore metropolitan-level data and neighborhood poverty patterns. The report highlights differences among the three largest federal rental assistance programs—Housing Choice Vouchers, Section 8 Project-Based Rental Assistance, and Public Housing—in promoting neighborhood choice and economic diversity. Project-based assistance serves a more economically diverse range of neighborhoods than public housing, where over half of residents live in high-poverty areas that often reflect local patterns of economic and racial segregation. Housing vouchers perform best overall, with recipients more likely to live in low-poverty and less likely in high-poverty neighborhoods than those in other programs. However, although one-third of all voucher-eligible units in major metros are in low-poverty areas, many remain inaccessible due to landlord discrimination, limited space, and low vacancy rates. |
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| The authors examine Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, and Milwaukee, revealing how local histories of racial and economic segregation continue to shape modern housing outcomes. In Washington, D.C., for example, decades of racially restrictive covenants and exclusionary zoning have produced lasting patterns of segregation that limit the neighborhood choices available to households using federal rental assistance. Similar dynamics appear in Los Angeles and Milwaukee, where racialized housing policies and the uneven distribution of affordable housing perpetuate inequality.
The report concludes with recommendations for federal, state, and local policymakers to ensure that all low-income households can access stable, affordable, quality housing in neighborhoods of their choice. Key recommendations include: the expansion of federal rental assistance to make it available to everyone who needs it, improving program responsiveness to better meet participants’ needs and support true neighborhood choice, preventing discrimination against people who use rental assistance, building and preserving affordable housing in a wider range of neighborhoods, including low-poverty areas, and investing in under-resourced neighborhoods to improve resource access and quality of life. The authors also recognize that achieving housing equity requires sustained effort to undo decades of racist policies that have contributed to unequal neighborhoods and wealth and income disparities. |
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The Journal of Social Science & Medicine Publishes Report on Health Benefits of Legal Counsel for Tenant Facing Eviction
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| Social Science & Medicine recently published an article, “Evictions, legal counsel, and population health: A mixed methods study.” The study investigates the impact of access to legal aid on the health outcomes of tenants facing eviction. The report draws on qualitative interviews with tenants who received legal assistance through Washington State’s Right to Counsel program and incorporates quantitative analysis of case outcomes related to tenants’ mental and physical health. The author finds that access to legal representation is associated with improved tenant health outcomes and broader well-being.
The study concludes that legal representation can enhance both short- and long-term tenant health by fostering a sense of protection and empowerment during eviction proceedings. Even when right-to-counsel programs do not directly reduce eviction filings or judgments, they may still improve mental health by offering psychological support and stabilizing short-term housing. Additionally, interview responses indicate that tenants perceive health benefits, stemming from improved housing security and access to social services that address key social determinants of health.
The article recommends expanding right-to-counsel programs, strengthening tenant protections, and supporting positive health outcomes. The author also calls for complementary policies that reduce eviction rates and empower tenants, thereby improving and addressing gaps in benefits provided by right-to-counsel programs. The “Eviction Crisis Act,” supported by the campaign, is one critical piece of legislation that would support increased landlord-tenant mediation services, reduce preventable evictions by stabilizing extremely low-income households that experience a sudden economic shock, and mitigate eviction’s consequences to prevent housing instability and homelessness. |
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JAMA Network Open Publishes Article on Housing Conditions and Adult Asthma Burden
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| JAMA Network Open published a recent article, “Tenant Reports of In-Home Asthma Triggers and Adult Emergency Department Use,” examining the association between tenant-reported residential asthma triggers and adult asthma emergency department visits. The cross-sectional study, conducted in Boston, utilized data from the city’s housing code enforcement system and health system electronic records. The authors found that tenant-reported asthma triggers were significantly associated with higher rates of adult asthma emergency department visits, underscoring the need for universal access to healthy housing to reduce health disparities.
The authors analyzed data from the Massachusetts General Brigham health system electronic health records (EHR) and tenant requests for home inspections by code enforcement officers. The study included 2,406 emergency department visits from 1,698 unique patients and 7,259 tenant reports across 552 residential block groups. Eight categories of tenant reports were identified as relevant to asthma: excessive or insufficient heat, pest infestation, mice infestation, bed bugs, chronic dampness or mold, poor ventilation, rodent activity, and Breathe Easy—a program in Boston that allows clinicians to report asthma triggers directly to the Inspectional Services Department. |
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| The findings demonstrate a link between unhealthy housing and asthma at the population level in Boston. Increases in tenant reports of in-home asthma triggers were associated with a rise in neighborhood rates of adult asthma related emergency department visits. Neighborhoods with higher proportions of Black or Latino residents had at least 72% higher rates of asthma triggers.
The article concludes by emphasizing the role of unhealthy housing in asthma burden differences between neighborhoods across Boston. It calls for greater investment in housing code enforcement and universal access to healthy housing to reduce asthma rates and disparities. The authors also highlight the broader, multi-sector impacts of improved housing conditions, noting healthy housing as a pathway to reducing psychosocial stress experienced by racial minorities, which contributes to worse asthma outcomes. |
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| Are you a part of a national organization interested in cross-sector partnership? Join representatives from over 130 multi-sector organizations, including housing, education, healthcare, civil rights, anti-poverty, seniors, faith-based, anti-hunger, veterans, LGBTQIA+, and more on the campaign’s Roundtable. If you are interested in the Roundtable, please fill out our interest form and and feel free to share it with other national organizations that may want to get involved. |
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Fact of the Month: Due to centuries of discrimination and inequality, Black, Latino, and Indigenous communities are overrepresented within homelessness.
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