Housing - A Crisis of Mediocrity and Imagination

When I find myself in discussions around achieving equity in housing it is difficult not to arrive at what seems to be a utopic vision where NIMBYism (Not In My Back Yard - an unfortunate condition of ignorance that leads individuals to insist that affordable housing or other similar housing not be built in their communities), redlining and other structurally and systemically racist social constructs and behaviors simply don’t exist anymore. As wildly unrealistic as it may seem that we might one day convince Americans to coexist peacefully regardless of their skin pigmentation, economic or documentation status, I continue to work towards this dream of a sustainable future.

My mother is white, and my father was Black. My mother told me when I was just a few months old, we were living in an apartment in Los Angeles and a self-identified skinhead (Neo-Nazi) kicked in the door and pointed a shot gun into my crib, stating that I shouldn’t exist. As a young adult I quickly learned that if my white mother was not with me when looking for a rental, my application was denied, and even as I advanced in my career, I was often charged double or triple the asking deposit despite meeting all the requirements.

I agreed to become a member of the Holos Board not because I believed they had all the answers to these problems but because they are willing to acknowledge that they exist and they are willing to work towards a more sustainable future. I consider myself both a pragmatist and an optimist. Pragmatically, I know that eliminating the root causes to housing inequity are linked to a civil rights movement that has spanned centuries. Optimistically, I believe that in order to build a more perfect world we all must do our part, one day, one person, one policy at a time. 

The housing crisis often referred to has different meanings in different circles. In disinvested and marginalized communities, our housing crisis is related to structural racism, ongoing redlining practices, and displacement from revanchism in the form of gentrification. In capitalist circles, the housing crisis is about the pursuit and accumulation of wealth. Capitalism is insatiable and in order to survive it must commodify, monetize and consume all that is in its path. Gentrification globally has been on the rise for several decades. In the global south, some of the oldest communities (unfortunately referred to as slums) of India have been wiped out in order to build housing for the rich and upwardly mobile. In Los Angeles, Skid Row and other forgotten communities, people are being disbursed, hidden, and soon may be institutionalized in asylums against their will, all to feed capitalism. Sadly, much of the discussion around the housing in Los Angeles is about preparing for major sporting events rather than transforming our culture of capital to a culture of care.

Permanent Supportive Housing would be sustainable if our priorities were in order. We must fund all the systems that touch people - health care, mental health, education, food access and workforce development - in order to assure the success of PSH. We must stop making the ills of our society the burden of the least of us and take collective responsibility for the providing critical supports to all communities even if there is no profit in it. This is not an impossible proposition. Our inability thus far to accomplish this is simply a crisis of mediocrity and imagination. We have to intentionally choose the harder more complex path, which means challenging, interrupting and disrupting these harmful systems. 

Michelle Burton

Michelle Burton, MBA, MALC, PhD is the Deputy Chief Executive Officer & Director of the Social Change Institute, a social enterprise of Community Health Councils (CHC). As part of Holos Communities’ board of directors, she is passionate about building bridges across sectors to design bold solutions for problems today and in the future.

You can read Michelle’s full bio here.