Housing

Banner image by Fernando Marti, “The View from Ohlone/Mission Bay: 1776-2016," originally created for the publication Frames, Life, and Liberation.

Housing is more than a place for shelter, it is the locus of opportunity in the United States, determining school assignment, access to jobs, a safe environment, and so much more.

Our research explores the role of housing in shaping inter-group inequality and how housing policy can be designed to improve these outcomes. In particular, our research related to housing centers on a few core areas: affordable housing, land use policy & zoning, racial discrimination, racial segregation, opportunity-based housing, and gentrification & displacement.

Related Content

Podcast
January 18, 2023

Podcast: Does Integration Close Racial Disparities?

In this episode of Who Belongs? we hear from Darrell Owens, a policy analyst at California Yimby, and a writer on Substack who focuses on housing, planning, displacement, mobility and other issues. He just authored a new piece called Segregation or...

Press Release
December 19, 2022

Three-quarters of San Diego region zoned for single-family housing

Just over three-quarters (75.66 percent) of residential land in southern California's San Diego region is reserved for single-family housing, according to a study released Monday by UC Berkeley's Othering & Belonging Institute (OBI).

Press Release
December 7, 2022

San José Directs Affordable Housing Programs to Address Segregation and Unequal Access to High Opportunity Areas

On December 6th, the City Council of San José, CA, adopted a policy to address persistent patterns of segregation and unequal access to neighborhoods where residents experience better life outcomes. The new policy will place more affordable housing...

Mini graphics illustrating the 13 crises described in the essay

Publication
November 30, 2022

Deconstructing the 'Housing Crisis'

For a several years now I’ve observed with growing alarm, then despair, as California’s housing woes—astronomical prices, skyrocketing rents and rates of annual appreciation, knee-jerk opposition to new housing, an epidemic of displacement and...

Publication
September 16, 2022

Community Land Trusts as Stewards of Public Land

California’s affordability crisis has reached every corner of the state, and local governments are examining their assets to find ways to support the preservation and development of affordable housing. This guide documents how local governments can...

Publication
August 1, 2022

California Zoning Atlas

The California Zoning Atlas is an ongoing project to produce zoning maps and analyses for every region and municipality in the state of California. The goals of this project are, firstly, to document with greater precision than before, and raise...

Publication
July 13, 2022

Single-Family Zoning in the Sacramento Region

Introduction The authors would like to thank Othering and Belonging Institute graduate student researcher Shahan Shahid Nawaz for his invaluable assistance in helping build the repository of municipal maps that made this analysis possible as well as...

Press Release
July 13, 2022

Exclusionary zoning covers 77 percent of Sacramento region

Seventy-seven percent of residential land in northern California's Sacramento region is reserved for single-family housing, according to this new study.

Blog
June 30, 2022

Racist Language Should Not Be Purged From Property Deeds

Note: This blog is being published on the occasion of California law AB 1466, which is related to this topic, going into effect. The last few years have brought much greater awareness of the degree to which racism is embedded in our society. Although...

Publication
April 13, 2022

Exclusionary Zoning and Community Resources in Greater Los Angeles

Background Our recently released report, Single-Family Zoning in Greater Los Angeles, examined the pervasiveness of single-family zoning in counties within the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) region. The analysis uncovered a...