Gautreaux v. Chicago
Housing Authority
And its subsequent opinions
Allegations
Count I
Defendants CHA intentionally
chose sites for family public
housing and adopted tenant
assignment procedures in
violation of 42 U.S.C. Secs.
1981 and 1983 for the purpose
of maintaining existing
patterns of residential
separation of races in Chicago
Count II
Same allegation in Count I, but
plaintiffs black tenants or
applicants demand relief under
section 601 of Title VI of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964
Allegations
Count III
Regardless of their intentions,
defendants CHA violated 42
U.S.C. Secs. 1981 and 1983 by
failing to select family public
housing sites in such locations
as would alleviate existing
patterns of residential
separation.
Count IV
Same allegation in Count III,
but plaintiffs black tenants or
applicants demand relief under
section 601 of Title VI of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964)
District Court decision, March 1967
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Plaintiffs have the right under the Fourteenth
Amendment to have sites selected for public
housing projects without regard to the racial
composition of either the surrounding
neighborhood or of the projects themselves.
This Court denied defendant’s motion to
dismiss Counts I and II and granted the
motion as to Counts III and IV
District Court, Feb. 1969 (subsequent
opinion)
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Both parties moved for summary judgment on Counts I and
II where Plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment is
granted on Count I, but denied as to both on Count II.
Finding there is discriminatory tenant assignment practices
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Black families in the projects vs. number of black applicants
CHA officials’ testimony
Finding there is discriminatory site selection procedures
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Statistics on the family housing sites during the five major
programs show a very high probability that many sites were
vetoed on the basis of racial composition of the site’s
neighborhood
CHA officials’ intent
Discriminatory site selection
procedures
District Court, July 1969 (subsequent
order)
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This Court determined that several provisions
of this judgment order are necessary to
prohibit future use and to remedy the past
effects of the CHA’s unconstitutional site
selection and tenant assignment procedures, to
the end that plaintiffs shall have the full
equitable relief.
The 1969 Judgment Order
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Divided the County of Cook on the basis of census tracts into two
areas: the Limited Public Housing Area and the General Public
Housing Area.
Mandated that CHA to
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use its best efforts to increase the supply of family public housing units as
rapidly as possible;
not commence construction of any family public housing units without
first beginning construction of 700 units in the General Public Housing
Area (defined as both 70% or more white and not within one mile of a
census tract 30% or more non-white);
locate 75% of all future family public housing units beyond the 700 units
in the General Public Housing Area;
cease discrimination on the basis of race; and
limit the size of new public housing projects and their concentration with
other CHA projects
Gautreaux v. Romney, Secretary of the
HUD, Court of Appeals, Sept. 1971
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The complaint in this case was filed simultaneously
with the complaint in the Gautreaux v. CHA, an order
of the District Court stayed all proceedings in this suit
until disposition of the companion CHA case.
District Court dismissed the complaint against
Secretary of HUD
This Court remanded the case holding that the case
was not moot and that the HUD did violate the due
process clause of the Fifth Amendment and the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 because HUD knowingly
acquiesced to CHA’s unconstitutional procedures.
Gautreaux v. Landrieu, Secretary of the
HUD, District Court, June 1981
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Since continuous litigation, plaintiffs have yet to
realize any relief
A proposed consent decree, negotiated between
plaintiffs and HUD is now before this court for
approval
This Court held that the proposed consent
decree was permissibly negotiated and did not
impermissibly intrude HUD’s authority
The Proposed Consent Decree
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Provided for metropolitan relief by dividing the
city into three areas according to percentage of
minority population: General, Limited and
Revitalizing.
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General Area = predominantly non-minority
Limited Area = predominantly minority
Revitalizing = substantial minority occupancy and
undergoing physical development
Some highlight provisions
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HUD will provide assisted housing until the number of occupancies in the
General Area and/or in the Revitalizing Area equals 7,100 (sec. 5.1)
Each year in addition to the fair share of Section 8 units annually allocated
to the Chicago SMSA, HUD must set aside additional funding authority for
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150 units of Section 8 Existing Housing units;
250 Section 8 New Construction and/or Substantial Rehabilitation units to be
located in the General Area or in the Revitalizing Area
100 units “that will increase housing choice for large minority families”
HUD will make available at least $3,000,000 Grant to aid in providing
assisted housing outside the Limited Area for eligible persons living in the
Limited Area.
HUD may not permit more than 1/3 of these Existing Housing Units and of
New Construction units within the city of Chicago to be located in the
Limited Area. HUD may not permit less than 1/3 of such housing to be
located in the General Area.
Court of Appeals, Sept. 1982
(subsequent opinion)
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This Court affirmed District Court that the decree
was not unreasonable and was not in violation of the
fair housing laws
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The consent decree does not violate statutes and
regulations governing HUD because the regulations gave
HUD express discretion with respect to application of its
fund.
No evidence that the negotiations leading to the proposed
decree was irregular.
The district court, in approving the decree, expressed the
desire to see the development of safe, clean public
housing which not only provides relief to plaintiffs, but
furthers integrated living and urban development.
District Court, Aug. 1997
(memorandum opinion and order)
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Low income renters moved to modify judgment order
against CHA.
This Court held that
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Judgment requiring that low income housing be constructed
according to formula, in order to avoid segregation, would not
be modified since there is no evidence that the existing
program was not working. It just takes time.
HUD’s obligation to set aside units for low income renters for
following fiscal year, under consent decree, was extinguished
because HUD reached the 7100 target.
Trial Court would not enforce provision of consent decree,
calling for HUD to withhold approval of low income rental
funding unless units subsidized were located in specified areas
of city, due to failure to timely protest noncompliance in prior
years
Facts about “Housing Vouchers”
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HUD’s Section 8 tenant-based rental subsidy
programs (“housing vouchers”) provide lowincome families with a financial subsidy if
they move to a private-market apartment or
house that meets certain program
requirements.
Around 1.6 million low-income families
receive housing vouchers.
The Gautreaux Program
by Sociologist James Rosenbaum
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Gautreaux generated a sample of Chicago public-housing
residents who were essentially randomly assigned to both city
and suburban neighborhoods.
A comparison across groups suggested that compared with
children who had moved to other parts of the city of Chicago,
families who moved to white suburbs experienced significant
socioeconomic improvement, with children evincing lower
dropout rates (5 vs. 20%), higher rates of college attendance
(54 vs. 21%), and higher rates of employment. Adults also
achieved higher rates of employment, improved incomes and
lower levels of welfare dependency.
As a result, a five-city demonstration project or “Moving to
Opportunity” (MTO) was formed to formally test the
Gautreaux hypothesis.
Moving to Opportunity Experiment
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600 families with children living in public housing within the
five cities’ worst neighborhoods volunteered for the program
Randomly assigned to one of the three groups
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Experimental: received housing vouchers that enabled them to
relocate to private-market housing only in very low-poverty
neighborhoods + counseling in basic life skills and relocation
assistance
Section 8-only comparison: received housing vouchers with no
restriction on relocation choices + no additional counseling or
relocation assistance
Control: no assistance through MTO
Evaluation surveyed families prior to the offer of vouchers,
kept track of subsequent moves, and surveyed participants at
an interim point 4-7 years after households were randomly
assigned.
Early Impact Estimates from HUD’s
MTO Demonstration
Post-program
outcomes:
Experimental
Section 8-only Control
Welfare (%)
**0.38
0.41
0.33
Employed (%) 0.44
0.43
0.45
Arrested of
**1.4
boys 11-16 for
violent crime
2.4
4.3
Fraction of
behavior
problems
**0.22
0.33
**0.24
Racial Composition does matter
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Minority areas are more disadvantaged in social and
economic terms than non-minority areas and are
more likely to experience social and economic
decline over time.
Even when the experimental compliers relocated to
non-poor neighborhoods, if these neighborhoods
were segregated, they would be exposed to a more
disadvantageous environment than if integrated.
Given that nearly ¾ of those using MTO vouchers
moved to a segregated rather than integrated
neighborhood, a simple comparison of experimental
and control group biases the assessment of
neighborhood effects downward
Criticism
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Selective acquiescence to the experimental manipulation:
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No guarantee that families will actually use the voucher
Of 1,723 subjects, only 814 (47%) accepted the offer and moved
The neighborhood circumstances experienced by non-compliers
vs. controls are thus not significantly different
Selective out-migration:
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No requirement to remain in the new neighborhood to experience
the advantages
By the 4th year, percentage of families residing in integrated nonpoor neighborhoods dropped from 28% to 21%, 72% to 46% in
non-poor segregated neighborhoods
Most of the out-migration was to poor, segregated neighborhoods
Selection Bias
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Selection into the population of experimental compliers were highly
selective
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Choice of integration vs. segregation was highly selective
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younger, lived in smaller households, enrolled in school, inhabited an
integrated neighborhood, and more dissatisfied with their current
neighborhood conditions
older, better educated non-African Americans, not on welfare, and not
owning a car
Having friends in the neighborhood and degree of confidence in finding an
apartment deterred people from relocating to an integrated area
Mobility subsequent to initial relocation was selective and path dependent
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Those whose initial moves were to integrated, non-poor were much more
likely to live in a low poverty neighborhood 4 years later, and were markedly
more likely to remain in an integrated setting
The factor that affect subsequent location is neighborhood circumstances at
baseline
Alternative analytic strategy
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Measured the cumulative amount of time spent in
different kinds of neighborhood (high poverty, lowpoverty segregated, and low-poverty integrated)
Measured the influence of variables known to affect
selection into categories of compliance, entry into
integrated vs. segregated areas, and out-migration
Included these measures in statistical models
predicting employment, earnings, and service
dependency
Findings
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Employment
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Weekly earnings
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Exposure to a non-poor environment is important, not whether the
neighborhood contained many or few minorities
Accumulating time in an integrated non-poor neighborhood appears
to be slightly more beneficial, though the difference between the two
coefficients is not statistically significant
Each additional month spent in an integrated non-poor neighborhood
raises slightly more weekly earnings than in segregated non-poor
neighborhood
Temporary Assistance for Needly Families (TANF) + food
stamps
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The more time spent in low-poverty area, the lower the odds of food
stamp receipt by the time of the interim assessment
Living in an integrated low poverty neighborhood had the greatest
effect in reducing dependency
If experimental compliers actually
spend more time…
Final Conclusion
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Neighborhood effects develop over time,
progressively unfolding with rising exposure to the
opportunities, resources, and improved
circumstances offered by low poverty neighborhoods
Although all subjects show a rising probability of
employment over time, rate of change is more rapid
among those moving into integrated low-poverty
neighborhood
As cumulative exposure to advantageous
neighborhood conditions increases, a gap
progressively opens up between experimental and
control subjects and widens.
Criticism of Neighborhood Research
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The random assignment of housing vouchers does
not address causal processes of why neighborhoods
matter. When MTO families relocate in a non-poor
neighborhood, many variables change at once,
making it difficult to disentangle the change in
neighborhood poverty from simultaneous changes in
social processes
MTO does not randomly allocate neighborhood
conditions to participants; voucher recipients can
choose to live in any middle-class neighborhood
conditions.
Difficult to explain contextual effects on individual
families and individual differences in behavior
What this all means…
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The normative aim of litigation and consent decree is twofold. It is designed to address Defendants’ constitutional
violations and to materially improve the lives of Plaintiffs and
families in similarly situated families
What the consent decree successfully achieved is to stop the
Defendants’ discriminatory acts on the basis of race
Whether or not the consent decree actually makes a material
improvement in people’s lives is questionable. Nevertheless,
expanding housing voucher programs to offer more public
housing residents the opportunity to relocate would improve
the life chances of many poor families more or less.