¶ Emeryville: Black & Brown Home Ownership (by the numbers)
¶ I will be hosting a housing town hall to address the future of housing in Emeryville. There will be a panel of experts, presentations, and community Q&A.
¶ Additional Information from Charles Bryant (Planning and Building Director, City of Emeryville) - 1.13.2023:
The attached charts show homeownership rates for Black, Latino, Asian, White, and all households at various geographical levels, including Emeryville, Oakland, Berkeley, San Francisco, Alameda County, the 9-county Bay Area, California, and the entire U.S. The first set of charts compares ownership rates for each race at all of the geographical levels. The second set of charts compares the ownership rates for the various races at each geographical level. These data are for 2000, and for each year from 2010 to 2021, and were compiled from the U.S. Census Bureau website at https://data.census.gov/. Except for 2000, which is from the decennial census, the data are from the American Community Survey (ACS), an annual survey that the Census Bureau conducts. There are a couple of important caveats to keep in mind when viewing these data:
- In the US Census, Emeryville is an extremely small sample size, which results in a huge margin of error and a lot of volatility from one year to the next (as evidenced by the “Emeryville” lines on each chart). Larger geographies, including the larger cities, the county, Bay Area, California, and the nation, are much larger sample sizes with much less margin of error and less volatility. In other words, the data for Emeryville may be a bit unreliable and should be taken with a grain of salt.
- The American Community Survey data are 5-year rolling figures. Thus, the data labelled “2021” are actually for 2017-2021; the data labelled “2010” are for 2006-2010, etc. Using ACS 5-year data, it is not possible to pinpoint data for a specific point in time.
These charts suggest a few broad trends:
- Black and Hispanic/Latino homeownership rates are lower than the average for all households, with Hispanic/Latino rates usually slightly higher than Black ownership rates.
- White and Asian homeownership rates are generally higher than the average for all households, with White usually higher than Asian. There are a couple of notable exceptions: in Alameda County, Asian homeownership rates have been trending upward and have been higher than White ownership rates since about 2012, and in San Francisco, Asian ownership rates have consistently been the highest of all races over the period covered by these data.
- For all races, homeownership rates in California, the Bay Area, and Alameda County tend to be about 10% lower than the U.S. as a whole, and rates in Emeryville, Oakland, Berkeley, and San Francisco tend to be about 15% lower than in California, the Bay Area, and Alameda County.
- There are no obvious effects of the pandemic on homeownership rates. In fact, in most cases, ownership has been trending upward from 2019 to 2021. But bear in mind that this is based on ACS 5-year rolling figures.
- Because these data do not include individual years between 2000 and 2010, it is not possible to see the effects, if any, of the 2006 - 2008 economic downturn. Generally, ownership rates increased slightly from 2000 to 2010.
In addition, we have compiled the following data on Black and Hispanic owners and renters for Emeryville for 2000, 2010, 2015, and 2020. Again, however, note that these data are from a small sample size with a large margin of error, and are based on 5-years rolling figures, so year-over-year comparisons may be of questionable accuracy:
In regards to BMR Rental turnover rates for Emeryville, we do not have data going back over the past ten years. Our Housing Administrator is currently finalizing the 2021 Annual Rental Report for the BMR Rental Projects and when that is complete we can tell you how many BMR units have turned over to new BMR tenants in 2021. This report should be complete before the end of the month.
In addition, one of the programs in the 2023-2031 Housing Element that was just adopted by the City Council is to track and analyze the racial and ethnic data for those who apply and secure a BMR unit to ensure we are attracting underserved populations. See Program Description and highlighted action below.
PP. Affirmative Fair Housing Marketing Plan. The City has required all developers of Below Market Rate (BMR) Housing Units, to create a Marketing Plan to be approved by the City prior to the sale and leasing of the BMR units for many years. The City will continue to implement this requirement but will expand the requirements of the Marketing Plan as follows:
1. Require marketing plans to be updated every 5 years.
2. Require the marketing plans to identify the underserved populations in the area and identify special outreach efforts.
3. Require the collection of race and ethnicity data for all those that apply and were successful in securing a BMR unit to be submitted to the City for review and analysis. Based on the City’s analysis, the City will evaluate if the advertising/outreach methods to attract underserved populations need to be modified or updated and if the reasons why the underserved populations were not approved, to determine if barriers to the tenant selection criteria may exist and need to be amended.
4. Ensure all BMR Property Management Entities participate in Fair Housing training at least once every 2 years.
5. Propose an amendment to the Resale Restriction Agreement for all future BMR resales to require a 3rd party to assist in marketing, screening and selecting the new eligible buyer via a lottery process