A surefire way to turn a bleeding-heart liberal into a raging conservative is to propose an affordable housing development in his or her neighborhood.

Folks talk a good game about fighting poverty and housing people. Most Americans know the best way to end poverty is to move children out of low-income neighborhoods to places where they can attend good schools and meet aspirational role models.

Very few people, though, want to share their neighborhoods with people who do not make as much money as they do, or who don’t look or sound like them. Homeowners worry that affordable housing might hurt their property values, even as they complain about rising taxes from sky-high valuations.

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Neighborhood associations have squashed dozens of affordable housing developments across the state in recent years. This opposition exacerbates a housing crisis that is driving the middle class from Texas cities and concentrating poverty in specific neighborhoods.

“The most difficult thing about doing any housing, affordable or not, is the economics of it. When you translate that down to the affordability side, it’s even that much harder to do,” said Jamie Bryant, executive vice president of Midway, a private development firm where he’s built two affordable housing projects in Houston.

Affordable housing is different from voucher programs best known as Section 8. Affordable developments offer homes, for sale or rent, within the means of working people and don’t necessarily house the indigent.

Developers rely on state and federal tax credits and local incentives to lower their costs and thereby lower prices. The Low-Income Housing Tax Credit, federally financed but state administered, is the largest and most competitive to win.

Gaining community support is critical when applying for these limited credits, and many cities require neighborhood association support. In Houston, where there is no zoning, neighborhood associations become de facto zoning boards that can declare: “Not in my backyard!

“Not being able to get those support letters is not a veto … but the applications are so competitive it might as well be,” said Bryant, who also serves on the board of Avenue, a non-profit, affordable housing developer in Houston.

Bryant recalled working on a 70-unit project where neighborhood leaders complained it would create too much traffic. They said they wanted a mixed-use development instead, even though mixed-use projects generate twice as much traffic.

“They were not using logic. They had a pure NIMBY mindset,” Bryant said.

The backlash against affordable housing became so bad that the non-profit Alamo Area Mutual Housing Association in San Antonio had to change its name to Alamo Community Group. But through meetings with neighborhood leaders, and after a decrease in available housing, executive director Jennifer Gonzalez said she faces less opposition.

Gonzalez said the conversation has changed over the last 20 years along with her typical customer. Affordable housing once focused on custodians and nursing aides, but applicants today are more likely to be teachers and nurses.

“The incomes have not risen, and the cost of housing has just continued to increase,” Gonzalez said. “It’s a booming population; it’s property taxes, it’s the cost of construction, cost of general development. It’s out-of-state money buying up real estate that looks so cheap to them. People are legitimately struggling here to pay for the cost of housing.”

To overcome opposition, her team introduces neighborhood leaders to the people who will live in the development. But that’s not enough to overcome resistance in wealthy neighborhoods, where people don’t want to mix with average Texans, or low-income communities, where residents are tired of being a repository for poverty, Gonzalez said.

The sweet spot is where Gonzalez can meet a housing need in a middle-income area while providing social services to the entire neighborhood, not just her tenants.

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The Texas economy is adding tens of thousands of jobs every year. Tens of thousands of people are moving to Texas to fill those jobs. They are driving the economy.

We need more housing not only for these new arrivals but also for the teachers, nurses, cooks, delivery drivers and other middle-class workers who form the foundation of our cities. If we believe in the American dream that hard work will bring prosperity, we must make room for people to take their shot at it.

Our communities are socially, culturally and politically more impoverished when we segregate ourselves by economic class and deny parents a safe place to live and educate their children. An open heart, an open mind and a helping hand will make us all stronger.

Tomlinson writes commentary about business, economics and policy.

chris.tomlinson@chron.com

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