Gentrification represents a double-edged sword — revitalizing older neighborhoods but also often shredding the social fabric of those communities in the process.

“What is bad is if gentrification causes involuntarily displacement,” said Paul Washington, executive director of the Denver Office of Economic Development, which released a study on the issue Wednesday, a day before the city’s 2016 Housing Summit.

With more than 1,000 new households moving to Denver each month, the city has seen a large share of formerly affordable neighborhoods go upscale.

Since 2000, about 42 percent of the Census tracts that are prime for gentrification in the city are doing so, according to the study.

Nationally, only about 5 percent of urban tracts are in that process, which involves higher-income residents displacing lower-income ones.

Gentrification is, in itself, neither good nor bad, Washington said.

What Denver officials, from the mayor on down, want to avoid is the unraveling of the historic, cultural and demographic identities of a community that results when residents are pushed out, he said.

Displacement happens in two key ways. Rising property values jack up property tax bills to the point that the original residents, especially seniors on fixed incomes, can’t afford them.

Rising rents are another concern, as older apartment buildings get purchased and spruced up, pricing out the original tenants.

Neighborhoods such as Cherry Creek and Washington Park long ago blazed the path, with a high income now the price of admission to live there.

Highlands has gentrified too, going from two-thirds Latino to two-thirds non-Latino whites since 2000. Even long-affordable places such as Five Points and Globeville are moving down the same path.

Stephen Moore, policy director for FRESC, a group focused on improving conditions for low-income and minority communities, said the study shows the city realizes the situation might be at a tipping point.

“We see this as a big step for the city acknowledging where we are and where we have been. The research is really needed,” Moore said.

The metro area faces a shortage of 80,000 affordable housing units, he said. The normal ebb and flow in which some areas revitalize and rise in cost while others decline and become more affordable has been disrupted.

Compounding matters, the vast majority of new homes and apartments hitting the market are on the higher end, Moore said.

Washington said the city plans to tackle the displacement problem in a variety of ways. By knowing where gentrification is likely to happen, the city and its partners can strategically buy up parcels on the cheap, especially along transit lines.

That land can then in the future be combined with tax credits and offered to developers focused on affordable units.

Another approach is to provide workforce training so residents of gentrifying neighborhoods can command a higher wage that will help them to afford the area.

Making residents aware of property tax abatements and other programs to help them stay in place is another approach, Washington said.

Moore said research shows that property owners who cash out of gentrifying neighborhoods typically end up worse off than those who stay put and make the transition.

Aldo Svaldi: 303-954-1410, asvaldi@denverpost.com or @aldosvaldi