Can We Learn & Live Together? 2.0 by School of Professional & Continuing Studies

CONTEXT & PROCESS FOR THE REPORT

In 2017, the report, Confronting School and Housing Segregation in the Richmond Region: Can We Live and Learn Together?, examined the issues of housing and education segregation in the metro-Richmond area and provided a ground-breaking visualization of housing and education together. It showed readers that in the metro-Richmond area it matters where you live and learn.

The report opened with the following narrative by Dr. John Moeser, who was a Professor of Urban Studies and Planning at Virginia Commonwealth University and a Senior Fellow at the Bonner Center for Civic Engagement at the University of Richmond:

It is common for people to think that Richmond was more segregated during the ﬁrst half of the 19th Century when slave codes dictated the routine life of African Americans including the prohibition against congregating in public. Yet when one compares 19th century maps of Richmond with 21st century maps, black and white populations are much more separated today than before.

After Reconstruction, though slavery had been abolished, Jim Crow laws emerged that had the same effect as slavery. Douglas Blackman’s book, Slavery by Another Name, discusses the newly adopted vagrancy laws that led to the jailing of enormous numbers of black males who couldn’t pay the

ﬁnes for walking in public places without documents establishing their employment and who employed them.

Still, throughout this period Richmond never forced blacks and whites to live in separate areas, at least not until 1911 when Richmond became only the second city in the US–after Baltimore–to designate neighborhoods by race. Neighborhoods were zoned for whites or blacks. Six years later, however, in 1917, the US Supreme Court ruled Richmond’s zoning law unconstitutional.

In the 1920s, Richmond tried again to zone neighborhoods by race using the zoning code referred to as Virginia’s Racial Integrity Law that forbade interracial marriage. People could not live in neighborhoods whose residents they could not marry. Because Virginia forbade interracial marriage, blacks couldn’t live in white neighborhoods or vice versa.

By the 1930s, Richmond neighborhoods were thoroughly segregated, though the preservation of segregation now fell largely to local bankers and realtors. Restrictive covenants were embedded in property deeds of privately owned homes that prohibited white homeowners from selling their houses to blacks and, in many instances, to Jews. In 1948, the Supreme Court acted again and nulliﬁed the use of these racist covenants.

Realtors reinforced segregation by steering white home buyers to white neighborhoods and black homebuyers to black neighborhoods. Bankers, meanwhile, denied mortgages to blacks or whites seeking to purchase housing in the “wrong” neighborhood. My wife and I can attest to that practice as it was employed when we sought to purchase our ﬁrst house in an integrated neighborhood.

A READER’S GUIDE TO THE REPORT

The LL2 report seeks to provide policy makers, advocates, educators, and citizens with the guidance, tools and ideas to understand and to ﬁght segregated housing and education by race, ethnicity, income, language and status. Examining eight localities in the metro-Richmond area, the LL2 report seeks to break down barriers of difference at the geographical level and push for more regional cooperation. As Dr. Moeser stated in the opening of the original report, “we must construct the multi-racial, income diverse, city-suburban coalitions that are fundamental to bringing about change.”

The LL2 report uses GIS maps to explore crucial school and housing characteristics related to educational access, opportunities, and outcomes. The report closes with a series of policy recommendations designed to expand access and opportunity for children in the metro-Richmond area. The report is broken down into the following sections:

• Demographic Change in Metro-Richmond Area

• Link Between School and Neighborhood Segregation in Metro-Richmond Area

• Unequal Educational Opportunities Related to Housing Segregation in Metro-Richmond Area

• Unequal Educational Outcomes Related to Housing Segregation in Metro-Richmond Area

• Policy Steps to Beneﬁt the Metro-Richmond Area

From the late 1930s through the early 1960s, one of the major drivers of segregated neighborhoods was none other than the federal government itself. Urban planners became their accomplices.

Mortgage discrimination, placement of public housing, Federal Housing Authority (FHA) policies, highway construction, urban renewal projects, and local economic development led to the decimation of Richmond’s black neighborhoods. Red-lining, a pervasive form of government mortgage discrimination, starved African Americans of investment, which in turn caused their neighborhoods to fall into disrepair. When that happened, private investors then cited deterioration as a reason for denying loans for new housing or for the repair of older housing. It was too risky, they said, though never admitting that the red-lining led to the decay.

Public funds were tapped and channeled to low-income neighborhoods, but these funds were used to build public housing, nearly all of which was concentrated in the East End of Richmond. The one housing project for whites, Hillside Court, was built south of the river. The presence of public housing itself was another reason for private banks and investment ﬁrms to steer clear of those neighborhoods. Collapse became a self-fulﬁlling prophesy.

Middle income blacks who lost their property due to highway construction and urban redevelopment couldn’t take advantage of FHA loans to purchase new housing in the suburbs

because new subdivisions were white and, according to FHA, anytime blacks moved into white neighborhoods, home values declined. The consequence was that not only were city neighborhoods segregated, but the whole metropolitan area was as well.

With the passage of the Fair Housing Act of 1968, middle income African American families could ﬁnally begin to take advantage of FHA loans and move to new housing in the suburbs. Many of their old neighborhoods, however, struggled with the loss of black leadership that sustained the schools, churches, businesses, professional networks, and political institutions.

It is a similar history with our schools. Over time, Richmond’s schools reflected the loss of the white and black middle class while county schools became more racially diverse. Along some measures, our schools are more segregated now than before. Raciallydefined poverty has skyrocketed, first in the city and now in the suburbs.

The stark divisions in our society remain regional in scope. Public policy created many of these problems, but public policy can also address these problems. To do so, we must construct the multi-racial, income diverse, citysuburban coalitions that are fundamental to bringing about change.

Our regional history of deeply intentional racial discrimination in housing and schools informs access to equal educational opportunity today.

Dr. Moeser ended by asking, “Is there a lesson for all of us as we call attention to the plight of our children in the public schools they attend and the neighborhoods in which they live?” Dr. Moeser passed away two years ago, but his question is true today, and it is what drove another group to continue this work and write a second edition, Live and Learn 2.0, or LL2

In LL2, the reader will see visual illustrations, accompanied by narrative descriptions, of several key trends in the metro-Richmond area: demographic change over the past decade, the link between school and neighborhood segregation in our region, and the links between housing segregation and unequal educational opportunities and outcomes. LL2 makes connections between housing and education and reexamines the question that Dr. Moeser asked: Why does segregation matter? LL2 goes further than the previous report by examining more detailed and complex data points in education and housing segregation. In this report, we outline how segregation is an outcome and a cycle resulting from pernicious policies at the local, state, and federal level that need to be either changed or overturned. Unfortunately, the message and analysis is the same as in the last report–the metro-Richmond area has become more multiracial, but in many ways we have also grown further apart. LL2 lays another cornerstone in the foundation for why, in this current moment, segregation is antithetical to the growing diversity of our region.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

In the years since the ﬁrst Live and Learn report was released, the region has grown substantially more racially and ethnically diverse. Many of our communities and schools are deﬁned by rapid racial and ethnic change and/or growing racial and ethnic isolation.

The Live and Learn 2.0 or LL2 report suggests that the geographic scale of our racial separation is growing, with Richmond and inner ring suburbs like Henrico and Chesterﬁeld becoming more racially and ethnically diverse while outer ring exurbs like New Kent, Hanover, and Goochland are considerably less diverse.

LL2 continuously underlines how school and residential segregation by race/ethnicity, poverty and, in some cases, language are linked to unequal educational opportunities and student outcomes. Those differentiated opportunities and outcomes feed a damaging cycle, perpetuating segregation as families with more choices and resources avoid separate and unequal schools and communities. When we fail to create stable communities and schools characterized by multifaceted diversity, we fracture our ability to build trusting relationships across lines of difference. In short, we fail to prepare rising generations for living and learning in a multiracial society.

Policy and law must tackle the cycle of segregation in two ways: both ensuring that resources ﬂow more equitably to communities and schools historically cut off from them and ensuring that historically marginalized families have a tangible option to move to opportunity-rich schools and communities.

Key Findings

The Richmond region has become more racially diverse as its overall population has grown in the 7 years since the prior iteration of this report.

• The region continues to have a densely populated, racially diverse core, stretching from the western border of Henrico to portions of eastern Henrico and down through Richmond to Chesterﬁeld’s rapidly growing population centers along I-288, Hull Street Road, and Route 1/I-95.

• Within the inner core, there are sharp differences in where people live by race, with many white and Asian residents in the western portions of Henrico, Richmond, and Chesterﬁeld, whereas the eastern parts of each locality are home to many more Black residents.

School segregation by race/ethnicity closely reﬂects neighborhood segregation by race/ethnicity in the Richmond region. Elementary schools do so most clearly, as they typically have smaller attendance zones than middle and high school attendance zones.

• School and neighborhood segregation also apparent within school divisions/localities. Richmond, Chesterﬁeld and Henrico, for instance, all report schools and communities with dramatic differences in racial/ethnic composition in the same school system.

• Racial/ethnic segregation in schools is further deﬁned by high concentrations of Black and Hispanic students in Richmond and the inner ring suburbs of Henrico and Chesterﬁeld, particularly on the eastern side of the area.

• Schools in outer ring suburbs like Goochland, Hanover, and New Kent generally report lower than average concentrations of Black and Hispanic students, reﬂecting lower than average residential concentrations of Black and Hispanic populations. (Charles City County is an important exception.)

Concentrations of student poverty, measured by the state as students considered economically disadvantaged, overlap signiﬁcantly with concentrations of Black and Hispanic students and residents.

• The eastern and southeastern swaths of the metro-Richmond area, especially in Richmond and just over the city-suburban boundaries in Henrico and Chesterﬁeld, show high concentrations of both school and neighborhood poverty.

• Schools with mid- and higher-levels of student economic disadvantage are present in exurban and rural localities along the I95 and Route 1 corridors as well as in Charles City and western Goochland.

• Schools with higher concentrations of multilingual learners tend to be located in the southside of Richmond and the inner ring suburbs of Henrico and Chesterfield. Many multilingual learners also reside in communities with higher poverty levels. This is particularly true in southeastern Richmond and Chesterfield. In western Henrico, however, some schools serve high shares of multilingual students in relatively affluent communities.

• Black elementary, middle, and high school students are excluded from schools at twice their rate of enrollment. Racially disproportionate discipline patterns are more pronounced in communities with low shares of families living in poverty.

• At the same time, schools issuing the highest number of long-term suspensions (10 or more days out of school) for Black students in the metro-Richmond area are concentrated in neighborhoods with the highest poverty levels, suggesting that students in these communities face more draconian discipline.

Schools employing higher percentages of inexperienced teachers are more likely to serve neighborhoods with higher concentrations of poverty. Stark variation is evident in the share of inexperienced teachers across schools within the Chesterﬁeld and Henrico school divisions. Richmond Public Schools did not report data on this dimension of teacher quality, but data from Henrico and Chesterﬁeld indicate that inexperienced teachers are largely concentrated in the eastern half of the counties. The eastern sides of both localities are also characterized by higher concentrations of neighborhood poverty than the western sides.

reading proﬁciency, and many are located in closest proximity to schools with the lowest 3rd grade reading proﬁciency levels.

• Households utilizing Housing Choice Vouchers (HCVs) are not able to live in close proximity to schools characterized by high levels of 3rd grade reading proﬁciency. Although the placement of HCVs is more geographically dispersed than other forms of subsidized housing, such as LowIncome Housing Tax Credit properties, Project-Based vouchers, and traditional public housing, disbursement is limited.

In the Richmond region, students in neigh-

• borhoods deﬁned by high levels of poverty are disproportionately learning from teachers who lack expertise in their ﬁelds (i.e., the subject area they teach, such as science, social studies or mathematics).

• Elementary, middle and high schools with higher percentages of teachers with provisional licenses are concentrated in communities characterized by higher concentrations of Black and Hispanic residents.

Sharp variation is evident among the metro school divisions in the state and local per pupil funding that supports student performance. In Charles City, Chesterﬁeld, Henrico, and Richmond, funding levels fell short of what would be needed for their students’ test scores to reach the national average, according to data from the Albert Shanker Institute that looked at actual 2020 spending levels. These four school divisions are also systems where more than half the students were students of color in 2020.

Local zoning policy signiﬁcantly limits the construction of new, more affordable housing in highly resourced school divisions.

• Few areas in the region that contain affordable housing have access to any schools that fall in the upper tertile of 3rd grade

Few schools with a high Advanced Di- • ploma rates are located in the more affordable rental markets of the metro-Richmond area, and none of the schools in the upper tertile of advanced diploma rates are in areas where rents are affordable to lowand moderate-income households. The lack of schools with high Advanced Diploma rates in areas with lower rents suggests that students living in more affordable rental housing do not have the same access to rigorous learning opportunities that are more likely to prepare them for future academic achievement.

High schools reporting a greater share of students taking one or more Advanced Placement (AP) courses are disproportionately located in areas where rental households are signiﬁcantly cost-burdened.

Schools with higher than average rates of chronic absenteeism consistently appear in or near ZIP codes where evictions are most frequently ﬁled. Schools with the lowest chronic absenteeism are also often located in places with less frequent ﬁlings.

Policy Recommendations

The LL2 report provides separate policy recommendations for Housing and for Education. It then examines education and housing public policies together. With each recommendation, there is a designation of the level of government and/or set of policy actors that are best equipped to address the recommendation: State, Localities or School Divisions.

Education

Removing Barriers

Expand metropolitan area school options

• with inclusive school admissions. We have robust regional collaborations, supported by state systems and resources, in educational areas such as professional development for student supports (VTSS), special education (TTAC), and secondary education for the gifted (Governor’s Schools.) With similar support, we could strengthen and expand metropolitan area options for schools with inclusive school admissions policies that feature effective outreach to families, weighted lotterybased admissions, and cross-locality transportation. (State/School Divisions)

Conduct intradistrict school rezoning with • integration as a local school board policy priority. Rezoning remains a frequent and common practice that impacts many students in our region, yet more school divisions need to include the policy goal of increasing racial/ethnic, socioeconomic and linguistic diversity through revised school boundaries. This is a clear path to help break the neighborhood-school segregation link. Incentives at the regional and state level could spur planning and

implementation just as they have done for other gubernatorial administration priorities, such as high school innovation and lab schools. State funding can provide a carrot for new school design strategies and cross-district or cross-sector collaboration, yet without policy provisions for inclusive admissions, new schools and programs will reinforce segregation rather than expand opportunity for students. (State/School Divisions)

Leverage growth in multilingual learners • through dual-language immersion models, where students are taught literacy and course content in two languages, rather than segregating multilingual learners for signiﬁcant portions of the school day within schools. (School Divisions)

Explore school division consolidation.

• Locality-led school division consolidation remains the purview of the state board of education, and state law sets forth the impetus of “promoting the realization of the standards of quality” in drawing school division boundary lines. The variations in educational quality that we see in our region are impediments to that realization, thus, they could also justify rethinking existing school division boundaries. (State)

Resources for Equity

Increase funding for schools and divisions

Virginia’s current funding formula is inadequate in terms of overall level of resources and inequitable in terms of not providing sufﬁcient support for students facing higher barriers to learning and thriving.1

Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission laid out a series of recommendations and policy options in July 2023 to address these shortcomings,2 most of which have not yet been implemented.3 With most local governments who can afford to do so already providing far more toward the costs of their local schools than is required by the state’s current school funding formula,4 creating adequate and equitable access to public education for every child must include increased state funding and an improved state funding formula. (State)

Provide incentives for highly qualiﬁed

• teachers to serve schools of highest unmet need. (State/School Divisions)

Change the recently updated state ac-

• countability system to accurately and fully reﬂect student learning growth as well as proﬁciency, provide comprehensive and accessible information about school inputs and outcomes, and guide support to schools and systems serving higher numbers of students with unmet needs. Research points to concerns about the correlation between school ratings and racial composition and the impact on perceptions and choices that further egregation. Despite this, the recently updated state system gives lower consideration to measures of student growth and emphasizes labels with the potential for such negative consequences.5 (State)

Housing

Removing Barriers

Amend local zoning codes to allow more

• diverse housing types, such as small-scale multifamily properties and apartments, across the area. (Localities)

Streamline development processes for af-

• fordable housing development to more efﬁciently facilitate the production of new homes affordable to low-income households. (Localities)

Fund the 5,000 families program (state

Provide experiential training programs for

• provisionally-licensed, alternatively-licensed, and out of ﬁeld teachers through ongoing professional development, residency, coaching, and mentorship, with particular emphasis on culturally responsive instruction and supporting and retaining minoritized teachers who enter the workforce with a provisional license.

(State/School Divisions)

• voucher program) to enable more families with children to move to areas with well-resourced schools. (State)

Increase funding to Richmond’s Eviction

July 1, 2020, and July 31, 2022.6 The General Assembly should expand the eligibility criteria and combine the program with ﬁnancial assistance to ensure more families qualify for and beneﬁt from diversionary efforts. (State/Localities)

Fully fund legal services for tenants com- • batting eviction, economic exploitation, and discrimination. (State/Localities)

Strengthen anti-discrimination protections • by removing the small landlord exemption to source of funds protections and by making it illegal for landlords to deny housing based on ﬁnancial challenges voucher holders experienced before they obtained an income-based housing subsidy. This will greatly improve the efﬁcacy of housing voucher programs and provide families with greater housing choice. (State)

Require voucher administrators to adopt

• small area fair market rents (SAMFRs) or exception payment standards to expand housing choice for families assisted by Housing Choice Vouchers (HCVs). Although HCV administrators have increased the payment standards over time, those increases have not kept up with increases in rents. The US Department of Housing and Urban Development has authorized voucher administrators to adopt SAFMRs, but those in the Richmond region have not.8 SAFMRs would allow the HCV administrator to calculate payment standards at the zip code level, rather than the metro-level used for traditional fair market rents. This would help ensure that the payment standards reﬂect the local market and would help provide voucher holders with greater access to low-poverty and/or high-opportunity neighborhoods. (State)

• ing enforcement, particularly against landlords who misapply minimum income requirements in violation of guidance from the Virginia Real Estate Board.7 Persistent violations of source of funds protections further constrain housing choices for voucher holders and limit their ability to move to neighborhoods with high performing schools. (State)

Dedicate additional resources to fair hous-

Establish a housing assistance program • that covers the cost of rental application fees and security deposits for low-income families and families with a housing voucher. These costs are a huge barrier to accessing housing. Application funds in combination with housing counseling greatly improve the success of households seeking to place their voucher in lowerpoverty areas. (State/Localities)

Moving to Opportunity and Resources for Equity

Establish mechanisms to prioritize the • preservation and maintenance of existing affordable housing that is not currently subsidized through government programs, for example by enacting laws that give nonproﬁt developers the right of ﬁrst refusal to purchase affordable housing properties when they are listed for sale, dedicating revenue or public funds for the acquisition and rehabilitation of affordable housing, or dedicating more funding to home repair programs for low-income homeowners. (State/Localities)

Dedicate state and local funding for the

• production and preservation of affordable housing for low and very low income households with a geographic focus on opportunity rich and highly resourced areas. One method is to establish a fair share affordable housing requirement, which would require the construction of lower-cost housing in historically exclusionary communities.9 (State/Localities)

Authorize any locality in Virginia to provide • for an affordable dwelling unit program under Va. Code §15.2-2304. Current law restricts such authorization to counties with an urban county executive form of government or county manager plan of government and certain other localities (Fairfax, Arlington, Albemarle, Loudoun, Alexandria, and Charlottesville), which severely limits the ability of local governments to require or incentivize the inclusion of affordable units in new housing construction. (State)

Launch racial equity impact assessment

• for the Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) Program’s Qualiﬁed Action Plan (QAP). The QAP is a set of instructions to guide LIHTC developers through the process of acquiring tax credits for producing affordable rental units and sets out the state’s priority for projects. By reviewing and amending the QAP with a racial equity lens, the state can direct tax credits towards projects that are accessible to minoritized households, constructed in highly resourced, amenity-rich, and transit-oriented neighborhoods, and include protective management standards. (State/Localities)

Bolster down payment assistance pro-

• grams targeting low-income households that provide critical resources to families who may not be able to purchase homes in many parts of the region. (State/Localities)

Encourage partnerships between for-proﬁt • developers and the Maggie Walker Community Land Trust to support permanently affordable homeownership opportunities in areas experiencing high housing costs or gentriﬁcation. (Localities)

Dedicate public surplus property or other • publicly owned parcels for the speciﬁc intent of affordable housing development. (Localities)

Increase collaboration and coordination • between housing agencies. Public housing authorities, housing assistance agencies, and homelessness service providers often operate in isolation and in a single jurisdiction, contributing to fragmented efforts to address affordability. Waivers of existing rules in programs such as the Rental Assistance Demonstration and Moving to Work programs can foster consortia-based solutions and encourage collaboration across multiple public housing authorities, nonproﬁt and private property owners, and essential service providers. (Localities)

Combined Education-Housing Policies

Localities should create collaborative • structures at the local or regional level to regularly bring together school and housing officials and stakeholders. These may include honorary seats for school officials on planning committees or for housing officials on school boards. The state should incentivize such structures.

(State/Localities)

Establish a multi-agency eviction preven-

• tion task force that brings together legal service providers, housing assistance organizations, McKinney Vento coordinators, and homelessness service providers to monitor eviction court dockets and coordinate eviction prevention efforts to help reduce the number of evictions, diminish the impact of evictions on families, ensure school absenteeism due to an eviction is short and rare, and develop and implement long-term eviction prevention strategies that address the needs of students. (Localities)

Localities should develop a shared school-

• housing agenda to foster stable, racially and economically diverse, well-resourced schools and communities. The state should incentivize these efforts. (State/Localities)

Shared agenda items recognizing the relationship between housing and school segregation may include:

Developing a metric to determine

• whether HCVs offer access to diverse, well-resourced schools.

Requiring new housing developments

• in proximity to diverse, well-resourced schools to set aside a share of deeply affordable units.

Assessing housing patterns in deci-

• sions about new school sites and redrawing attendance boundaries. Assessments should prioritize siting and attendance boundary options that nurture diverse, well-resourced schools.

• dized housing for school choice options like open enrollment or specialty programs.

Prioritizing children residing in subsi-

Targeting anti-displacement strategies

• in neighborhoods with rapidly rising home values. To help prevent the displacement of renters, advocate for just cause eviction protections10 and legislation that would enable localities to adopt anti-rent gouging ordinances. To mitigate the risk of displacement of homeowners, expand and improve real property tax relief programs and implement robust repayment plans for taxdelinquent owner occupants. Localities can proactively protect land from the speculative housing market by buying land in neighborhoods with high displacement risk ratios and preserving it for affordable housing use.

Set measurable goals for fostering stable,

• racially and economically diverse, well-resourced schools and communities. Goals should recognize the link between housing and school segregation. Issue regular reports assessing progress to or away from goals. (State/Localities)

INTRODUCTION

Live and Learn 2.0 or LL2 report suggests that the geographic scale of our racial separation is growing, with Richmond and inner ring suburbs like Henrico and Chesterﬁeld becoming more racially and ethnically diverse while outer ring exurbs like New Kent, Hanover and Goochland are considerably less diverse.

Concentrations of student poverty overlap closely with concentrations of neighborhood poverty, and both are related to high concentrations of Black and Hispanic students and residents. These patterns, as Dr. John Moeser’s reprinted foreword reminds us, have been shaped over long periods of time by discriminatory law and policy. LL2 also clearly shows how contemporary school and housing policy—from attendance boundaries and zoning decisions to the implementation of Housing Choice Vouchers (HCVs)—shapes and restricts equitable access to wellresourced schools.

This LL2 report continuously underlines how school and residential segregation by race/ethnicity, poverty and, in some cases, language are linked to unequal educational opportunities and student outcomes. Those differentiated opportunities and outcomes feed a damaging cycle, perpetuating segregation as families with more choices and resources avoid separate and unequal schools and communities. When we fail to create stable communities and schools characterized by multifaceted diversity, we fracture our ability to build trusting relationships across lines of difference. In short, we fail to prepare rising generations for living and learning in a multiracial society.

Figure 1 represents the eight localities of focus for this report–Richmond, Henrico, Chesterfield, Hanover, New Kent, Goochland, Powhatan, and Charles City–which we describe as the metro-Richmond area. While other entities define the metropolitan area differently, we selected these localities partly to reflect how educational and residential dynamics play out across urban, suburban, exurban, and rural geographies. The 8 jurisdictions also constitute the planning district commission for the region. As a network of local governments designed to foster regional cooperation,11 the footprint of the Richmond Regional Planning District makes sense as a unit of analysis in a report focused on understanding challenges and opportunities faced by the metro-Richmond area. Additionally, regionally-focused organizations, such as PlanRVA and the Partnership for Housing Affordability (PHA), already work collaboratively with partners at this geographic scope and can act as key connectors for local cooperation to address mutual challenges and develop shared solutions for the region.

Figure 1: Localities of Study Within the Richmond Area

DEMOGRAPHIC CHANGE IN THE METRO-RICHMOND AREA

The Richmond region has continued to become more racially diverse as its overall population has grown in the 7 years since the prior iteration of this report.12 The maps in Figure 2 show the population of the region by race and ethnicity in 2018-2022–the most recently available data period–compared to the prior report’s data period of 2011-2015. Each dot represents 100 people.

The metro-Richmond area continues to have a densely populated, racially diverse core, stretching from the western border of Henrico County to portions of eastern Henrico and down through Richmond to Chesterﬁeld’s rapidly growing population centers along Route 288, Hull Street Road, and Route 1/I-95.13

Hanover is also experiencing population growth, and portions of the county off I-295 near Atlee Station and Mechanicsville are developing population densities approaching those of the inner core. The exurban ring of Charles City, Goochland, Hanover, New Kent, and Powhatan continue to have a far lower population density than Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterﬁeld.

With the exception of Charles City, the exurban counties also continue to have a far higher share of their residents who are non-Hispanic and white compared to the inner core. In a region where, overall, 43% of residents are

people of color,14 more than 75% of residents in Hanover, New Kent, Goochland, and Powhatan identiﬁed as non-Hispanic and white. Meanwhile the share of non-Hispanic white residents is between 42% and 59% in the region’s inner core of Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterﬁeld plus Charles City County.15

Within the inner core, these maps show sharp differences in where people live by race, with many white and Asian residents living in the western portions of Henrico, Richmond, and Chesterﬁeld, while the eastern parts of each locality are home to many more Black residents. Additionally, the maps show the growing number of Latino residents along the Route 1 corridor in Chesterﬁeld.

These sharp differences in population density and racial composition are not neutral or naturally occurring. As we will show in the remainder of this report, they have been created in large part through housing and education policy choices, and they align with differences in educational opportunity.

Figure 2: Race and Place in the Metro-Richmond Area

LINK BETWEEN SCHOOL AND NEIGHBORHOOD SEGREGATION IN THE METRO-RICHMOND AREA

School segregation by race/ethnicity closely reﬂects neighborhood segregation by race/ethnicity in the Richmond region (see Figure 3). Elementary schools do so most clearly, as they typically have smaller attendance zones than middle and high schools attendance zones. Thus, the green circles representing schools that have a lower percentage of Black and Hispanic students are concentrated in the localities and communities with a lower percentage of Black and Hispanic residents (lighter shading). Conversely, the red triangles show schools with the highest percentage of Black and Hispanic students, and most appear in areas with the highest percentages of Black and Hispanic populations.

In addition to racial/ethnic disparities in the makeup of schools between different school divisions/localities in the metro-Richmond area, school segregation is also apparent within school divisions/localities. Richmond, Chesterﬁeld and Henrico, for instance, all report schools and communities with dramatic differences in racial/ethnic composition in the same school system (i.e.,intradistrict segregation).

Racial/ethnic segregation in schools is further deﬁned by high concentrations of Black and Hispanic students in Richmond and the inner ring suburbs of Henrico and Chesterﬁeld, particularly on the eastern side of the area. (See the darker shaded localities and the higher number of schools represented by purple squares and red triangles). Schools in outer

ring suburbs like Goochland, Hanover and New Kent generally report lower than average concentrations of Black and Hispanic students, reﬂecting lower than average residential concentrations of Black and Hispanic populations. Charles City County is an important exception to this pattern in the outer ring suburbs.

These area patterns matter because school segregation by race/ethnicity harms our students and our communities. They deprive all students from the opportunity to learn with and from one another in preparation for the racially and ethnically diverse future.16 School segregation by race/ethnicity is also associated with a highly unequal distribution of resources.17

Figure 3: Black/Hispanic Students and Residents in the Metro-Richmond Area

Concentrations of student poverty, measured by the state as students considered economically disadvantaged,18 overlap signiﬁcantly with concentrations of Black and Hispanic students and residents (see Figure 4). Concentrations of student poverty in schools also overlap closely with concentrations of poverty in neighborhoods, highlighting again the close relationship between school and neighborhood segregation. The eastern and southeastern swaths of the metro-Richmond area, especially in Richmond and just over the citysuburban boundaries in Henrico and Chesterﬁeld, show high concentrations of both school and neighborhood poverty. These are represented by the concentration of red triangles showing the school percentage of economically disadvantaged students and the darker shading for neighborhoods. We also see schools with mid- and higher-levels of economic disadvantage in exurban and rural localities along the I-95 and Route 1 corridors as well as in Charles City and western Goochland.

Double segregation by race/ethnicity and poverty is a central driver of racial achievement gaps as measured by standardized test scores in K12 education. Black and Hispanic students have much higher exposure to concentrations of student poverty, on average, than white and Asian students.19 In a study of over 100 million student test scores in public schools across 300 metropolitan areas, the disparity in the average school poverty rate between Black and white students was the most powerful correlate of achievement gaps.20 In other words, racially disparate exposure to student poverty is closely related to racial achievement gaps.

Schools with higher concentrations of multilingual learners (represented by red triangles) tend to be located in the southside of Richmond and the inner ring suburbs of Henrico and Chesterﬁeld (see Figure 5). Many multilin-

MULTILINGUAL LEARNERS

We use the term multilingual learner (MLL) to center the assets that MLLs bring to the classroom. MLLs are students who have regularly engaged with and are developing proﬁciency in multiple languages. It includes students who are referred to in Virginia as English learners (ELs).*

gual learners also reside in communities with higher poverty levels (represented by blue shading). This is particularly true in southeastern Richmond and Chesterﬁeld. In western Henrico, however, some schools serve high shares of multilingual students in relatively afﬂuent communities.

Segregating multilingual learners from monolingual learners in communities of concentrated poverty is a growing problem nationwide. Roughly 20 percent of US schools enroll 75 percent of all multilingual learners, many in schools and neighborhoods characterized by high levels of poverty.21 Similar harms to students and society that flow from segregating children by race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status also hold for segregation by language. Affected students will be ill-prepared for navigating a world containing many languages. Access to important resources and opportunity-rich social networks is often distributed unevenly across schools defined by linguistic segregation.22 And while not illustrated with data here, segregating multilingual learners within schools for significant portions of the school day is also harmful. In-school segregation often removes multilingual students from core academic classes and creates stigma around language.23

*https://www.hmhco.com/blog/how-to-support-multilingual-learners-mlls-in-the-classroom

Figure 4: Economically Disadvantaged Students and Neighborhood Poverty Level in the Metro-Richmond Area

Figure 5: Multi-Language Learner Students and Neighborhood Poverty Level in the Metro-Richmond Area

UNEQUAL EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES RELATED TO HOUSING SEGREGATION IN THE METRO-RICHMOND AREA

Many dynamics of K12 schooling are shaped by our region’s housing segregation, including how our region’s students are disciplined in ways that impact their learning time, student access to quality instruction and advanced coursework, and the resources for schools and systems.

Racially disproportionate shares of Black students experience short-term suspensions, when students are excluded from school for anywhere between one and nine days, across all school levels in the metro-Richmond area. As we look from elementary to middle to high school in Figure 6, yellow squares or red triangles representing schools where Black students are suspended out of school on a short term basis at rates disproportionate to their overall share of the student population appear in all but one locality (Charles City).24 The average composite index for Black students in elementary, middle and high school is nearly 2, meaning that Black students are excluded from schools at nearly twice their rate of enrollment. Racially disproportionate discipline patterns are more pronounced in communities with low shares of families living in poverty, as represented by beige shading. This suggests that even when Black families are able to break the accumulated disadvantages from decades of deliberate racial segregation and send their children to schools in low-poverty neighborhoods, their children are still subject to more punitive disciplinary practices.

Schools issuing the highest number of longterm suspensions (10 or more days out of school) for Black students in the Richmond region are concentrated in neighborhoods with higher poverty levels. (See Figure 7.) The number of long-term suspensions for Black students is highest overall in high

schools, followed by middle schools. The dark beige circles show that school administrators in a sizable number of secondary schools in the metro-Richmond area issue 10 or more suspensions to Black students in a single school year. Martin Luther King Middle and Richmond High School for the Arts, both in Richmond, reported more than forty long-term suspensions issued to Black students. Though considerably smaller in number, almost all of the elementary schools issuing long-term suspensions to Black students are located in Richmond.

Punitive disciplinary measures that exclude students from instructional time have negative academic and social consequences.25 Racially disproportionate and exclusionary discipline remains a deep challenge in the K12 system, particularly for Black students.26 Research shows that Black students experience higher rates of exclusionary discipline for low-level infractions and for subjective infractions like disorderly conduct or deﬁance, relative to white students.27 Moreover, Black students are disciplined more harshly than white students for the same infractions.28 This holds true despite studies showing that Black students do not act out at rates different than other students.29

These studies, alongside racially disparate discipline patterns that persist in our region’s schools, all suggest that punishment is meted out unfairly for Black students, in schools with low and high concentrations of Black students and in communities with high concentrations of families below the poverty line.

Figure 6: Short-Term Suspensions Issued to Black Students and Neighborhood Poverty Level in the Metro-Richmond Area

Figure 7: Long-Term Suspensions Issued to Black Students and Neighborhood Poverty Level in the Metro-Richmond Area

Figure 8: Inexperienced Teachers and Neighborhood Poverty Level in the Metro-Richmond Area

Figure 9: Out-of-Field Teachers and Neighborhood Poverty Level in the Metro-Richmond Area

Stark variation is evident in the share of inexperienced teachers across schools in the Chesterﬁeld and Henrico school divisions (see Figure 8). In these two school systems, schools with high percentages of inexperienced teachers, or those reporting one year or less in the classroom, are represented by yellow squares and red triangles. Richmond Public Schools did not report data on this dimension of teacher quality, but data from Henrico and Chesterﬁeld indicate that inexperienced teachers are largely concentrated in the eastern half of the counties.30 The eastern sides of both localities are also characterized by higher concentrations of neighborhood poverty than the western sides.

More broadly, schools employing higher percentages of inexperienced teachers are more likely to serve neighborhoods with higher concentrations of poverty (represented by the darker blue shading.) In many communities with more than a third of families living below the poverty line, schools in or around the area report that between roughly 4% and 15% of teachers are inexperienced (represented by the yellow squares or orange triangles).

Though strong teaching ﬂows from many different skills and the time to practice them, several measurable attributes associated with teacher quality include licensure, years of experience, teaching in the teacher’s area of expertise, and advanced degrees.31 High quality teachers matter a great deal for a variety of student outcomes, including achievement.32

It is important to note that Richmond area schools are operating in the context of a challenging teacher shortage. Statewide, most school divisions reported signiﬁcant challenges with attracting and retaining teachers since the pandemic. The 2024 school year began with 230 more teacher vacancies across the state than the previous summer.33 Regionally, different factors inﬂuence the ability to attract and retain teachers within

urban, rural, and suburban divisions. Punitive accountability systems that label or sanction schools struggling to meet the needs of historically marginalized students may deter experienced faculty from opting in or staying.34 Charged politics related to classroom instruction around race, racism, and gender have also been associated with higher levels of educator turnover.35

In the metro-Richmond area, students in neighborhoods defined by high levels of poverty are disproportionately learning from teachers who lack expertise in their fields (field meaning subject area like science, social studies, or mathematics). Teaching “out of field” means that teachers have not received certification and/or coursework in the subject area they are expected to teach. The share of out-of-field teachers is also higher in middle and high schools, where teachers are expected to have more content knowledge related to their subject area. In middle schools, for instance, the average share of teachers out-of-field is 8.1%, compared to 3.4% in elementary schools.

Teaching out-of-field is associated with lower student test scores, especially in social studies and math,36 though findings have been somewhat mixed.37 Out-of-field teachers may be less effective than fully licensed teachers because of the lack of preparation and vertical and horizontal understanding of the content they are teaching.38 If a teacher does not understand the vertical alignment of their content, so that they know the end goals needed for the following course, it can make teaching more difficult and leave students unprepared for the next course.

Elementary, middle, and high schools with higher percentages of teachers with provisional licenses (represented by yellow squares and red triangles) are concentrated in communities characterized by higher concentrations of Black and Hispanic residents (represented by darker blue shading). (See Figure 10.) These communities include Richmond, Charles City, the border of Chesterﬁeld shared with Richmond, and Eastern Henrico.

Teachers with provisional licenses have not yet fully met the state’s requirements to hold a license to teach in their subject area and/or grade level and may have completed little or no teacher preparation coursework. State teacher licensure requirements are intended to create consistency in educator preparation by requiring candidates to meet the same basic education course requirements, licensure exams, and college credit towards their area of teaching.

Current patterns illustrated in the metroRichmond area maps for minoritized students and provisionally licensed teachers mirror past trends and broader patterns statewide. A recent analysis of state data found that provisionally licensed teachers accounted for 12% of the faculty in schools with the highest shares of Black students, versus 6% in schools with the lowest shares of Black students.39 The number of applications for provisional licenses has grown more than 2,000 percent between 2015 and 2021 in the context of a major teacher shortage.40

As with out-of-field teachers, disproportionate shares of provisionally licensed teachers serving historically marginalized students reflects unequal access to highly qualified teachers. Studies have shown that schools serving more minoritized students tend to have less qualified teachers and fewer resources to entice more qualified teachers.41

At the same time, it is also important to acknowledge the path that provisional licensure opens up for minoritized teachers. Most Black and male Hispanic teachers enter the edu-

cator workforce as provisionally licensed teachers.42 Because minoritized faculty can help increase academic achievement and educational attainment for minoritized students,43 in addition to providing role models for all students, supporting minoritized teachers who enter the workforce with a provisional license as they work toward a professional license is crucial.

Clear variation is evident among the metro school divisions when it comes to the state and local per pupil funding that supports student performance. In Figure 11, four school divisions are shaded beige, tan, and red (Charles City County, Chesterﬁeld, Henrico, and Richmond). In these divisions, funding levels fell short of what would be needed for test scores to reach the national average, according to data from the Albert Shanker Institute that looked at actual 2020 spending levels.44 These four school divisions are also systems where more than half the students were students of color in 2020. In the other four school divisions shaded blue (Goochland, Hanover, New Kent, and Powhatan), funding levels were above the dollar amount that research shows would be needed to reach national average test scores. This analysis by national researchers includes adjustments for factors like geographic differences in labor costs and poverty rates.45

There are also signiﬁcant barriers facing the many families seeking well-funded, highquality schools who cannot afford to buy a single-family home. In Figure 11, areas where multifamily housing (e.g., apartments) can be built are shaded in gray. The map shows how local zoning policy signiﬁcantly limits the construction of new, more affordable housing in highly resourced school divisions. (Zoning data were not available in the same format for Goochland, Powhatan, New Kent, and Charles City.)

Figure 10: Teachers with Provisional Licenses and Race in the Metro-Richmond Area

Figure 11: School Division Funding Gaps and Multi-Family Housing Zones in the Metro-Richmond Area

High schools reporting a greater share of students taking one or more Advanced Placement (AP) courses are disproportionately located in areas where rental households are signiﬁcantly cost-burdened, as shown in Figure 12. Said differently, housing affordability is more of a struggle near high schools with plentiful opportunities to take advanced coursework. In addition to communities with high housing cost burdens in the city and surrounding suburbs, exurban/rural areas in the metro-Richmond area also report lower shares of students taking one or more AP courses.

Equitable access to AP courses matters because the classes can support student success in college. AP courses do so by preparing students for college-level content and rigor and by enabling them to receive college credit and tuition savings from successfully passing the courses. AP course access is thus a critical opportunity, particularly for ﬁrst-generation college students and those who will need

financial assistance for post-secondary education. Division- or school-level barriers to offering numerous AP courses include the need for teachers in-field (i.e., familiar with the subject matter) and enough students to fill multiple AP classes.46 Potential student-level barriers to taking multiple AP courses include bias in teacher recommendations and grading practices as well as earlier tracking.47

COST BURDEN

Cost burden is when a household pays more than 30 percent of their income on housing. Households are considered severely burdened when they pay more than 50 percent of their income on housing. These measures can indicate the ﬁnancial pressure households experience when signiﬁcant portions of their incomes are devoted to housing, which can leave these households without the means to meet other basic needs such as health care, food, transportation, and child care.

Figure 12: Students Taking More than One AP and Cost-Burdened Renters in the Metro-Richmond Area

UNEQUAL EDUCATIONAL OUTCOMES RELATED TO HOUSING SEGREGATION IN METRO-RICHMOND AREA

Mapping chronic absenteeism at school alongside eviction filings–one measure of housing instability, indicating the beginning of the legal process of eviction for tenants–shows the impacts of housing instability on students’ ability to consistently attend school. Schools with higher than average rates of chronic absenteeism generally appear in or near ZIP codes where evictions are filed most frequently. Schools with the lowest chronic absenteeism are also often located in places with less frequent filings. Importantly, eviction filings do not account for all chronic absenteeism. For example, Charles City has low

filing rates but relatively high chronic absenteeism at the high school (which serves grades 7-12) and elementary level, and on the other hand, high filing rates in far southwest Chesterfield County without corresponding chronic absenteeism demonstrates how concentrated eviction filing activity in one exurban multifamily complex may not have a direct impact on absenteeism. With the exception of Charles City, however, all of the schools with the relatively highest levels of absenteeism are within or adjacent to ZIP codes that have above-average filing rates. Existing knowledge shows how housing instability negatively

Figure 13: Chronic Absenteeism and Household Threatened Rates in the Metro-Richmond Area

impacts students’ ability to attend school and to learn, and these data provide one window into how housing instability prevents students from being able to regularly attend school in the metro-Richmond area.

In 2023 more than one out of ten renters in Virginia–over 137,000–were threatened with eviction by their landlord ﬁling an unlawful detainer lawsuit, and more than a quarter of renters are threatened with eviction each year in Virginia’s major urban regions.48 Importantly, children are the group most frequently threatened with eviction, and those children represent four out of every ten people threatened with eviction.49

Eviction, most broadly understood as involuntary displacement, whether through the legal process or not, causes signiﬁcant harm to households, their communities, and the wider public, as eviction creates a cascade of public expense. Households experience negative effects for years after being evicted, such as relocating to poorer-quality housing, increased use of homeless shelters, increased absence from school, increased exposure to lead in children, and negative impacts on physical and mental health.50 Given the signiﬁcant prevalence of children among those who are threatened with eviction, it is not surprising that children who are evicted miss more school than those who are stably housed, and in one study, children who were evicted missed 30 percent of school days in the two years following their eviction.51

Even when an eviction ﬁling does not result in the removal of a household from their housing, the impacts are still harmful and increase the likelihood of future displacement. Due to fees and court costs, an eviction ﬁling alone can increase a household’s housing costs by as much as 20 percent on average.52 Simply paying more than 30 percent of household income on housing, or being rent-burdened (i.e., cost-burdened), is associated with higher rates of mortality; that is, people who are rent-burdened die earlier than those who have

affordable housing. This risk of premature death increases for those who receive an eviction ﬁling, even without a judgment, and the risk is higher still for those with a judgment.53 Higher mortality in these situations stems in part from the inability for rent-burdened households to meet their healthcare needs, such as necessary medications, while paying unaffordable rent. Additionally, unhealthy housing that often accompanies housing instability and the stress of the threat of eviction harms people’s physical and mental health.

The development of homes that are dedicated as affordable to low-income households provides stable housing options to those most likely to face housing insecurity. However, as Figure 14 shows, schools that have a high level of reading proficiency among 3rd graders (including students with both “proficient” and “advanced” assessment results) are not located in those parts of the metro-Richmond area where there are higher numbers of affordable housing units. In fact, few neighborhoods with affordable housing have access to any schools that fall in the upper tertile of reading proficiency, and many are located in closest proximity to schools with the lowest reading proficiency levels. While some schools with high reading proficiency are located in areas with affordable housing units located in western Chesterfield, the majority of subsidized affordable housing is spread throughout south and east Richmond and northeast Henrico County, where schools with the lowest reading proficiency levels are located.

Affordable housing units (in this case, deﬁned as housing units that are affordable to households earning 80 percent of the area median income54 through rents subsidized by federal, state, or local government programs) ensures that families do not spend more than 30 percent of their income on their housing costs and, therefore, are able to sustainably maintain their housing. However, development and maintenance of subsidized affordable housing has proved challenging. As developers of af-

fordable housing compete with the private market for land, resources, and access to capital, constructing new affordable units is often financially infeasible without significant public funding, which has been inconsistent over the past decade.55 Still, research has shown that households living in subsidized affordable homes experience numerous benefits, including increased educational opportunities and outcomes, positive physical and mental health impacts, and greater overall community wellbeing.56 Despite these benefits of affordable housing, many communities resist such developments, citing unsubstantiated fears of negative impacts on home values,57 increased crime rates,58 overcrowding community utilities

and schools,59 and stereotypes of subsidized housing residents.60

The few affordable housing developments proximate to schools with high reading proﬁciency rates underlines a lack of access to residency in many high-opportunity parts of the metro-Richmond area for low-income families who rely on housing subsidies. Excluding affordable housing from being constructed in areas with higher performing schools limits the positive impact–including greater educational opportunities for children–that subsidized affordable housing can have on families leaving unstable housing situations.

Figure 14: Reading Proﬁciency and Subsidized Housing Units in the Metro-Richmond Area

The Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) Program—the Nation’s largest source of federal housing assistance—helps individuals and families with very low income pay for housing in the private market, including single-family homes, townhomes, and apartments.61 Administered through state and local housing agencies and public housing authorities, the HCV program subsidizes rent for qualifying low-income households in the form of a direct payment to private landlords. Assisted households typically pay 30 percent of their income (or 50 dollars minimum rent for households experiencing ﬁnancial hardship) towards rent and utilities, and the voucher covers the remainder.

By reducing housing costs, the HCV program should give recipients access to a wide range of neighborhoods and enable them to relocate to areas where they can take advantage of new economic and educational opportunities. Yet Figure 15 illustrates the limitations of the HCV program in granting families greater access to high performing schools.

Figure 15 shows that households utilizing HCVs in the metro-Richmond area are generally unable to live in close proximity to schools characterized by high levels of reading proﬁciency. Although the placement of HCVs is more geographically dispersed (indicated by

Figure 15: 3rd Grade Reading Proﬁciency and Housing Choice Vouchers in the Metro-Richmond Area

blue shading, with darker blue representing larger concentrations of voucher households) than other forms of subsidized housing, such as Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) properties and project-based housing, disbursement is limited. The largest concentration of HCV-assisted households is in close proximity to schools with low reading proficiency levels (represented by red triangles). There are a very few to no voucher households living in close proximity to schools with higher third grade reading proficiency (indicated by green circles). When viewed together, Figure 14 and Figure 15 indicate that access to affordable housing is negatively related to access to schools with high reading proficiency.

THIRD GRADE READING LEVELS

The share of students achieving proﬁcient or “advanced” levels in reading at the end of third grade, as measured by their performance on the Standards of Learning (SOL) tests, at least partly highlights the extent to which educators in a school have prepared them to “read to learn” rather than “learn to read.” Reading to learn becomes ever more central to understanding content once a student begins fourth grade.* While high stakes tests measure a variety of opportunities in and outside schools, the percentage of third graders achieving reading proﬁciency signals an important individual student and collective school outcome.

Over the past several decades, the federal government has embraced deconcentration of poverty, which prioritizes the dispersion of low-income people over the investment of resources in poor communities, as the means to alleviate the ill effects of poverty on families. As part of this strategy, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has

shifted funding away from project-based public housing towards market-based subsidized housing programs, such as voucher programs, to house low-income families. The HCV program was designed, in part, to provide affordable housing choice for families in the private market beyond the limited locations of unitbased subsidized housing programs.62 Indeed some ﬁndings have demonstrated beneﬁts of the voucher program: moving to a lower-poverty neighborhood when young increases college attendance and earnings.63 Although the research shows that the program is successful at reducing housing instability, homelessness, and overcrowding,64 numerous other studies have documented the concentration of vouchers in poorer neighborhoods.65 Key structural problems have prevented the program from fully delivering on its promise of housing choice and opportunity for all participating families.

*https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/rel/Products/Region/paciﬁc/Ask-AREL/70038#:~:text='%20Students%20who%20are%20not%20reading,students%20who%20struggle%20to%20read

MOVE TO OPPORTUNITY

Since its inception in 2014, Housing Opportunities Made Equal of Virginia’s mobility counseling program has been responsible for moving clients living in neighborhoods with an average poverty rate of 32 percent to neighborhoods with an average poverty rate of 18 percent. The Move to Opportunity Program combines mobility counseling, tenant education, and landlord recruitment services to assist households with a Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) in ﬁnding housing of their choice. As of May 2024, HOME had provided counseling to over 2,220 HCV households and successfully placed 533 households into opportunity-rich neighborhoods. Despite these successes, HOME’s mobility counselors report several major barriers that severely limit voucher holders’ housing choices: lack of housing supply that is within the HCV payment standards, high fees (e.g., rental application fees, hold fees, and security deposits), unfair tenant screening criteria, and discrimination against families with vouchers.

In addition to the limited ability of housing programs to provide access to affordable housing opportunities in highly resourced neighborhoods and school districts, significant differences in the cost of housing between neighborhoods makes it difficult for low- or moderate-income households to access many parts of the metro-Richmond area. Figure 16 outlines the varied affordability of rents among the area’s markets. ZIP Codes with the lowest rents in the region are seen in the east end and south side of Richmond, eastern Henrico, New Kent, and Charles City, where typical rents for a two-bedroom apartment are close to 1,200 dollars a month. Meanwhile, parts of southwest Chesterfield, west end Richmond, and northwest Henrico see typical rents in ex-

cess of 2,000 dollars for a two-bedroom unit. This significant disparity in typical rents underscores the relative lack of access to affordable rental housing for many households in large parts of the region. Furthermore, the figure illustrates that few schools with a high Advanced Diploma graduation rate66 are located in the more affordable rental markets of the area, while few of the schools in the upper tertile of advanced diploma rates are in neighborhoods where rents are affordable to low- and moderate-income households. Research has shown that students earning Advanced Diplomas were much more likely to earn a postsecondary degree or still be enrolled in postsecondary education four years after high school when compared to Standard Diploma students.67 Additionally, peer influences and effects mean that attending a school with higher percentages of students working toward a more rigorous diploma can positively impact choices for other students.68 The negative relationship between areas with lower rents and schools with high Advanced Diploma rates suggests that students living in more affordable rental housing do not have the same access to the rigorous learning opportunities that are more likely to prepare them for future academic achievement.

Rents have risen across the metro-Richmond area amid a context of a growing regional population and increasing national home prices.69 Figure 16 shows small area fair market rents (SAFMRs), which HUD computes for individual ZIP codes.70 This measure is useful to understand the approximate average rents in the region, since SAFMRs are set at the 40th percentile for gross rent of an area, according to Census data. In other words, 40 percent of apartments in a particular area have gross rents that are lower-cost than the small area

fair market rent, while 60 percent of apartments are at higher cost.

As rents exceeding 2,000 dollars a month are only affordable to households earning 80,000 dollars or more, many households in the region are excluded from accessing opportunities to receive Advanced Diplomas without some form of additional assistance to afford

higher-cost housing. The lack of affordable housing options and limited impact of the HCV program, as outlined above, coupled with high average rent in many areas of the region, emphasizes the difﬁculties of accessing schools with greater learning opportunities for low- and moderate-income renter households.

Figure 16: Advanced Diploma Rate and Fair Market Rent in the Metro-Richmond Area

POLICY STEPS

Key Takeaways

As each of these maps illustrates in some way, the metro-Richmond area has become more diverse yet remains divided along the lines of race, income, ethnicity, language, and poverty. Through these visualizations in the LL2 report, we can see the intertwined and pervasive nature of housing and school segregation. What we can’t see–but must emphasize–is how segregation perpetuates and reinforces itself by creating the conditions of more and less opportunity that then can inﬂuence those with opportunity to separate further from those with less. With this pernicious cycle in mind, the LL2 report offers both policy solutions that seek to shift the status quo by addressing the fundamental barriers to opportunity and providing policy recommendations designed to meet the current needs of those experiencing the inequitable opportunities that segregation causes.

The goal of the policy section of the LL2 report is to imagine how policy makers, non-proﬁts, and advocacy groups can break down and remove barriers but also provide opportunities and resources to assist in addressing housing and education segregation. The LL2 report has outlined how segregation is an outcome, but also it is a cycle that is a result of pernicious policies at the local, state, and federal level that need to be either changed or overturned. This section starts by analyzing the policy developments that have been achieved since the publication of the ﬁrst Learn and Live report in 2017. The report then provides separate policy recommendations for housing and for education. It continues by offering public policy solutions that address the housing and education segregation - how to overcome or remove persistent barriers, while providing resources to assist children and caregivers move to opportunity. We conclude with examining housing and education public policies together - something that is rarely

done. With each recommendation, there is a designation of the level of government and set of policy actors that are best equipped to address the recommendation: State, Localities or School Divisions in Education sections.

Policy Progress

Since the ﬁrst Learn and Live report was released, there have been some promising results in both the education and housing sectors, including:

Education

Coordinated advocacy to reduce racial • disparities in out-of-school suspensions statewide helped ensure the passage of a state law that restricts the suspensions of students in preschool through third grade to three days or less for cases of “physical harm or credible threat of physical harm to others,” “aggravating circumstances,” or those “involving ﬁrearms, destructive devices, or drugs.”71

CodeRVA High School, in operation since • 2017, offers a regional magnet approach for students from ﬁfteen localities–including the eight featured in this report. The school features a lottery-based admissions process that addresses the inequities of the current science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) sector, and it provides services, including transportation, that ensures access to students from diverse communities and backgrounds.

Housing

•

Passage of source of funds protections

A person’s source of funds, or source • of income, became a legally protected characteristic in the Virginia Fair Housing Law on July 1, 2020.72 Source of funds protections mandate that it is unlawful to discriminate because of any source that lawfully provides funds to or on behalf of a renter or buyer of housing, including any assistance, beneﬁt, or subsidy program, whether such program is administered by a governmental or nongovernmental entity.73

• program

Virginia Eviction Reduction Pilot (VERP)

In November 2020, the Virginia Gen-

• eral Assembly directed the Department of Housing and Community Development to establish a competitive Eviction Prevention and Diversion Program to support local or regional eviction protection and diversion programs that utilize a systems approach, with the program launching in April 2021.74 This eventually became known as the Virginia Eviction Reduction Pilot (VERP) program. Results from the first two years of VERP found that eviction filings and judgements were significantly lower in ZIP codes where a VERP program was active, and the presence of a VERP program was the most influential factor in lowering filings and judgements.75 Between April 2021 and July 2023, the VERP program served 8,784 individuals from 3,813 households facing eviction. Nearly half of those served were children (44 percent) and the majority of households served were headed by a person of color (59 percent).76

COVID eviction protections •

• tions included eviction moratoria, expansion of tenants’ rights, and the Virginia Rent Relief Program, which provided over 1 billion dollars to help families make 193,588 housing payments and remain housed during the pandemic from 2020 to 2022.77

Successful COVID-era eviction protec-

Even though these protections were

• time-limited, they showed that evictions are a policy choice and that the state has the power to stop the churn of evictions, should it choose to do so.

Increases in local funds directed to • affordable housing development

In 2024, Richmond announced its

• Equitable Affordable Housing Program, which will utilize 50 million dollars in general obligation bond funding for affordable housing projects. This money will be matched by another 50 million dollars from the Low-Income Support Coalition for a total investment in affordable housing of 100 million dollars over the next ﬁve years.

Also in 2024, Henrico invested 60

• million dollars into a newly created Henrico Affordable Housing Trust Fund that will focus on assisting in the development of affordable homeownership. The investment will help fund a goal of 500 new affordable homes in the county over the next ﬁve years.

Increases in funds dedicated to the • Virginia Housing Trust Fund from the General Assembly:

For ﬁscal years 2014-2020, the average • allocation to the Virginia Housing Trust Fund was 9 million dollars annually.

Starting in ﬁscal year 2021, the average annual allocation has increased to 70 million dollars.78

Despite the steps forward outlined above, the metro-Richmond area remains a long way from tackling the regional school-housing segregation link. Seven years later, in addition to exploring the issues with fresh data, the LL2 report outlines updated policy solutions.

Policy Recommendations for Education

Removing Barriers

Expand metropolitan area school options

•

Conduct intradistrict rezoning with integra-

tion as a local school board policy priority. Rezoning remains a frequent and common practice that impacts many students in our region, yet more school divisions need to include the policy goal of increasing racial/ethnic, socioeconomic and linguistic diversity through revised school boundaries. This is a clear path to help break the neighborhood-school segregation link. Incentives at the regional and state level could spur planning and implementation just as they have done for other gubernatorial administration priorities, such as high school innovation and lab schools. State funding can provide a carrot for new school design strategies and cross-district or cross-sector collaboration, yet without policy provisions for inclusive admissions, new schools and programs will reinforce segregation rather than expand opportunity for students. (State/School Divisions)

Leverage growth in multilingual learners

• through dual-language immersion models, where students are taught literacy and course content in two languages, rather than segregating multilingual learners for signiﬁcant portions of the school day within schools. (School Divisions)

Explore school division consolidation. Lo-

• cality-led school division consolidation remains the purview of the state board of education, and state law sets forth the impetus of “promoting the realization of the standards of quality” in drawing school division boundary lines. The variations in educational quality that we see in our region are impediments to that realization, thus, they could also justify rethinking existing school division boundaries. (State)

Resources for Equity

Inequality in our K12 system has always been bound up in segregation by design, and those systemic design challenges also make it harder to desegregate. Whether independent of or concurrent with the root cause solutions above, policies should also address the existing resource inequalities associated with segregation that have been highlighted. This means a continued focus on state and federal policy and funding to:

Increase funding for schools and divisions

• serving high concentrations of historically disadvantaged students. This could include increased ﬂexible state funding for schools and divisions serving many multilingual learners, students from low-income families, and students with disabilities. Virginia’s current funding formula is inadequate in terms of overall level of resources and inequitable in terms of not providing sufﬁcient support for students facing higher barriers to learning and thriving.79 Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission (JLARC) laid out a series of recommendations and policy options in July 2023 to address these shortcomings,80 most of which have not yet been implemented.81 With most local governments who can afford to do so already providing far more toward the costs of their local schools than is required by the state’s current school funding formula,82 creating adequate and equitable access to public education for every child must include increased state funding and an improved state funding formula. (State)

Provide incentives for highly qualiﬁed

• teachers to serve schools of highest unmet need. (State/School Divisions)

Provide experiential training programs for

(State/School Divisions)

Change the recently updated state ac-

• countability system to accurately and fully reﬂect student learning growth as well as proﬁciency, provide comprehensive and accessible information about school inputs and outcomes, and guide support to schools and systems serving higher numbers of students with unmet needs. Research points to concerns about the correlation between school ratings and racial composition and the impact on perceptions and choices that further segregation. Despite this, the recently updated state system gives lower consideration to measures of student growth and emphasizes labels with the potential for such negative consequences.83 (State)

Policy Recommendations for Housing

Removing Barriers

There are also signiﬁcant barriers facing families seeking well-funded, high-quality schools who cannot afford to buy a single-family home. Local zoning policy signiﬁcantly limits the construction of new multifamily housing (e.g., apartments) in highly resourced school divisions, and structural problems associated with housing subsidy programs limit households’ ability to move to high-opportunity neighborhoods. State and local policy makers can and should remove the barriers families face in accessing housing of their choice.

Amend local zoning codes to allow more

• diverse housing types, such as small-scale multifamily properties and apartments, across the region. (Localities)

Streamline development processes for

• affordable housing development to more efﬁciently facilitate the production of new homes affordable to low-income households. (Localities)

• batting eviction, economic exploitation, and discrimination. (State/Localities)

Fully fund legal services for tenants com-

Strengthen anti-discrimination protections

• by removing the small landlord exemption to source of funds protections and by making it illegal for landlords to deny housing based on ﬁnancial challenges voucher holders experienced before they obtained an income-based housing subsidy. This will greatly improve the efﬁcacy of housing voucher programs and provide families with greater housing choice. (State)

Dedicate additional resources to fair hous-

• ing enforcement, particularly against landlords who misapply minimum income requirements in violation of guidance from the Virginia Real Estate Board.86 Persistent violations of source of funds protections further constrain housing choices for voucher holders and limit their ability to move to neighborhoods with high performing schools. (State)

Establish a housing assistance program

Fund the 5,000 Families program84 to en-

• able more families with children to move to areas with well-resourced schools. (State)

Increase funding to Richmond’s Eviction

• Diversion Program and amend program requirements to remove barriers to eligibility. Due to the narrow tailoring of the participation criteria, the Richmond General District Court referred a mere 12 cases to the Eviction Diversion Program between July 1, 2020, and July 31, 2022.85 The General Assembly should expand the eligibility criteria and combine the program with ﬁnancial assistance to ensure more families qualify for and beneﬁt from diversionary efforts. (State/Localities)

• that covers the cost of rental application fees and security deposits for low-income families and families with a housing voucher. These costs are a huge barrier to accessing housing. Application funds in combination with housing counseling greatly improve the success of households seeking to place their voucher in lowerpoverty areas. (State/Localities)

Require voucher administrators to adopt • small area fair market rents (SAMFRs) or exception payment standards to expand housing choice for families assisted by Housing Choice Vouchers (HCVs). Although HCV administrators have increased the payment standards over time, those increases have not kept up with increases in rents. HUD has authorized voucher administrators to adopt SAFMRs, but those in the Richmond region have not.87 SAFMRs would allow the HCV administrator to calculate payment standards at the zip code level, rather than the metro-level used for traditional fair market rents. This would help ensure that the payment standards reﬂect the local market and would help provide voucher holders with greater access to low-poverty and/or high-opportunity neighborhoods. (State)

Moving to Opportunity and Resources for Equity

Establish mechanisms to prioritize the preservation and maintenance of existing affordable housing that is not currently subsidized through government programs, for example by enacting laws that give nonproﬁt developers the right of ﬁrst refusal to purchase affordable housing properties when they are listed for sale, dedicating revenue or public funds for the acquisition and rehabilitation of affordable housing, or dedicating more funding to home repair programs for low-income homeowners. (State/Localities)

Dedicate state and local funding for the production and preservation of affordable housing for low and very low income households with a geographic focus on opportunity rich and highly resourced areas. One method is to establish a fair share affordable housing requirement, which would require the construction of lower-cost housing in historically exclusionary communities.88 (State/Localities)

Authorize any locality in Virginia to provide

• for an affordable dwelling unit program under Va. Code §15.2-2304. Current law restricts such authorization to counties with an urban county executive form of government or county manager plan of government and certain other localities (Fairfax, Arlington, Albemarle, Loudoun, Alexandria, and Charlottesville), which severely limits the ability of local governments to require or incentivize the inclusion of affordable units in new housing construction. (State)

Launch racial equity impact assessment for • the Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) Program’s Qualiﬁed Action Plan (QAP). The QAP is a set of instructions to guide LIHTC developers through the process of acquiring tax credits for producing affordable rental units and sets out the state’s priority for projects. By reviewing and amending the QAP with a racial equity lens, the state can direct tax credits towards projects that are accessible to minoritized households, constructed in highly resourced, amenity-rich, and transitoriented neighborhoods, and include protective management standards. (State/Localities)

Bolster down payment assistance pro- • grams targeting low-income households that provide critical resources to families who may not be able to purchase homes in many parts of the region. (State/Localities)

• developers and the Maggie Walker Community Land Trust to support permanently affordable homeownership opportunities in areas experiencing high housing costs or gentriﬁcation. (Localities)

Encourage partnerships between for-proﬁt

Establish a multi-agency eviction preven-

Dedicate public surplus property or other

• publicly owned parcels for the speciﬁc intent of affordable housing development. (Localities)

Increase collaboration and coordination

• between housing agencies. Public housing authorities, housing assistance agencies, and homelessness service providers often operate in isolation and in a single jurisdiction, contributing to fragmented efforts to address affordability. Waivers of existing rules in programs such as the Rental Assistance Demonstration and Moving to Work programs can foster consortia-based solutions and encourage collaboration across multiple public housing authorities, nonproﬁt and private property owners, and essential service providers. (Localities)

Combined School-Housing Policies

Given the close relationship between school and housing segregation, intentional efforts to collaborate across often siloed sectors is crucial. State, regional and local ofﬁcials should consider efforts to:

Develop a shared school-housing agenda

• to foster stable, racially and economically diverse, well-resourced schools and communities.

Shared agenda items recognizing the relationship between housing and school segregation may include:

Developing a metric to determine

• whether HCVs offer access to diverse, well-resourced schools.

Requiring new housing developments

• in proximity to diverse, well-resourced schools to set aside a share of deeply affordable units.

Assessing housing patterns in deci-

Create collaborative structures at the local

• or regional level to regularly bring together school and housing officials and stakeholders. These may include honorary seats for school officials on planning committees or for housing officials on school boards. The state should incentivize such structures. (State/Localities)

• sions about new school sites and redrawing attendance boundaries. Assessments should prioritize siting and attendance boundary options that nurture diverse, well-resourced schools.

• dized housing for school choice options like open enrollment or specialty programs.

Prioritizing children residing in subsi-

Call to Action

Targeting anti-displacement strategies

• in neighborhoods with rapidly rising home values. To help prevent the displacement of renters, advocate for just cause eviction protections89 and legislation that would enable localities to adopt anti-rent gouging ordinances. To mitigate the risk of displacement of homeowners, expand and improve real property tax relief programs and implement robust repayment plans for taxdelinquent owner occupants. Localities can proactively protect land from the speculative housing market by buying land in neighborhoods with high displacement risk ratios and preserving it for affordable housing use.

• racially and economically diverse, wellresourced schools and communities. Goals should recognize the link between housing and school segregation. Issue regular reports assessing progress to or away from goals. (State/Localities)

Set measurable goals for fostering stable,

This LL2 report is one step of many needed, but it leaves us with a powerful truth: school and housing segregation are strongly intertwined, and they run counter to the needs of a thriving community. This challenge is exacerbated by a fragmented local government structure in our region that can impede collaboration. Further, despite the intertwined issues and interests, it is still uncommon to have shared conversations or problem-solving efforts across the education and housing sectors. We hope that this LL2 report assists with initiating a dialogue.

Despite the hurdles, the report’s authors see reasons for optimism and efﬁcacy. Bringing together leaders from various organizations is a starting point for the additional conversations and actions needed for sustainable change. We also see in other areas both promising and politically tenable solutions. Taking a “we’re all in this together” approach, as we have done in the LL2 report, is the only way forward. Addressing these issues together will allow us to make regional progress and accomplish the goals outlined in the LL2 report. There are real students and real families, represented by symbols on these maps, whose learning opportunities and future contributions to our community will be shaped by our choices today.

The creators of the LL2 report believe that progress is possible–and urgently needed.

METHODOLOGY

This report was a collaborative effort of researchers from ﬁve different organizations in the metro-Richmond area–Housing Opportunities Made Equal of Virginia (HOME), Partnership for Housing Affordability (PHA), the Commonwealth Institute, University of Richmond, and Virginia Commonwealth University. Michelle Quach (Research Assistant, University of Richmond Spatial Analysis Lab) and Kyle Redican (Director of the Spatial Analysis Lab / Faculty, University of Richmond Department of Geography, Environment, and Sustainability) produced all data visualizations in the report using ArcGIS Pro 3.1.

Geographic information systems (GIS) were used to manage, analyze, and visualize the education, demographic, and housing data compiled from various sources. (See tables on pages 46 and 47.)

Geospatial data with the physical locations of public schools in the study area were obtained and downloaded in April 2024 from the Virginia Geographic Information Network database. The education data were merged ﬁrst in Excel into one dataset, which was then imported into ArcGIS Pro and joined to the geographic data on public schools using the twelve digit National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) school number. The dataset was separated into sub datasets for elementary, middle, and high schools for subsequent, relevant data analysis and visualizations. Tertiles, as well as median and mean values, were calculated using ArcGIS Pro, which was also used to create the ﬁnal data visualizations, including the maps.

This analysis included data on 214 schools across the eight school divisions of the Metro-Richmond area, including 136 elementary schools, 38 middle schools, and 34 high schools, as well as 6 specialty schools90 that are not included in those prior categories. Early learning/preschool centers and regional magnet schools are not included in this analysis.

The primary source of education data in this report was the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE). VDOE’s School Quality Proﬁles data were downloaded via the “Download Data” menu, and VDOE Fall Membership data were retrieved via the Build-A-Table function.

Housing and neighborhood demographic data were compiled from a number of sources as detailed in the table below, including the RVA Eviction Lab/Legal Services Corporation, US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), US Census Bureau American Community Survey (ACS), and analysis by the Partnership for Housing Affordability of local datasets. ACS 5-year estimate data were retrieved from the Census Bureau’s API using the “TidyCensus” R package for 2011-2015 and 2018-2022 estimates.

We use the term Hispanic because much of our data relies on Census Bureau deﬁnitions.

A 2023 survey also suggested that a majority (52%) of respondents identifying as Hispanic or Latino/a/x prefer “Hispanic.”91

EDUCATION DATA

VARIABLE DATA SOURCE

Percent of Inexperienced Teachers

Percent of Out of Field Teachers

Provisional License

Share of all students taking one more AP*

3rd Grade Reading Proﬁciency*

Advanced Diploma Rate

Chronic Absenteeism

Short Term Suspensions (Black Student Composite Index)

Long Term Suspensions

Percent Economically Disadvantaged

Percent ELL (multilingual learners)

Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) School Quality Proﬁles, 20222023

VDOE School Quality Proﬁles, 2022-2023

VDOE School Quality

Proﬁles, 2022-2023

VDOE School Quality

Proﬁles, 2022-2023

VDOE School Quality

Proﬁles, 2022-2023

VDOE School Quality

Proﬁles, 2022-2023

VDOE School Quality

Proﬁles, 2022-2023

VDOE School Quality

Proﬁles, 2022-2023

VDOE School Quality Proﬁles, 2022-2023

SOURCE VARIABLE NAME

FIRST_YR_TCH_PCT

Percent Black and Hispanic Students

School Funding Adequacy

VDOE Fall Membership Build-a-Table, 2022-2023

VDOE Fall Membership

Build-a-Table, 2022-2023

NON_ENDORSED_TCH_PCT

Provisional Percent

Advanced Placement course enrollment

Percent Pass (percent proﬁcient + advanced)

Calculated as Advanced Diploma / Cohort

Chronic Absenteeism, Percent above 10

Calculated as Black student Percent of Short Term Suspensions / Black student Percent of the Student Population

Black students Number Suspended Long Term

DATA NOTES

Data was unavailable for Richmond Public Schools.

Data unavailable for 2 of the specialty schools.

Data unavailable for 3 of the specialty schools.

Data available for 36 schools, but only 34 are displayed due to excluding the specialty schools.

Data unavailable for 2 elementary schools. Speciality schools not shown.

Data is available for all 34 high schools and 3 speciality centers. The specialty schools are not shown.

Data available for all schools. The specialty schools are not shown.

Data available for all schools except 1 specialty center. Many schools reported no long-term suspensions of Black students and are included as zero. The specialty schools are not shown.

Total Count of students identiﬁed as economically disadvantaged / Total Count of students in the school

Total Count of ELL students / Total Count of students in the school

VDOE Fall Membership

Build-a-Table, 2022-2023

Albert Shanker Institute District Cost Database (2020) and Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI-U

(Total Count of students identiﬁed as Black, not of Hispanic origin + Total Count identiﬁed as Hispanic) / Total Count

fundinggap adjusted for inﬂation from 2020 to 2024 dollars using BLS CPI-U

Data available for all schools.

Where the number of ELL students is less than 10, VDOE suppresses data for privacy. These schools are assigned to the lowest tertile for this variable in this report. Specialty schools are not shown.

Data available for all schools.

Data is shown at the district level.

NEIGHBORHOOD AND HOUSING DATA

VARIABLE DATA SOURCE

Eviction Filing Rate RVA Eviction Lab/Legal Services Corporation (2023)

Eviction Judgment Rate RVA Eviction Lab/Legal Services Corporation (2023)

Small Area Fair Market Rent (FMR)

Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) (2024)

Number of Households with a Housing Choice Voucher (HCV)

Percent of Renter who are Housing Cost Burdened

Subsidized Affordable Housing Units

Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) (2023)

Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) - Comprehensive Affordable Housing Strategy dataset (ACS 2018-2022)

Compiled by Partnership for Housing Affordability; Sources: Virginia Housing, National Housing Preservation Database (2024)

Combined Zoning Compiled by PHA; Sources: City of Richmond, Chesterﬁeld County, Henrico County, Hanover County

DESCRIPTION / DATA NOTES GEOGRAPHY

The number of eviction ﬁlings in a given ZIP code divided by the number of renter households in that tract

The number of eviction judgments in a given ZIP code divided by the number of renter households in that tract

• A proxy for average rent

• Speciﬁc to HUD’s Small Area FMR program

• HUD’s deﬁned allowable rent that can be covered by a Housing Choice Voucher within a given ZIP code

Number of households using a Housing Choice Vouchers (have subsidized rent)

Census Tract

Percentage of renter households who pay 30% or more of their income to housing costs alone Census Tract

Number of subsidized affordable housing units (includes Low Income Housing Tax Credit, Public Housing, Section 8, etc properties)

“MFcode”=2 represents zones that allow most types of multifamily housing by-right

“MFcode”=1 represents zones that allow multifamily development containing 2-5 units by-right

“MFcode”=0 represents zones that do not allow any multifamily development by-right (single family housing, agricultural, industrial, etc)

Point dataAddresses

Zoning district geographies (polygons)

Population by Race

Black and Hispanic Share of Residents

Neighborhood Poverty Levels

US Census Bureau American Community Survey 5-year data (2011-2015 and 20182022)

US Census Bureau American Community Survey 5-year data (2018-2022)

Number of residents in the area, with each 100 residents represented by 1 dot that is randomly placed within the Census Tract

Share of residents who are Black or Hispanic (of any race)

Share of Families with Incomes Below the Poverty Line in the Past Year

Census Tract

AUTHORS

Below are the names in alphabetical order of those involved in the creation of this report.

Kiana Bradford, K-12 Educator, Doctoral student in Curriculum, Culture & Change, Virginia Commonwealth University

Kim Bridges, Associate Professor, Educational Leadership, School of Education, Virginia Commonwealth University

Jovan Burton, Executive Director, Partnership for Housing Affordability

Laura Dobbs, Director of Policy, Housing Opportunities Made Equal of Virginia

Levi Goren, Director of Research & Education Policy, The Commonwealth Institute for Fiscal Analysis

April Hewko, Doctoral student in Educational Leadership, Policy & Justice, Virginia Commonwealth University

Bryan Mooreﬁeld, independent data analyst and researcher

Corey Nolan, Doctoral student in Public Policy and Administration, Virginia Commonwealth University

Michelle Quach, Undergraduate student, University of Richmond

Kyle Redican, Director, Spatial Analysis Lab, University of Richmond

Tom Shields, Associate Professor, Education and Leadership Studies, Chair of Graduate Education, School of Professional and Continuing Studies, University of Richmond

Genevieve Siegel-Hawley, Professor, Educational Leadership, School of Education, Virginia Commonwealth University

Ben Teresa, Associate Professor, Assistant Chair, Urban and Regional Studies and Planning Program, Co-Director of the RVA Eviction Lab, L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs, Virginia Commonwealth University

Woody Rogers, Policy Director, Partnership for Housing Affordability

Special thanks to James Campbell, Senior Director of Marketing & Engagement, School of Professional and Continuing Studies, University of Richmond for formatting and designing the report.

NOTES

1 Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2024). Summary of report: Summary: Virginia’s K–12 funding formula. https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/summary/Rpt575Sum-1.pdf;

Education Law Center. (2023). Making the grade: 2023 state profiles. https://edlawcenter.org/research/making-thegrade-2023-state-profiles/

2 Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2024). Summary of report: Summary: Virginia’s K–12 Funding Formula. https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/summary/Rpt575Sum-1.pdf

3 Goren, L. (2024, August 21). What’s up with the JLARC report on Virginia schools? The Commonwealth Institute for Fiscal Analysis. https://thecommonwealthinstitute.org/the-half-sheet/whats-up-with-the-jlarc-report-on-virginiaschools/

4 Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2024). Summary of report: Summary: Virginia’s K–12 funding formula (p.2). https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/summary/Rpt575Sum-1.pdf

Virginia General Assembly. (2024). Actual fiscal year 2023 required local effort and required local match; Certification of budgeted fiscal year 2024 required local effort and required local match. https://rga.lis.virginia.gov/Published/2024/RD86/PDF

5 Piazza, P. and Noonan, J. (2023, January). Accountability systems and the persistence of school segregation: Research and future directions. The National Coalition on School Diversity. https://www.school-diversity.org/wpcontent/uploads/NCSD_RB16.pdf

6 Virginia Housing Commission. (2023, November 20). Virginia eviction diversion program final report. https://vhc.virginia.gov/Virginia%20Eviction%20Diversion%20Program%20Final%20Report2023%20(1)%20(1).pdf

7 Virginia Real Estate Board, Housing Discrimination on the Basis of Source of Funds, available at https://townhall.virginia.gov/L/GetFile.cfm?File=C:%5CTownHall%5Cdocroot%5CGuidanceDocs%5C222%5CGDoc_ DPOR_6978_v1.pdf

8 Establishing a More Effective Fair Market Rent System; Using Small Area Fair Market Rents in the Housing Choice Voucher Program Instead of the Current 50th Percentile FMRs, 81 Fed. Reg. 80567 (Nov. 16, 2016), available at https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr/fmr2016f/SAFMR-Final-Rule.pdf

9 Mai, E. (2024, March 28). Does “fair share” housing work? HousingForward Virginia. https://housingforwardva.org/news/fwd-204-fair-share-housing/

10 Dobbs, L. (2024, August 28). Guest blog: Evictors without a cause. Housing Forward Virginia. https://housingforwardva.org/news/g31-just-cause-evictions-richmond/

11 Planning District Commissions represent political entities chartered by the Virginia Area Development Code in 1968 (later revised as the 1995 Regional Cooperation Act) and organized by the state based on the community of interest among its counties, cities and towns.

PlanRVA. (n.d.). Our history. https://planrva.org/home/about-the-commission/history/

12 US Census Bureau (2015 and 2022). American Community Survey, 2011-2015 and 2018-2022. Retrieved August 2024 from ACS DP05 2011-2015 and ACS DP05 2018-2022.

13 Although New Kent had the largest percentage growth (19 percent) during this time period, Chesterfield had the largest numeric growth (37,800). Every locality except Charles City experienced some growth. US Census Bureau (2015 and 2022). American Community Survey, 2011-2015 and 2018-2022. Retrieved August 2024 from ACS DP05 2011-2015 and ACS DP05 2018-2022.

14 US Census Bureau (2015 and 2022). American Community Survey, 2011-2015 and 2018-2022. Retrieved August 2024 from ACS DP05 2011-2015 and ACS DP05 2018-2022.

15 US Census Bureau (2022). American Community Survey, 2011-2015 and 2018-2022. Retrieved August 2024 from ACS DP05 2018-2022.

16 Mickelson, R. A., Nkomo, M., & Wimberly, G. L. (2012). Integrated Schooling, Life Course Outcomes, and Social Cohesion in Multiethnic Democratic Societies. Review of Research in Education, 36(1), 197–238. https://doi.org/10.3102/0091732X11422667

Tropp, T. & Saxena, S. (2018). Re-Weaving the Social Fabric Through Integrated Schools: How Intergroup Contact Prepares Youth to Thrive in a Multiracial Society. Research Brief No. 13, Commemorating the 64th Anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. National Coalition on School Diversity, https://school-diversity.org/wpcontent/uploads/2018/05/NCSD_Brief13.pdf

17 Johnson, R. (2019). Children of the Dream: Why School Integration Works. Basic Books

Black, D. (Ed.) (2023 April-July). Special Issue: The Interconnection between School Finance and Segregation. Poverty and Race Research Action Council. https://www.prrac.org/the-interconnection-between-school-finance-andsegregation-april-july-2023-pr-journal/

Rooks, N. (2017). Cutting school: The Segrenomics of American Education. The New Press.

18 The Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) defines a student as economically disadvantaged if they meet any of the following criteria: They are eligible for free or reduced meals; They receive Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF); They are eligible for Medicaid.

19 Siegel-Hawley, G., Taylor, K., Frankenberg, E., & Bridges, K. (2021). Double segregation by race and poverty in Virginia schools. Center for Education and Civil Rights. https://cecr.ed.psu.edu/sites/default/files/Double_Segregation_by_Race_and_Poverty_Virginia_Schools_2021.pdf

Orfield, G., & Pfleger, R. (2024). The unfinished battle for integration in a multiracial America – from Brown to now. Civil Rights Project, UCLA. https://www.civilrightsproject.ucla.edu/research/k-12-education/integration-anddiversity/the-unfinished-battle-for-integration-in-a-multiracial-america-2013-from-brown-to-now/NationalSegregation-041624-CORRECTED-for.pdf

20 Spector, C. (2019, September 23). School poverty – not racial composition – limits educational opportunity, according to new research at Stanford. Stanford News. https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2019/09/new-data-toolshows-school-poverty-leads-racial-achievement-gap

21 Quintero, D., & Hansen, M. (2021, January 14). As we tackle school segregation, don’t forget about English Learner students. Brookings Institution. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/as-we-tackle-school-segregation-dont-forgetabout-english-learner-students/

22 de Cohen, C., Deterding, N., Clewell, B. (2005 September). Who’s Left Behind? Immigrant Children in High and Low LEP Schools. The Urban Institute, https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED490928.pdf

Carnock, J. T., & Ege, A. (2015, November 17). The "Triple Segregation" of Latinos, ELLs: What can we do? New America. https://www.newamerica.org/education-policy/edcentral/latinos-segregation/

23 Gandara, P. & Orfield, G. (2010 July). A Return to the “Mexican Room:” The Segregation of Arizona’s English Learners. UCLA Civil Rights Project, https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED511322.pdf; Kieffer, M. J., & Weaver, A. W. (2024). Classroom Concentration of English Learners and Their Reading Growth. Educational Researcher, 53(1), 54-58. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X231203646

24 Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction. (2020, January). Discipline data and practice brief: Supporting equity in school discipline. https://ospi.k12.wa.us/sites/default/files/2023-08/2020_01-discipline-data-practice-brief.pdf

25 Losen, D. (Ed.). (2015). Closing the school discipline gap: Equitable remedies for excessive exclusion. The Civil Rights Project at UCLA. https://civilrightsproject.ucla.edu/research/k-12-education/school-discipline/closing-theschool-discipline-gap-equitable-remedies-for-excessive-exclusion

26 Siegel-Hawley, G., Tefera, A. A., Naff, D., Lester, A., Senechal, J., Levy, R., Palencia, V., Parry, M., & DeBusk-Lane, M. (2019). Understanding racial inequities in school discipline across the Richmond region. Richmond, VA: Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium; U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights. (2018). 2015-16 Civil Rights Data Collection: School climate and safety. https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/crdcdiscipline-school-climate-report.pdf

27 Skiba, R. J., Michael, R. S., Nardo, A. C., & Peterson, R. L. (2002). The color of discipline: Sources of racial and gender disproportionality in school punishment. The Urban Review, 34(4), 317–342. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ663870 ; Smolkowski, K., Girvan, E. J., McIntosh, K., Nese, R. N., & Horner, R. H. (2016). Vulnerable decision points for disproportionate office discipline referrals: Comparisons of discipline for African American and White elementary school students. Behavioral Disorders, 41(4), 178–195. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1113080.

28 Okonofua, J. A., & Eberhardt, J. L. (2015). Two strikes: Race and the disciplining of young students. Psychological Science, 26(5), 617–624

29 Skiba, R. J., Michael, R. S., Nardo, A. C., & Peterson, R. L. (2014). The behavior of African American students in classrooms: Implications for discipline, policy, and practice. Indiana University, The Equity Project. https://indrc.indiana.edu/tools-resources/pdf-disciplineseries/african_american_differential_behavior_031214.pdf

30 We focus here on Henrico and Chesterfield, as these school divisions reported more within-division variation in teacher experience than the exurban ones.

31 Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2020, December). Operations and performance of Virginia’s Department of Education’s special education program (Report No. 568). Commonwealth of Virginia. https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/reports/Rpt568.pdf

32 Gonzalez, G. C., He, X., Bozick, R., & Davis, L. M. (2020). The Impact of Early Achievement in Math and Literacy on High School Outcomes. RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR4300/RR4312/RAND_RR4312.pdf

33 Mattingly, J. (2021, January 25). Virginia's teacher shortage hits Chesterfield, Henrico, and Richmond schools hard. Richmond Times-Dispatch. https://richmond.com/news/state-regional/education/virginia-teacher-shortagechesterfield-henrico-richmond/article_8a25c8b4-5e6a-11ef-93e6-d7c8d7450e7a.html

34 Ingersoll, R. M., Merrill, E., & May, H. (2016). Do accountability policies push teachers out? University of Pennsylvania, Consortium for Policy Research in Education. https://www.gse.upenn.edu/system/files/Doaccountability-policies-push-teachers-out.pdf

35 Hansen, M. (2024, February 1). A Nation at Risk offers key lessons for reinvigorating America's teacher workforce. Brookings Institution. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/a-nation-at-risk-offers-key-lessons-for-reinvigoratingamericas-teacher-workforce/

36 Dee, T. S. (2006). The Why Chromosome: How a teacher's gender affects boys and girls. Public Finance Review, 34(1), 31-54. https://tom-dee.github.io/files/PFR%202006.pdf

37 Porsch, R., & Whannell, R. (2019). Out-of-field teaching affecting students and learning: What is known and unknown. In L. Hobbs & G. Törner (Eds.), Examining the phenomenon of “teaching out-of-field” (pp. 179–191). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-3366-8_7

38 Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2020, December). Operations and performance of Virginia’s Department of Education’s special education program (Report No. 568). Commonwealth of Virginia. https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/reports/Rpt568.pdf

39 Virginia Education Association. (2023, May 10). Virginia students deserve fully trained teachers. https://www.veanea.org/virginia-students-deserve-fully-trained-teachers/

40 Virginia Education Association. (2023, May 10). Virginia students deserve fully trained teachers.

41 García, D. R. (2019). Separate and unequal: Title I and teacher quality. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 27(109). https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.27.4233

42 University of Virginia. (2024, January 31). Teacher licensure in Virginia: Policy brief. University of Virginia, Education Policy Works. https://education.virginia.edu/sites/default/files/2024-01/epw_teacher-licensure-brief_2024-01-31.pdf

43 Klopfenstein, K. (2005). Beyond test scores: The impact of black teacher role models on rigorous math taking. Contemporary Economic Policy, 23(3), 416–428. https://doi.org/10.1093/cep/byi031; Gershenson, S., Hart, C. M. D., Hyman, J., Lindsay, C. A., & Papageorge, N. W. (2022). The Long-Run Impacts of Same-Race Teachers. American Economic Journal. Economic Policy, 14(4), 300–342. https://doi.org/10.1257/pol.20190573

44 EdBuild. (n.d.). District cost differences visualization. School Finance Data. https://www.schoolfinancedata.org/dcdviz1/; Albert Shanker Institute & Rutgers University. (2024, January). The adequacy and fairness of state school finance systems: Sixth edition. School Finance Data. https://www.schoolfinancedata.org/the-adequacy-and-fairness-of-state-school-finance-systems-2024/

45 EdBuild. (n.d.). District cost differences visualization. School Finance Data. https://www.schoolfinancedata.org/dcdviz1/; Albert Shanker Institute & Rutgers University. (2024, January). The adequacy and fairness of state school finance systems: Sixth edition. School Finance Data. https://www.schoolfinancedata.org/the-adequacy-and-fairness-of-state-school-finance-systems-2024/

The fairest way to measure school funding adequacy and equity is to adjust for the higher cost of serving students who need more support to thrive. That is why school funding comparisons and school funding formulas usually adjust for the higher cost of serving students with disabilities, English language learners, and students from low-income families. For example, the July 2023 report by the state’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission on the Virginia school funding formula looked at best practices models for school funding from across a range of states and found an average additional funding need of 35 percent for low-income students, 40 percent for English language learners, and 105 percent for special education students. Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2021, December). Impact of school choice on educational outcomes: Part 3 (Report No. 575-3, p. 149). Commonwealth of Virginia. https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/reports/Rpt575-3.pdf)

46 Naff, D., Parry, M., Ferguson, T., Palencia, V., Lenhardt, J., Tedona, E., Stroter, A., Stripling, T., Lu, Z., & Baber, E. (2021). Analyzing Advanced Placement (AP): Making the Nation’s Most Prominent College Preparatory Program More Equitable. Richmond, VA: Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium. https://merc.soe.vcu.edu/reports/reports/analyzing-advanced-placement-ap-making-the-nations-most-prominentcollege-preparatory-program-more-equitable.html

47 Lewis, A. E., & Diamond, J. B. (2015). Despite the best intentions: How racial inequality thrives in good schools. Oxford University Press. https://global.oup.com/academic/product/despite-the-best-intentions9780195342727?cc=us&lang=en&

48 Legal Services Corporation. (n.d.). Virginia eviction data. Civil Court Data. https://civilcourtdata.lsc.gov/data/eviction/virginia

49 Graetz, N., Gershenson, C., Hepburn, P., Porter, S. R., Sandler, D. H., & Desmond, M. (2023). A comprehensive demographic profile of the US evicted population. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120(41), e2305860120. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2305860120

Badger, E., Miller, C. C., & Parlapiano, A. (2023, October 2). The Americans Most Threatened by Eviction: Young Children. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/02/upshot/evictions-children-americanrenters.html

50 Desmond, M., & Kimbro, R. T. (2015). Eviction’s Fallout: Housing, Hardship, and Health. Social Forces, 94(1), 295–324. https://doi.org/10.1093/sf/sov044

51 Richter, F. G.-C., Coulton, C., Urban, A., & Steh, S. (2021). An Integrated Data System Lens Into Evictions and Their Effects. Housing Policy Debate, 31(3–5), 762–784. https://doi.org/10.1080/10511482.2021.1879201

52 Serial Eviction Filings: How Landlords Use the Courts to Collect Rent. (2020). Eviction Lab. Retrieved August 1, 2024, from https://evictionlab.org/serial-eviction-filings/

53 Graetz, N., Gershenson, C., Porter, S. R., Sandler, D. H., Lemmerman, E., & Desmond, M. (2024). The impacts of rent burden and eviction on mortality in the United States, 2000–2019. Social Science & Medicine, 340, 116398. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2023.116398

54 Find the Area Median Income limits chart set by HUD for Richmond, VA MSA here:

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. (2024). 2024 income limits summary data: Richmond, VA MSA. https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/il/il2024/2024summary.odn?inputname=METRO40060M40060*Richmond% 2C+VA+MSA&wherefrom=%24wherefrom%24&selection_type=hmfa&year=2024

55 Federal Budget and Spending. (n.d.). National Low Income Housing Coalition. https://nlihc.org/federal-budgetand-spending

56 Brennan, M., Reed, P., & Sturtevant, L. (2014). The Impacts of Affordable Housing on Education: A Research Summary. National Housing Conference. Center for Housing Policy. https://nhc.org/wpcontent/uploads/2017/03/The-Impacts-of-Affordable-Housing-on-Education-1.pdf; Gaitán, V. (2018, September 19). How Housing Can Determine Educational, Health, and Economic Outcomes. Housing Matters: An Urban Institute Initiative. https://housingmatters.urban.org/articles/how-housing-can-determine-educational-health-and-economicoutcomes

57 Stacy, C., & Davis, C. (2022). Assessing the Impact of Affordable Housing on Nearby Property Values in Alexandria, Virginia. In Metropolitan Housing and Communities Policy Center. Urban Institute. https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/2022-04/Alexandria%20Affordable%20Housing%20Brief.pdf; Albright, L., Derickson, E. S., & Massey, D. S. (2013). Do Affordable Housing Projects Harm Suburban Communities? Crime, Property Values, and Taxes in Mount Laurel, NJ. City & Community, 12(2), 89–112. https://doi.org/10.1111/cico.12015

58 Woo, A., & Joh, K. (2015). Beyond anecdotal evidence: Do subsidized housing developments increase neighborhood crime? Applied Geography, 64, 87–96. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apgeog.2015.09.004; Freedman, M., & Owens, E. G. (2011). Low-income housing development and crime. Journal of Urban Economics, 70(2-3), 115–131. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jue.2011.04.001; Lens, M. C. (2013). Subsidized Housing and Crime. Journal of Planning Literature, 28(4), 352–363. https://doi.org/10.1177/0885412213500992

59 Obrinsky, M., & Stein, D. (2006, March). Overcoming Opposition to Multifamily Rental Housing. Revisiting Rental Housing: A National Policy Summit. https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/media/imp/rr0714_obrinsky_stein.pdf

60 Nguyen, M. T., Basolo, V., & Tiwari, A. (2013). Opposition to Affordable Housing in the USA: Debate Framing and the Responses of Local Actors. Housing, Theory and Society, 30(2), 107–130. https://doi.org/10.1080/14036096.2012.667833

61 The HCV Program helps 5 million people in 2.3 million low-income households afford housing in the private market.

Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. United States Housing Choice Voucher Fact Sheet. https://www.cbpp.org/sites/default/files/atoms/files/PolicyBasics-housing-1-25-13vouch.pdf

62 The “Congressional findings and declaration of purpose” of the Housing and Community Development Act of 1974 include “the reduction of the isolation of income groups within communities and geographical areas and the promotion of an increase in the diversity and vitality of neighborhoods through the spatial deconcentration of housing opportunities for persons of lower income and the revitalization of deteriorating or deteriorated neighborhoods.” 42 U.S.C. 5301(c)(6).

63 Chetty, R., Hendren, N., & Katz, L. F. (2016). The effects of exposure to better neighborhoods on children: New evidence from the Moving to Opportunity experiment. The American Economic Review, 106(4), 855-902. https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/aer.20150572

64 Wood, M., Turnham, J., & Mills, G. (2008). Housing affordability and family well-being: Results from the Housing Voucher Evaluation. Housing Policy Debate, 19(2), 367-412. https://doi.org/10.1080/10511482.2008.9521639; Mills, G., & others. (2006, September). Effects of housing vouchers on welfare families. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Policy Development and Research. https://www.huduser.gov/portal/publications/commdevl/hsgvouchers.html

65 Mazzara, A., & Knudsen, B. (2019, January). Where families with children use housing vouchers: A comparative look at the 50 largest metropolitan areas. Center on Budget and Policy Priorities & Poverty & Race Research Action Council. https://prrac.org/pdf/where_families_use_vouchers_2019.pdf; Schwartz, Schwartz, A., McClure, K., & Taghavi, L. B. (2016). Vouchers and Neighborhood Distress: The Unrealized Potential for Families With Housing Choice Vouchers To Reside in Neighborhoods With Low Levels of Distress. Cityscape (Washington, D.C.), 18(3), 207–228.; McClure, K., Schwartz, A. F., & Taghavi, L. B. (2015). Housing Choice Voucher Location Patterns a Decade Later. Housing Policy Debate, 25(2), 215–233. https://doi.org/10.1080/10511482.2014.921223

66 Recipients of Virginia’s Advanced Diplomas earned more credits than recipients of Standard Diplomas. Though the numbers can vary over time, the Advanced Diploma typically signals that a student has taken 26 credits versus 22, in addition to earning more verified credits by passing the Standards of Learning tests at the end of the course.

67 Jones, D., Garland, M., Dougherty, C., & Ware Herrera, A. (2014). Why Diploma Types Matter. Virginia Longitudinal Data System (VLDS). https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/edLabs/regions/appalachia/events/materials/VLDS_03.pdf

68 Chen, X. (1997). Students’ Peer Groups in High School: The Pattern and Relationship to Educational Outcomes. National Center for Education Statistics. https://nces.ed.gov/pubs97/97055.pdf

69 US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). (n.d.). Fair Market Rents (40th Percentile Rents). Huduser.gov. Retrieved September 12, 2024, from https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr.html

70 US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). (n.d.-b). Small Area Fair Market Rents (SAFMRs). HUD.gov. Retrieved September 12, 2024, from https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/programs/hcv/safmr#:~:text=SAFMRs%20allow%20for %20payment%20standards

71 Suspensions and Expulsions of Students Generally, § 22.1-277. (2018). https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title22.1/chapter14/section22.1-277

72 2020 Acts of General Assembly Ch. 477.

73 Va. Code §§36-96.1, et seq.

74 Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development. (2022, January). Creating a post-COVID-19 eviction prevention and diversion strategy: Lessons learned from the pandemic. https://www.dhcd.virginia.gov/sites/default/files/Docx/verp/evictions-report-post-covid-eviction-prevention-anddiverison-strategy.pdf

75 Teresa, B., Howell, K., Suen, I., Woehrle, H., White, C., & Enriquez Dougherty, M. T. (2022, September 26). The Virginia eviction reduction pilot program: Final report on Phase 1. RVA Eviction Lab. https://www.dhcd.virginia.gov/sites/default/files/Docx/verp/VERP-2020-final-report.pdf

76 Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development. (2024, January). VERP Fact Sheet. https://acrobat.adobe.com/id/urn:aaid:sc:VA6C2:63090cfc-fb66-4f05-819d-6a95b99f95b9

77 Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development. (2022, October 24). Virginia rent relief at a glance. https://www.dhcd.virginia.gov/sites/default/files/Docx/rrp/rent-relief-infographic.pdf

78 Virginia Housing Alliance. (2023). Virginia Housing Trust Fund 2023 report. https://vahousingalliance.org/wpcontent/uploads/2023-Virginia-Housing-Trust-Fund-Impact-Report.-VHA.pdf

79Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2021, December). Impact of school choice on educational outcomes: Summary (Report No. 575-1). Commonwealth of Virginia. https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/summary/Rpt575Sum-1.pdf; Education Law Center. (2023). Making the grade 2023: State profiles. https://edlawcenter.org/research/making-the-grade-2023-state-profiles/

80 Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2021, December). Impact of school choice on educational outcomes: Summary (Report No. 575-1). Commonwealth of Virginia. https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/summary/Rpt575Sum-1.pdf

81 The Commonwealth Institute. (2023, August 24). What’s up with the JLARC report on Virginia schools? The Half Sheet. https://thecommonwealthinstitute.org/the-half-sheet/whats-up-with-the-jlarc-report-on-virginia-schools/

82 Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. (2021, December). Impact of school choice on educational outcomes: Summary (Report No. 575-1, p. ii). Commonwealth of Virginia. https://jlarc.virginia.gov/pdfs/summary/Rpt575Sum-1.pdf; Virginia Department of Planning and Budget. (2024). Report on Virginia state operations and performance (Report No. RD86). Commonwealth of Virginia. https://rga.lis.virginia.gov/Published/2024/RD86/PDF

83 Piazza, P. and Noonan, J. (2023, January). Accountability systems and the persistence of school segregation: Research and future directions. The National Coalition on School Diversity. https://www.school-diversity.org/wpcontent/uploads/NCSD_RB16.pdf

84 5000 Families. (n.d.). 5000 families. https://5000families.com/

85 Virginia Housing Commission. (2023, November 20). Virginia eviction diversion program final report. https://vhc.virginia.gov/Virginia%20Eviction%20Diversion%20Program%20Final%20Report2023%20(1)%20(1).pdf

86 Virginia Real Estate Board. (2021, April 16). Housing discrimination on the basis of source of funds. https://townhall.virginia.gov/L/GetFile.cfm?File=C:%5CTownHall%5Cdocroot%5CGuidanceDocs%5C222%5CGDoc_ DPOR_6978_v1.pdf

87 Establishing a More Effective Fair Market Rent System; Using Small Area Fair Market Rents in the Housing Choice Voucher Program Instead of the Current 50th Percentile FMRs, 81 Fed. Reg. 80567 (Nov. 16, 2016). https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr/fmr2016f/SAFMR-Final-Rule.pdf

88 Mai, E. (2024, March 28). Does “fair share” housing work? HousingForward Virginia. https://housingforwardva.org/news/fwd-204-fair-share-housing/

89 HousingForward Virginia. (2024, August 28). Just cause evictions in Richmond. https://housingforwardva.org/news/g31-just-cause-evictions-richmond/

90 The 6 specialty schools are as follows:

• Amelia Street School (a Richmond specialty school serving students ages 5-21),

• Carver College and Career Academy (a Chesterfield alternative high school),

• Franklin Military Academy (a Richmond magnet school that serves grades 6-12),

• Patrick Henry School Of Science And Arts (a Richmond charter elementary school),

• Richmond Alternative (a Richmond alternative high school), and

• Richmond Career Education and Employment Academy (a Richmond career education-focused magnet school for students ages 14-22).

91 Lopz, M., Krogstad, J. & Passel, J. (2024 September 12). Who is Hispanic? Pew Research Center. Available at: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/09/12/who-ishispanic/#:~:text=Another%20Center%20survey%20in%202022,and%2018%25%20have%20no%20preference

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