John Brannen

‘Any disruption spells disaster’: A deeper look at Houstonians’ financial vulnerability

Thirty-four percent of Harris County residents are financially secure, meaning they could go without a paycheck for three months or longer using just their savings, according to new Kinder Institute research.

How Houston's only public recovery high school is creating new paths for student success

Of all youth in Harris County, high schoolers had the highest rate of substance-involved health care facility visits and deaths from 2018-22, according to a new report.

Q&A: For Houston’s working poor, rising costs mean tougher choices

Over 725,000 households in the Houston area earn an income above the federal poverty line but cannot cover the rising cost of all of their essential needs, such as housing, health care and food, according to data compiled by United Way.

Housing, disasters, money and education: The Urban Edge in 2024

Extreme weather, the shortage of affordable housing and the benefits of prekindergarten were of greatest interest to Urban Edge readers this year, especially as they pertain to the Houston region.

Making the case for increasing funding for Texas schools that need it most

Seventy percent of Houstonians believe schools need “significantly more” money to provide a quality education to students, a sentiment that has grown stronger since the Kinder Houston Area Survey began asking this question in the early 1990s.

How a Houston Yellow Cab brownfield became a green light for affordable housing in Near Northside

Before ride-hailing services like Lyft and Uber emerged in Houston, outposts like the Yellow Cab headquarters, just north of downtown, dispatched taxis to people in need of quick transportation.

‘We have to move faster’: Grappling with Harris County’s maternal health crisis

Maternal death rates in Harris County, particularly among Black and Hispanic women, have been among the highest in the country since 2016, according to a report released earlier this year by Harris County Public Health.

Over $20 million in federal grants boost Houston’s investment in parks

Houston has over 1,200 parks and nearly 65,000 acres of greenspace. Keeping them adequately funded requires a combination of public-private partnerships, tax increment reinvestment zones and ballot initiatives.

Doing the math: What it would cost to close Houston’s low-income housing gap

America’s housing shortage and housing costs have emerged as talking points in the race for the White House, with Vice President Kamala Harris addressing these problems in her opening remarks during the presidential debate with Donald Trump in September. Fixing them, however, will require federal, state and local action — and, of course, a lot of money.

Houston has an independent political streak, but it mirrors the nation on several key issues

Houston has had a lengthy run of residents affiliating as politically independent, according to 40-plus years of Kinder Houston Area Surveys.

New research highlights potential responses to student homelessness caused by natural disasters

Hurricane Harvey rendered some 24,000 students in Houston Independent School District to be listed as homeless. The storm brought the district's overall total to more than 29,000 homeless students in the subsequent year, according to new research from the Kinder Institute for Urban Research’s Houston Education Research Consortium.

A Houston initiative helped 2,000 people of color become homeowners — but there’s more work to do

After renting for the majority of her adult life, Tonia Macklin recently became a homeowner for the first time. The native of southeast Houston achieved this goal with the assistance of the Harris County Homeownership Collaborative’s Own the HOU initiative, a multiorganization effort that seeks to bridge the homeownership gap for people of color.

How Houston is trying to make philanthropy work smarter in disaster recovery

A national report last year by the Center for Disaster Philanthropy indicated an imbalance between how philanthropic disaster funds are spent.

Master-planned community in northeast Houston puts affordable housing within reach

Last year, Nura Jemal, her husband and two sons lived in a two-bedroom apartment in southwest Houston. But with a third son on the way, they began to reconsider their living arrangement.

How Houston, the world’s energy capital, is embracing the transition to cleaner sources

Eighty-seven percent of all respondents in the 43rd Kinder Houston Area Survey felt that Houston should take a leading role in forging a new energy future.