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

FEATURES :  Dec. 23, 2024

2024 Year in Review

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.

The Urban Edge showcased the work of researchers and scientists at the Kinder Institute for Urban Research on those and many more key topics, emphasizing how their findings impact residents.

Beryl, derecho, power outages amplify Houstonians’ concerns about climate, resilience

What we wrote: Human-caused climate change contributed to several severe weather events in the Houston area during 2024.

Hurricane Beryl made landfall on July 8 and knocked out power to over 2 million businesses and homes. A derecho in May was responsible for eight fatalities and caused over $1.2 billion in damage in Texas, Louisiana, Alabama and Florida.

According to the 2024 Kinder Houston Area Survey, nearly 60% of respondents were either “worried,” “very worried,” or “extremely worried” about the impact of climate change in the region, while only 13% said they were “not at all worried.” For residents who expressed some degree of worry, nearly 90% said it was a regular fixture in their thinking about the future.

What’s new: Hurricane Beryl’s final death toll in Harris, Fort Bend, Galveston, Matagorda and Montgomery counties was 42, according to reports by the Houston Chronicle and Houston Public Media. It caused about $7.2 billion in damage, according to the National Centers for Environmental Information.

After the widespread power outages, CenterPoint Energy commissioned a third-party review that was released in October. Among its recommendations were to enhance power circuits through “targeted vegetation management, the installation of covered conductors or tree wire, and the potential undergrounding of lines.”

How public pre-K sets Houston’s students on a path to success

What we wrote: In 2023-24, over 50,000 children attended public prekindergarten in the Houston area, which brought overall enrollment close to pre-pandemic levels.

Pre-K provides a vital boost to young learners, positioning them for academic success. The benefits are especially meaningful for the many emergent bilingual students in the region. Children’s brains develop rapidly during the first five years of life, laying the groundwork for future learning and well-being.

What’s new: With the Texas legislative cycle beginning next month, advocacy organizations and school districts are calling for a greater investment in pre-K. The Houston Education Research Consortium made its case in “Increase Support for Public Pre-K in Texas,” a policy brief for Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. But further expansion of pre-K could face opposition from the child care industry, as detailed in an October article by the Texas Tribune.

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

What we wrote: The Greater Houston Disaster Alliance, a partnership between the Greater Houston Community Foundation and United Way of Greater Houston, was officially established in June 2023. It seeks to create a more balanced approach to how philanthropic dollars are spent after a natural disaster, emphasizing resilience and recovery.

What’s new: The Greater Houston Disaster Alliance raised more than $9 million to respond to the derecho and Hurricane Beryl. The Beryl Recovery Fund raised over $6 million, made grants to 31 nonprofit organizations and has served 1,915 households through emergency financial assistance and home repair. The Derecho Recovery Fund raised $3 million, made grants to 20 nonprofits and has assisted 2,056 households.

Closing local achievement gaps begins with closing spending gaps in Houston, Harris County

What we wrote: Examining data from the School Finance Indicators Database, Kinder Institute Director Ruth N. López Turley found that almost all school districts in Harris County are underfunded, and that districts with higher percentages of Black and Hispanic students are severely underfunded, needing about twice as much per pupil as is currently being spent. In addition, the data suggested that underfunded districts also tended to underperform on state assessments. 

What’s new: Building on that early analysis, a full study of statewide school district funding gaps was published in August, demonstrating that severely underfunded districts were much less likely to have student achievement scores of “C” or higher in the Texas ratings system. The research found that to close the gaps — and improve outcomes — for all districts that are severely underfunded, the state would need to invest an additional $9 billion per year toward them.

While Harris County grows a little, its suburbs see big change

What we wrote: Most of the largest counties in Texas grew from 2020 to 2023, the U.S. Census Bureau reported in March. That includes Harris County, which added 104,003 residents, giving it a total estimated population of more than 4.83 million, an increase of 2.13%. While the growth was undeniable, it was at a much slower pace than in the decade spanning 2010-20, when the county averaged growth of 15.6% per year.

Meanwhile, Harris County’s neighbors grew rapidly. The population of Montgomery County to the north increased to 711,354. To the southwest, Fort Bend County increased to 898,514 residents.

What’s new: In June, analysis in the Kinder Institute's State of Housing report showed that in addition to rapid population growth, the suburbs are seeing more home sales and a diversification of homeownership.

National report: Houston metro is second-worst for providing affordable housing options

What we wrote: The National Low Income Housing Coalition reported that no state has enough affordable housing for its lowest-income renters, and that Texas ranks near the bottom.

According to the coalition’s 2024 report, which reflected 2022 American Community Survey data, Texas was tied for third-worst for number of affordable homes for extremely low-income households. A deeper dive indicated that Houston had the second-most severe shortage of rental homes that are affordable to extremely low-income households.

What’s new: Though the Federal Reserve’s Dec. 18 interest rate cut — its third this year — may be welcome news to potential home buyers and landlords seeking lower mortgage rates, little relief is available to renters, who have seen rent increases outpace wages in recent years. Affordable housing became a national campaign issue in 2024 and is also a high priority for some Texas lawmakers in the upcoming legislative session, bringing new attention to a longstanding issue.

Why Houston’s progress on homelessness is in jeopardy

What we wrote: Houston’s housing-first approach to homelessness has been lauded as a national model. But with federal COVID-19 pandemic dollars dwindling, new sources of funding are needed, according to the Coalition for the Homeless of Houston/Harris County.

What’s new: In November, Mayor John Whitmire announced a new strategy to end homelessness in Houston. He said the plan will focus on “reducing the number of people living on the streets” and “reclaiming public spaces” by making it illegal to sleep in public areas at night.

Whitmire cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson in June, which made sleeping in public places punishable by law, as a tool that the city could use.

Why thousands of Houston-area households could soon lose a crucial internet subsidy

What we wrote: Funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program ended in April, leaving millions of people across the country — including more than 292,000 residents in the nine-county Greater Houston area — without subsidies to help afford internet service, dealing a blow to efforts to close the digital divide.

Created as part of the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, Congress failed to include the program in any funding bills. In December 2023, there were more than 18.4 million subscribers using the service, including 1.45 million in Texas.

What’s new: While the Affordable Connectivity Program has ended, USA.gov is assisting residents with needed connectivity. The Texas Public Utility Commission may also help residents with certain bills through its Texas Lifeline program.

Houston area led nation in issuing building permits for housing in 2023

What we wrote: Data released by the U.S. Census Bureau indicated that the Houston metropolitan statistical area led the nation in building permit activity for housing in 2023, with 50,444 single-family homes making up the majority of the 68,755 permits issued for residential units.

What’s new: Permitting activity showed no signs of slowing in 2024. As of October, 55,228 total permits for housing units had been issued. Of those, over 45,000 were for single-family units.

About half of Harris County residents unable to pay an unexpected $400 bill

What we wrote: According to the 2024 Kinder Houston Area Survey, 46% of respondents said they would not be able to pay for such an expense, the highest percentage recorded by the survey since the question was first asked in 2019. Not only is this number high, it’s been rising steadily over the last couple of years, with a low of 29% in 2022 followed by a jump to 42% in 2023.

What’s new: Harris County explored the concept of a guaranteed income program for households living 200% below the federal poverty line and in one of the top 10 high-poverty ZIP codes in Harris County. However, the Community Prosperity Program and its predecessor, the Uplift Harris initiative, have been hampered by legal disputes. The Community Prosperity Program was approved by the Harris County 165th District Court in October but is in limbo after it was blocked by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Dec. 13.

RELATED INITIATIVES
Kinder Houston Area Survey

For over four decades, the Kinder Houston Area Survey has been tracking the changing attitudes and experiences of Houstonians.

RELATED INITIATIVES
State of Housing

The Kinder Institute’s State of Housing in Harris County and Houston reports provide annual updates across a variety of housing-related indicators tracking shifts in the region's housing system. 

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