The Tribune

With CHARLIE HARPER

RICHARD and his wife of six years, Elise, live in a large northeastern US metropolitan area. They have a young son and Elise is expecting the couple’s second child later this year.

Both are college graduates from schools you have heard about, and they both believe their good education helped them to land excellent entry jobs and accelerated their progress as they get better established in their respective careers.

They are well launched on their pursuit of what is still called the American Dream.

The odds favour their long-term success.

But a cloud has now appeared on the horizon of their serenity. Let’s get to know them and see how they respond, and what it might mean for America’s future.

Richard is an attorney developing specialized expertise in potentially noxious building materials, and he hopes this will help him to become a sought-after litigator and consultant in harmful death and serious injury and illness cases.

Elise is a trained emergency room nurse and is pursuing a specialization in paediatric cardiac care.

While she is proud of her achievements in the hospital workplace, she is looking forward to 15 years or so of active, committed motherhood after Richard starts to bring in the big paychecks.

When their son was born three years ago, the couple was able to secure financing for the purchase of a “starter” three-bedroom brick ranch house in a moderately upscale suburb near her work. They used monetary gifts from each set of parents to qualify for more favorable mortgage loan terms via a larger than required down payment on the house. They plan to move to a better school district when their son enters primary school in a few years and then, who knows? Maybe Richard will strike it rich in his law practice and they will be able to move again to the best part of town.

These two young people make it a priority to get involved in the local civic affairs of their immediate neighbourhood.

It’s a good way to meet new friends and get information on schools, shops and carpool possibilities. Their respective parents live about an hour away, with both grandmothers eager to do occasional babysitting and the grandfathers looking forward to baseball games with their grandson.

Richard is an instinctive liberal Democrat. He has never voted for a Republican, and has been alienated further by the xenophobic turn of the GOP in the past 10 years.

While he is careful with his political opinions at work and with people he doesn’t know well, he loudly denounces Republicans when with Elise or close friends.

Programmes

Elise is sympathetic to the liberal social agenda, but somewhat more conservative, especially when it comes to government spending. She can be harshly critical of large government programmes that aim to “legislate away” social and economic inequality. She feels that many social welfare programmes, are wasteful and that her tax money is poorly managed and distributed. Still, she shares many of her husband’s ideals and hopes for the US to become more egalitarian and offer greater opportunities to “underserved” minorities.

She often speaks of heartbreaking cases she encounters at work that involve black and brown children.

Richard and Elise are both white. Each grew up in a home largely insulated from the terrifying worries and insecurities that accompany family income levels that the parents know cannot meet their families’ basic human requirements for food, shelter and freedom from the shadow of all but the most coincidental crimes against property and persons.

The couple were relaxing after dinner and their son’s bedtime rituals had seen him safely off to dreamland.

“A couple of the firm’s partners were talking about Missing Middle at lunch today,” Richard mused. “Ever heard of it?” His wife shook her head.

“It’s a fairly new name to describe local government efforts to make upscale neighbourhoods more affordable to entry-level buyers, and to add equity and diversity to the housing equation. Via zoning and land use planning changes, a municipality can essentially begin to reverse the effects of racial and ethnic discrimination that has produced segregated housing throughout the northeast and on the west coast.”

“How would this work in an area like ours?” Elise inquired.

“As I understand it, Missing Middle aims to make more accessible for lower-income buyers the single-family upscale neighbourhoods that are now mostly all white enclaves, with the hope that the result will be more black and brown residents in those areas,” Richard said.

“OK,” Elise replied, “but aren’t issues like zoning and other land use regulations the responsibility of local governments? Is the federal government involved in this?”

Incentives

Richard hesitated for a moment, aware that he needed to be careful not to trigger a government-is-wasteful response from his wife. “Well, the guys at work were saying that programmes to redress racially unbalanced housing policies and practices have been a liberal priority for a long time. There’s talk now that the Feds would offer financial incentives to local governments that agree to change their zoning to accommodate different housing options in single-family neighbourhoods.”

Elise thought for a moment. “So if I understand this correctly, government is going to try to influence housing patterns specifically to promote diversity? What would this look like in an area like ours?”

Again, Richard was careful before replying. “Apparently data the Feds have tells them that in the deepest blue parts of the country – the west coast states of California, Hawaii, Oregon and Washington, as well as places like New York City and Washington, DC – the rate of homelessness is the highest.

“This is supposedly because economic activity in these areas is the most attractive for newcomers; lots of new jobs are available, and these are ‘prestige’ areas, whatever that means.

“But there’s little or no affordable housing in those areas.

“So people, especially young people, want to move to these areas. According to the laws of supply and demand, that means sale prices for existing homes and rents are among the highest in the country. So, by this reasoning, that means that the barriers to entry into these housing markets are the highest in the US. Neighbourhoods in these areas are among the most settled, and are filled with detached single-family homes. Residents have little interest in changing anything about where they live.

“The people already there paid a high price to live there. They’re supposedly concerned that an influx of poorer, black and brown people will devalue their property values. Furthermore, Missing Middle aims to replace aging single-family detached housing stock with duplexes, triplexes or even low-rise apartment buildings. You following me?”

Elis frowned, thinking about what her husband said. “I can see that the municipalities would get more density, more property taxes, more overall revenue.

“But infrastructure like stormwater runoff, parking and pressure to build more schools would all be potentially negative impacts too, wouldn’t they?”

Richard admitted that this was likely true. There was a pause as both spouses reflected. Elise spoke first.

“Would this Missing Middle housing affect our area?”

“The guys at work said our neighbourhood was one of the high priority areas.

“That’s because we already have a mixture of older homes and newer, McMansion-type houses. The county reasons that Missing Middle housing would be less disruptive here.”

Elise’s jaw dropped. “What did you say?”

“I just listened, really. What could I say?”

Resolute

Elise’s gaze was steady and resolute. “Well, I think this is a really lousy idea, and I’m going to fight it. I get it that the powers that be want to diversify neighbourhoods. But we put every spare cent we have into this mortgage, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to sit around and watch our property value tumble because of some do-gooder down at city hall.

“I’m going to call my dad and see who he knows at the mayor’s office. Didn’t we just get a notice that the neighbourhood association is meeting next week?

“I’m going. I’ll see who else knows about this and how they feel. I’m going to try to organize some resistance to this stupid idea.

“Those idiots downtown can try out their social experimentation in someone else’s back yard. Not here. Are you with me?”

Richard looked at the floor. Finally, he answered.

“What about the principles of equity and diversity?”

“Not in my back yard.”