Spillovers and Subsidized Housing: The Impact of Subsidized Rental Housing on Neighborhoods

RR07-3: At a congressional hearing in 1948, representative A.S. Mike Monroney argued that the construction of new, subsidized rental housing improves the surrounding neighborhood, and in so doing, raises property tax revenues. He stated: “One of the principal arguments, with which I go along, is that the establishment of a housing project in a city raises the assessed valuation for blocks around it and puts back onto the municipal tax rolls a great deal more money than is taken off by the land that is occupied by these public housing projects.”1 Congressman Monroney was not alone in his beliefs; when the federal public housing program was first established in the late 1930s, neighborhood benefits were a key justification…