Dallas Housing Policy Reveals 3 Target Areas For Investment in Affordable Projects And They’re All in Southern Dallas

After an extensive community outreach effort, consultants announced last week they plan to target three areas of Southern Dallas for focused investment and more affordable housing in the Dallas Housing Policy 2033. 

The areas comprise about 10 percent of Dallas, said TDA Consulting Group President and CEO Dionne Roberts. 

“The target areas are intended to identify places where investment is overlaid with investment from not only other public departments but also the private market, so there is opportunity for both preservation and production in various ways,” she said. “These are areas with not only significant needs and opportunities but also significant disparities.” 

Dallasites Say Housing Policy Needs New Strategies For Affordability, Home Repair, And Preservation Programs

Target Area One includes portions of Council Districts 2 and 7 near Fair Park. Target Area Two is in Council Districts 4 and 7 bounded at the top by the Trinity River. Target Area Three is in Council Districts 8 and 3, and includes the University of North Texas at Dallas.

Target Areas Selected For Housing Investment 

Roberts said that Target Area One offers opportunities to produce and preserve around Fair Park and surrounding neighborhoods. 

“You will also see the breakdown of the demographics of the households is also significantly different than the city overall,” she said. “You see a much lower percentage of owner-occupied, higher percentage of rental, [and a] much higher percentage of folks living below the poverty line.” 

Assistant Director of Housing and Neighborhood Revitalization Thor Erickson noted that nearby neighborhoods like Elm Thicket/Northpark could benefit from being on the edge of the target area. 

“Any time you invest in one neighborhood there are edge effects, or when you invest around a neighborhood it puts pressure on, ” he said. “We know these areas through the Market Value Analysis have changed pretty quickly in the average home sales price and continue to do that. Anytime there’s new development or repurposed development, we know they’re going to have that market pressure that starts to filter out … The market tends to respond when there’s pressure put on an area.” 

That can also create challenges with gentrification and displacement, Erickson acknowledged. 

Target Area Two has a vacancy rate of almost 7 percent and “the poverty rate is extreme, in terms of being more than double the average of the city,” Roberts said. 

Target Area Three was also selected because of its opportunities for production and preservation, Roberts explained. 

“These are not some of the oldest homes in the city like they are in Target Area Two for example,” she said. 

The target areas were selected based on a Market Value Analysis, community feedback, and data indicators related to equity, community characteristics, housing characteristics, historical disparities, and current market conditions when looking for potential investment areas. City staff and TDA officials also looked at potential partnerships with the private sector. 

“Target areas are not intended to eliminate citywide funding and a citywide focus on some very important things,” Roberts said. “Target areas will be used for things like identifying specific projects and potentially having bonus points on future funding applications that would encourage investment in these areas. It also is really intended to help the Housing Department to align its resources with the other resources, both public and private, that are already going into these neighborhoods.” 

Target Areas For Affordable Housing Are All in The Southern Sector 

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has grant funding available through its Neighborhood Revitalization Strategy Areas program that may offer some opportunities for the target areas, Roberts said. 

District 13 Councilwoman Gay Donnell Willis said she didn’t like the approach of presenting three target areas in a “take it or leave it” fashion. 

“I might like to have five of them so we see the depth of the data,” she said. “Another good point has been raised around the geography. We know that our Economic Development Policy goals are very focused on Southern Dallas. This answers that call, and that’s good.” 

Willis suggested that public safety issues ought to also be considered when making focused efforts and investment in certain areas. 

“I think we can’t not look at that,” she said. 

District 1 Councilman Chad West expressed concern that the Dallas Housing Policy update isn’t moving forward at a reasonable rate. 

“We’ve been working on this housing policy — we approved it almost a year ago — and we’re really just hearing about one pillar of seven today,” West said. “At this rate, if we don’t accelerate this, it’s going to take years to roll this out … Prove me wrong, please, and come back and show me that we’re moving forward more aggressively.” 

West also questioned why none of the target areas are in the northern part of the city. 

“We are putting a lot of our eggs in the basket of the south, which we’ve said for years we need to do, because there needs to be infrastructure there, but I just think we need to acknowledge that,” West said. 

The entire city needs affordable housing, but the target area strategy makes sense when concentrating resources and collaborating with other city departments to see more progressive housing activity, Erickson said. 

“When it comes to the areas in town where we have resources to deploy, where we can preserve existing housing to ensure they remain affordable and people can stay in their homes, that’s where we need to look for areas that have more homeownership currently,” he said. “When we have opportunities to build new, we typically are seeing those scattered throughout the city, and through the variety of different resources we have, sometimes that’s an acquisition rehab; sometimes that’s a new construction.” 

District 3 Councilman Zarin Gracey said he understood the concerns about the target areas being concentrated in the southern sector but supported the recommendations. 

“Southern Dallas has been neglected for years and it’s hard to quantify if you haven’t lived there,” Gracey said.