Recent lewis_wps items

Evaluating ADU/Homelessness Programs

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

In response to a worsening homelessness crisis, Los Angeles City and County have recently looked to accessory dwelling units (ADUs) — small second homes on the same lot as a single-family home — as a part of the solution. Pilot programs in both jurisdictions offer homeowners subsidies for ADU construction in exchange for housing a person experiencing homelessness for between three and 10 years. In this paper, I evaluate the scalability, longevity, efficacy, political feasibility, and cost-effectiveness of these programs compared to traditional multifamily supportive housing. In doing so, I employ the metric of cost per year of affordability, to compare cost- effectiveness for programs of varying duration. I find that while ADU programs may be more politically feasible and have moderate potential to be scaled up, they will encounter significant difficulties in reaching that potential. They lack the longevity of traditional supportive housing, will either prove less cost-effective...

The Palisades and Eaton Fires: Neighborhood Data and Potential Housing Market Effects

Wed, 12 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The Palisades and Eaton fires started in Los Angeles County on Jan. 7, 2025, centered on the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles and the unincorporated community of Altadena. Together, they killed at least 28 people and destroyed more than 16,000 structures. The fires displaced thousands of households to surrounding communities, raising questions about their effects on the housing market. In this white paper, I review previous research on how earlier California wildfires impacted housing prices and migration, contribute my own analysis of long-term rent and home price effects of the 2018 Camp Fire, and describe the neighborhoods affected by the L.A. fires. I conclude with lessons we can draw from these data.

Incoming! Spatial Enrollment Competition between Charter Schools and Traditional Public Schools

Tue, 12 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Incoming! Spatial Enrollment Competition between Charter Schools and Traditional Public Schools

Regional Development Reconsidered

Tue, 10 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Regional Development Reconsidered

Reducing Development Costs with Impact Fee Deferral

Wed, 27 Jan 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Reducing Development Costs with Impact Fee Deferral

Exploration and Implications of Multimodal Street Performance Metrics: What’s a Passing Grade?

Wed, 14 Oct 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Exploration and Implications of Multimodal Street Performance Metrics: What’s a Passing Grade?

One to Four: The Market Potential of Fourplexes in California’s Single-Family Neighborhoods

Tue, 7 Jul 2020 00:00:00 +0000

The State of California seeks to increase housing production by regulating the number of homes local zoning allows, yet the market feasibility of delivering units under more expansive zoning is rarely acknowledged and mostly unanalyzed. New guidelines from the Department of Housing and Community Development emphasize the need to assess realistic capacity of sites, including the feasibility of new housing development during the upcoming planning period. One statewide policy push is to allow three- and fourplexes in single-family zones. To assess the impact of this zoning change, we analyze the market feasibility of homebuilding under fourplex zoning on the 6.8 million parcels with single-family homes built in California prior to 2005.

The Highway Capacity Manual’s Method for Calculating Bicycle and Pedestrian Levels of Service: the Ultimate White Paper

Thu, 28 May 2020 00:00:00 +0000

The Highway Capacity Manual’s Method for Calculating Bicycle and Pedestrian Levels of Service: the Ultimate White Paper

Does the Los Angeles region have too many vacant homes?

Fri, 7 Feb 2020 00:00:00 +0000

In recent years, vacant homes have increasingly been identified as a potential indicator of speculation or otherwise underutilized housing stock. Recently constructed market-rate and mixed-income housing, in particular, has been cast as villain in this debate, with relatively high vacancy rates taken as a sign that this type of housing isn’t needed. Using Los Angeles as a case study, this working paper explores the nature, extent, and causes of housing vacancy, and draws conclusions about what should be done about vacant homes in high-cost locations like L.A. Analyzing multiple data sources with varying jurisdictional boundaries, I find that Los Angeles vacancy rates rank among the lowest in the nation, and are lower today than they were for most of the past 15 years. The types of vacancies in the city and metro area (“market” and “non-market” vacancies) also appear in similar proportion to other jurisdictions. And, accounting for the lease-up periods of newly constructed buildings,...

Neighborhood Effects on HIV Testing: A Multi-Level Analysis

Wed, 3 Dec 2003 00:00:00 +0000

Only one study has explored geographic variations in HIV-testing and one possible regional characteristic correlated with that variation, leaving many potential regional characteristics unexamined. This paper explores geographic disparities in HIV-testing and eleven neighborhood characteristics as potential correlates of those disparities, controlling for individuals’ characteristics.

Black/Immigrant Labor Market Competition: New Insights from a Case Study of the Hospital Industry in Los Angeles County

Tue, 5 Aug 2003 00:00:00 +0000

Many recent studies have looked at the labor market effects of immigrants on native workers using cross-sectional survey data, yielding inconclusive results and shedding little light on the firm-level and industry-level processes which lead to observed outcomes. Towards an understanding of these processes, this paper examines the skill requirements and hiring procedures for entry-level jobs in the hospital industry, utilizing interviews with managers in Los Angeles County hospitals. The substitutability of immigrant for native labor is affected by a number of factors. Job complexity and English language requirements, for instance, favor African Americans, who have long been over-represented in area hospitals, over less-skilled immigrants. Upskilling in many jobs, however, increasingly excludes less-educated natives and immigrants alike, while privatization of some functions has led to the rise of low-wage contracting firms which minimize both skills and wages and employ mainly...

The Social Process of Undocumented Border Crossing

Tue, 5 Aug 2003 00:00:00 +0000

In this paper we develop a theoretical model that views undocumented border-crossing as a well-defined social process influenced by the kind of human and social capital migrants bring with them to the border and constrained by the intensity and nature of U.S. enforcement efforts. We draw upon detailed histories of border-crossing from undocumented migrants originating in 34 Mexican communities to estimate equations corresponding to this model. We find that having a migrant parent greatly increases the odds of crossing the border with family or friends, and that people with ties to migrant parents and those who come from communities where U.S. migration is prevalent are more likely to cross with paid smugglers, or coyotes. As people accumulate migratory experience across U.S. trips, however, they grow progressively less likely to travel with others and more likely to cross alone, thus substituting migration-specific human capital for social capital. On initial undocumented trips,...

Traditional Neighborhoods and Auto Ownership

Tue, 5 Aug 2003 00:00:00 +0000

Many cities have traditional neighborhoods, or established, inner-city districts comprised of diverse housing, mixed-land uses, pedestrian connectivity and convenient transit access. This study quantifies the likely effects of land use patterns on auto ownership for such neighborhoods. Using Portland, Oregon, we test a model that explains auto ownership based on household, neighborhood, and urban design characteristics. The index of mixed-land use is statistically significant, ceteris paribus. We find compelling evidence of the impact of mixed-land use on auto ownership: as land use mix changes from diverse to homogeneous, the probability of owning an auto decreases by 31 percentage points. The findings imply that traditional neighborhoods are more conducive to alternatives to private vehicle use, such as walking and public transit, and to higher motor vehicle costs.

Failing but not Fooling, Public Housing Residents: The Impact of Job Interventions

Tue, 5 Aug 2003 00:00:00 +0000

The focus of this paper is on public housing and the impact of job interventions in Los Angeles. Rather than preserving affordable housing, national housing policy is aimed at reducing numbers of units, dispersing public housing residents, and, effectively replacing the permanency of the existing program with the temporary benefits of Section 8 vouchers. HUD's policy banks on residents being able to find decent jobs to afford higher rents in the private market. The new welfare program, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF), limits time a person can be on welfare and severely limits opportunities for training and education. TANF assumes that enough jobs will exist to support needy families and individuals.

As part of this study, in early 1993, we interviewed 30 enrollees in the Job Training Partnership Program (JTPA) in Los Angeles and directors of Community Service Centers (CSCs) at five public housing sites in Los Angeles. We conducted over 30 interviews with...

In Search of the Glass Ceiling: The Career Trajectories of Immigrant and Native-born Engineers

Tue, 5 Aug 2003 00:00:00 +0000

This paper reports on an effort designed to search for the glass ceiling, through a study of the career trajectories of native white and Asian immigrant engineers. Using data drawn from a survey of the M.S. graduates of the engineering school at "Southern California U," we find that some form of labor market segmentation, so common at lower levels of the economy, is also restricting the mobility of highly skilled foreign-born engineers. Our key finding shows that immigrants receive a significantly lower return to experience than do their native-born counterparts. Consequently, the immigrant's career takes a distinctively different shape after 17 years of experience, native-born engineers surpass their immigrant counterparts, enjoying continuous earnings growth.

Asian Pacific Islander Community Based Organizations and Welfare Reform