Jenny Schuetz, Senior Fellow at Brookings Metro (‪@BrookingsInstitution‬) was keynote speaker at the Polk County Housing Trust Fund's Housing Matters Symposium in Des Moines in April, 2024.
Dr. Schuetz discussed themes from her 2022 book Fixer Upper: How to Repair America's Broken Housing Systems. (Learn more: www.brookings.edu/books/fixer...)
Find slides Dr. Schuetz presented as well as much additional content looking back on the event at www.pchtf.org/post/reflection....
If you live in Greater Des Moines and Polk County Iowa, we hope you'll get involved in our region's effort to meet everyone's housing needs. Sign up to get our updates at www.pchtf.org/sign-up
Key highlights:
0:00 Introduction
01:13 Historical context of the housing market
02:47 How local policy and zoning contributes to higher housing cost
06:45 Local policy limits the diversity of neighborhoods
08:00 The approval process for housing is also broken
09:42 The challenges for affordable housing are even greater
11:44 We build too much housing in high risk areas
13:02 Relationship between housing and the racial wealth gap
15:16 Local government interests surrounding housing
18:16 What are state governments doing?
19:13 What can the federal government do?
21:03 Iowa and local data
23:09 Hope for reform and call to action