Shawn Flanigan

The importance of strong “personal touch” relationships in housing services

by Bedrosian Center

by Shawn Flanigan

To learn why the San Diego Housing Commission’s Achievement Academy – a suite of workforce development programs – is effective in supporting families receiving Section 8 vouchers, we continue conducting interviews in our longitudinal data collection with Achievement Academy families. Our conversations have put a spotlight on a key factor: a strong personal touch. The Section 8 recipients highly value the intensive, personal, positive interactions they have with Achievement Academy staff, and almost all of them point to positive outcomes that come from the personal investment of their “caseworkers”.

The benefits of partnering with local universities

by Bedrosian Center

By Dr. Shawn Flanigan

As part of my interdisciplinary freshman Honors course at San Diego State University titled “Housing, Home, and Homeland,” I had my twenty-six students spend several weeks reading and discussing Matthew Desmond’s renowned book Evicted, and then gave them an assignment to code an interview from Access to Opportunity research in San Diego. As a culminating experience, we visited the Monarch School, an innovative K-12 school for homeless youth in downtown San Diego ….

The Power of One: Why do single women tend to fare better in FSS programs than their married counterparts?

by Bedrosian Center

By Alexandra Metz

Access to Opportunity researchers are engaging with families that take part in specialized programs for the recently homeless, and families taking part in a new cohort program designed specifically for single mothers, called the Power of One program.

What does self-sufficiency mean in the face of skyrocketing housing costs?

by Bedrosian Center

Dr. Shawn Flanigan, San Diego State University, shares the next installment of our blog on the Access to Opportunity Project. San Diego is consistently ranked among the least affordable housing markets in the United States, topping that list in 2015! Coming in at number two on the list in 2016. Rather than looking exclusively at housing costs, assessments of housing affordability consider housing costs in relation to how many residents of a community could afford to purchase a home at the median price. In 2015, real estate industry research showed that less than half of households could qualify to buy a median priced home in 93.3 percent of San Diego zip codes. This was the highest ratio of any city in the study.

Stories from inside the battle for successful children and families

by Bedrosian Center

by Dr. Raphael Bostic and Sheryl Whitney

Opportunity. It has become the buzz word for policymakers across the political spectrum. From Paul Ryan to Barack Obama and Bernie Sanders to Donald Trump, everyone seems to trumpet the importance of Americans having access to good jobs, quality housing, strong education, healthy food, safe streets, clean air and water. But the more fundamental question is this: What can communities actually do to increase the likelihood that Americans have real access to opportunity?