John Gilderbloom

Last updated

John Ingram "Hans" Gilderbloom
Born(1952-10-00)October , 1952
Nationality Dutch American
Alma mater University of California, Santa Barbara (B.A., 1975; M.A. 1978; Ph.D., 1983)
Known for Rent control
Urban renewal
Community organizing
Homeless advocacy
Scientific career
Fields Housing, Green Cities
Institutions University of Louisville
Center for Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods
Website http://gilderbloom.org/
http://sun.louisville.edu
http://chromatichomes.com/

John I. "Hans" Gilderbloom is a Dutch American community organizer, academic, author, and researcher. He works as an international consultant on creating livable neighborhoods and cities, owns a real estate company that renovates historic housing, and is a professor of urban and public affairs at the University of Louisville. In 2014 he was nominated as a Fellow of the Scholars Strategy Network housed at Harvard University. He has been ranked as one of the "top 100 urban thinkers in the world." [1]

Contents

Early life and education

Gilderbloom was born in San Mateo, California to parents Murray Edward and Jeanette Lauder Gilderbloom (Dutch Gelderblom). He grew up in San Francisco in a creative environment of writers and musicians. His godfather was Dave Lewis, a Stanford University writing professor who was the co-author of Klute , which won an Academy Award for Best Picture in 1970. Mark Dowie, former publisher and editor of Mother Jones was a frequent Sunday guest for family meals. His uncle Clarence W. Gilderbloom was a respected inventor involved in developing patents for early versions of the dishwasher and a motorized Lazy Boy recliner. Another influential relative, Gilderbloom's distant aunt Hanneke Gelderblom, was known as "the Anne Frank that lived" and was featured in the documentary Sex, Drugs, and Democracy. She was elected a Senator in the Netherlands and worked at the International Court of Justice.

Gilderbloom received his B.A. (1975), M.A. (1978), and Ph.D. (1983) in Sociology from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He graduated with the highest GPA in his graduating class (1975) with a straight A average. While at UCSB he took classes from and was mentored by Harvey Molotch, Richard Appelbaum, and took classes from David Harvey (who stayed with him while teaching at UCSB), Christopher Jencks, W. Dennis Keating, Michael Teitz, Jürgen Habermas, Roger Friedland, William Bielby, and William Domhoff.

Community organizer

In high school, Gilderbloom worked with protest groups against the Vietnam War, for environmental awareness following the Santa Barbara Oil Spill, and Cesar Chavez in the local Grape Boycott.

In the 1970s Gilderbloom organized several local, state and national tenant organizations including the California Housing Action and Information Network to help pass rent control laws and other tenant protections. The Foundation for National Progress (Mother Jones) published an organizing manual, Rent Control: A Source Book which was adopted by the emerging tenant movement in the 1980s. Orange County's The Register called it the "Bible" of the rent control movement and it received both praise and attacks from The Nation, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal. [2] [3] [4] He later published a book, Community Versus Commodity: Tenants and the American City on the renters movement with Stella Capek. [5]

Gilderbloom himself has experienced the landlords' wrath. He was advised to halt his study several times. "You'll never survive to finish your work," one industry lobbyist warned him. In another instance, a real estate agent wrote one of the Governor's aides that: "We must find a way to neutralize him [Gilderbloom]." [2] Gilderbloom worked with Mitch Snyder, founder of the National Coalition for the Homeless, to block President Ronald Reagan from prohibiting federal funds to cities who have enacted rent control. He co-authored a study demonstrating that rent control was not correlated with increases in the homeless population, [6] refuting William Tucker's research. President Reagan's proposal was defeated in Congress.

Later Gilderbloom began work in poor neighborhoods to develop affordable, accessible, and attractive housing. He writes about his struggles in Promise and Betrayal: Universities and the Battle for Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods. [7] [8]

Academic career

Gilderbloom is a professor in the Department of Urban and Public Affairs at University of Louisville and director at the Center for Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods. His research interests include "[r]esearch methods, statistics, housing, community development, planning and design." [9] Gilderbloom is also the Director of the Center for Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods, a research center in the Urban Studies Institute at University of Louisville that explores ways to create more sustainable communities. [10] He is a frequent collaborate with Dr. William (Billy) Riggs from University of San Francisco.

Gilderbloom has written and edited five books and countless articles on issues concerning rental housing, poverty, health, community development, and urban policy. His work includes, "50 peer reviewed publications (including several in Journal of Urban Affairs), 30 book chapters, eight authored or co-authored books or journals, and [...] op-ed pieces in Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Sun-Times, USA Today Magazine, Governing Magazine, American Banker, Courier Journal, and many other outlets." [11] His book Rethinking Rental Housing was called "[T]he most significant piece on housing policy written in the last 40 years" by Daniel Lauber, past President of the American Planning Association. [12] A National Housing Institute Survey of Books in Housing Courses found Rethinking Rental Housing to be the most widely chosen book in college housing courses. [12] He later updated the book with new chapters and new numbers called: Invisible City: Housing, Poverty, and New Urbanism. Additionally, Gilderbloom contributed a chapter on modern Cuban architecture for the Encyclopedia of 20th-Century Architecture which won Planetizen's top ten best books in planning for 2005 [13] and a chapter on the history of rent strikes for the Encyclopedia of Housing, 2nd edition, [14] which won best reference book award from American Library Association. [15] [16] [17] Gilderbloom has been consulted by several countries for his work, including Russia, Cuba, Venezuela, Mexico, the Netherlands, and Spain.

Other work

Clinton Administration

Gilderbloom consulted with the Clinton Administration on "Clinton's first State of the Union Speech" and "Section 108 programs, Hope VI, and Community Outreach Partnership Programs." [18] He was recognized for his "extraordinary service to the President's Council on Sustainable Development" for his research.

Neighborhood revitalization

Gilderbloom runs a successful consulting business and has contributed his expertise on numerous neighborhood revitalization projects in West Louisville, Newport (KY), Covington (KY), and Southern Indiana worth over $100 million. His work has been featured in The New York Times. The East Russel Partnership, a collaboration between local organizations; city, state, and federal government; and the Center for Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods received the Sierra Club's Best Practices Award, given for smart growth projects for their success in West Louisville. [19] He has also worked with cities to produce "green housing developments" in Louisville, Indianapolis, Muncie, IN; Covington, KY; and Newport, KY.

Real estate

Gilderbloom has restored 10 historic homes as a part of his business, one of which has been featured in The New York Times [20] and been the set of the movie The Song . His homes are restored using principles of green design.

Recognitions and achievements

Gilderbloom's research has earned him numerous awards and recognition throughout his career. His largest recognition was an international survey of planners and city officials of the Top 100 Urban Thinkers poll conducted by Planetizen, where he was ranked as 63 (placing him in the top forty for living urban thinkers). [21] Additionally, he was chosen as one of the select few academics to be a commentator in Politico's "Arena." [22] He was awarded by the University of Louisville the Presidential Medal for Distinguished Faculty in Research and Creative Activity (2013). [23] In 1997 he was awarded honorary membership in the Phi Kappa Phi for his "outstanding research and character".

In 1982 Gilderbloom received the American Planning Association Chapter Award for Outstanding Contribution to Planning for his research on inter-city rent differentials and housing policy analysis. A year later in 1983, Gilderbloom received the Douglas A. McGregor Memorial Award for Outstanding Social Science from the Journal of Applied Behavioral Science for his research paper "Housing Supply and Regulation: A Study of Rental Housing Market", co-written with Dr. Richard Appelbaum. [24]

His work on rent control includes two books, eight scholarly articles, and numerous op-eds in publications including The Wall Street Journal [25] and The Los Angeles Times, [26] making him one of the most outspoken scholars on rent control.

In the summer of 2015, Gilderbloom was invited to speak on behalf of his work at the Strelka Institute in Moscow, Russia. He is currently working on a documentary film .which hopes to get wide distribution. in classrooms.

Selected publications

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gentrification</span> Urban socioeconomic process

Gentrification is the process of change in the character of a neighborhood through the influx of more affluent residents and investment. There is no agreed-upon definition of gentrification. In public discourse, it has been used to describe a wide array of phenomena, sometimes in a pejorative connotation.

In the United States, rent control refers to laws or ordinances that set price controls on the rent of residential housing to function as a price ceiling. More loosely, "rent control" describes several types of price control:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Housing cooperative</span> Type of housing development that emphasizes self-governance and quasi-communal living

A housing cooperative, or housing co-op, is a legal entity, usually a cooperative or a corporation, which owns real estate, consisting of one or more residential buildings; it is one type of housing tenure. Typically housing cooperatives are owned by shareholders but in some cases they can be owned by a non-profit organization. They are a distinctive form of home ownership that have many characteristics that differ from other residential arrangements such as single family home ownership, condominiums and renting.

Section 8 of the Housing Act of 1937, commonly known as Section 8, provides rental housing assistance to low-income households in the United States by paying private landlords on behalf of these tenants. Approximately 68% of this assistance benefits seniors, children, and individuals with disabilities. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) oversees Section 8 programs, which are administered locally by public housing agencies (PHAs).

Subsidized housing is government sponsored economic assistance aimed towards alleviating housing costs and expenses for impoverished people with low to moderate incomes. In the United States, subsidized housing is often called "affordable housing". Forms of subsidies include direct housing subsidies, non-profit housing, public housing, rent supplements/vouchers, and some forms of co-operative and private sector housing. According to some sources, increasing access to housing may contribute to lower poverty rates.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Single-room occupancy</span> Type of low-cost housing

Single-room occupancy (SRO) is a type of low-cost housing typically aimed at residents with low or minimal incomes, or single adults who like a minimalist lifestyle, who rent small, furnished single rooms with a bed, chair, and sometimes a small desk. SRO units are rented out as permanent residence and/or primary residence to individuals, within a multi-tenant building where tenants share a kitchen, toilets or bathrooms. SRO units range from 7 to 13 square metres. In some instances, contemporary units may have a small refrigerator, microwave, or sink.

The YIMBY movement is a pro-housing movement based on supply-side economic theory that focuses on encouraging new housing through deregulation, opposing density limits, and supporting public transportation. It stands in opposition to NIMBY tendencies, which generally oppose most forms of urban development in order to maintain the status quo.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Affordable housing</span> Housing affordable to those with a median household income

Affordable housing is housing which is deemed affordable to those with a household income at or below the median as rated by the national government or a local government by a recognized housing affordability index. Most of the literature on affordable housing refers to mortgages and a number of forms that exist along a continuum – from emergency homeless shelters, to transitional housing, to non-market rental, to formal and informal rental, indigenous housing, and ending with affordable home ownership.

A slumlord is a slang term for a landlord, generally an absentee landlord with more than one property, who attempts to maximize profit by minimizing spending on property maintenance, and to tenants that they can intimidate. Severe housing shortages allow slumlords to charge higher rents and, when they can get away with it, to break rental laws.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Parkmerced, San Francisco</span> Apartment complex in the California city

Parkmerced is a neighborhood in San Francisco, California. It was designed by architects Leonard Schultze and Thomas Dolliver Church in the early 1940s. Parkmerced is the second-largest single-owner neighborhood of apartment blocks west of the Mississippi River after Park La Brea in Los Angeles. It was a planned neighborhood of high-rise apartment towers and low-rise garden apartments in southwestern San Francisco for middle-income tenants.

The Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy is a joint center at New York University School of Law and the NYU Wagner School of Public Service. The Furman Center was established in 1995 to create a place where people interested in affordable housing and land use issues could turn to for factual, objective research and information. Since that time, the Furman Center has become an authority on such matters in New York City. The Furman Center has a three-part mission, including providing objective academic research about land use, real estate, housing and urban affairs, with a particular focus on New York City, promoting intense debate and productive discussion among elected, academic, and industry leaders, and presenting essential data and analysis about the state of New York City's housing and neighborhoods.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Subsidized housing in the United States</span> Rental assistance for low-income households

In the United States, subsidized housing is administered by federal, state and local agencies to provide subsidized rental assistance for low-income households. Public housing is priced much below the market rate, allowing people to live in more convenient locations rather than move away from the city in search of lower rents. In most federally-funded rental assistance programs, the tenants' monthly rent is set at 30% of their household income. Now increasingly provided in a variety of settings and formats, originally public housing in the U.S. consisted primarily of one or more concentrated blocks of low-rise and/or high-rise apartment buildings. These complexes are operated by state and local housing authorities which are authorized and funded by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). In 2020, there were one million public housing units. In 2022, about 5.2 million American households received some form of federal rental assistance.

The Urban Homesteading Assistance Board (UHAB), formed in 1974, is a city-wide non-profit housing and tenant advocacy group in New York City.

Rent regulation in Canada is a set of laws and policies which control the amount by which rental prices for real property can increase year to year. Each province and territory can pass legislation, where the purpose is to limit rent prices increasing beyond what is affordable for most home dwellers.

Rent regulation is a system of laws for the rental market of dwellings, with controversial effects on affordability of housing and tenancies. Generally, a system of rent regulation involves:

The Costa–Hawkins Rental Housing Act ("Costa–Hawkins") is a California state law, enacted in 1995, which places limits on municipal rent control ordinances. Costa–Hawkins preempts the field in two major ways. First, it prohibits cities from establishing rent control over certain kinds of residential units, e.g., single-family dwellings and condominiums, and newly constructed apartment units; these are deemed exempt. Second, it prohibits "vacancy control", also called "strict" rent control. The legislation was sponsored by Democratic Senator Jim Costa and Republican Assemblymember Phil Hawkins.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Billy Riggs</span>

William Warren Riggs or "Billy" Riggs is an author, city planner, entrepreneur and professor of Management at University of San Francisco, and an international expert in the areas of sustainable transport, technology, urban development and the future of cities. He is the author of the book, End of the Road: Reimagining the Street as the Heart of the City and Disruptive Transport: Driverless Cars, Transport Innovation and the Sustainable City of Tomorrow. He has worked as a professional planner, in venture capital for Just Business and a strategic consultant for various technology firms and startups. He also has experience as a successful recording artist and music producer, having worked on award-winning projects with Frances England, Gabriel Riggs and Carlos Villarreal.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gentrification of San Francisco</span>

The gentrification of San Francisco has been an ongoing source of tension between renters and working people who live in the city as well as real estate interests. A result of this conflict has been an emerging antagonism between longtime working-class residents of the city and the influx of new tech workers. A major increase of gentrification in San Francisco has been attributed to the Dot-Com Boom in the 1990s, creating a strong demand for skilled tech workers from local startups and close by Silicon Valley businesses leading to rising standards of living. As a result, a large influx of new workers in the internet and technology sector began to contribute to the gentrification of historically poor immigrant neighborhoods such as the Mission District. During this time San Francisco began a transformation eventually culminating in it becoming the most expensive city to live in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eviction in the United States</span> Landlord removals of rental housing tenants in the North American country

Eviction in the United States refers to the pattern of tenant removal by landlords in the United States. In an eviction process, landlords forcibly remove tenants from their place of residence and reclaim the property. Landlords may decide to evict tenants who have failed to pay rent, violated lease terms, or possess an expired lease. Landlords may also choose not to renew a tenant's lease, however, this does not constitute an eviction. In the United States, eviction procedures, landlord rights, and tenant protections vary by state and locality. Historically, the United States has seen changes in domestic eviction rates during periods of major socio-political and economic turmoil—including the Great Depression, the 2008 Recession, and the COVID-19 pandemic. High eviction rates are driven by affordable housing shortages and rising housing costs. Across the United States, low-income and disadvantaged neighborhoods have disproportionately higher eviction rates. Certain demographics—including low income renters, Black and Hispanic renters, women, and people with children—are also at a greater risk of eviction. Additionally, eviction filings remain on renters' public records. This can make it more difficult for renters to access future housing, since most landlords will not rent to a tenant with a history of eviction. Eviction and housing instability are also linked to many negative health and life outcomes, including homelessness, poverty, and poor mental and physical health.

The Metropolitan Council on Housing is a tenant rights organization in New York City founded in 1959. As the oldest and largest tenants' organization in the city," it has focused on issues including rent regulation and affordable public housing.

References

  1. "Top 100 Urban Thinkers". Planetizen. Retrieved January 31, 2015.
  2. 1 2 Koeppel, Barbara (May 26, 1979). "Rent Control: A Tenant Revolt". The Nation.
  3. Pransky, Joan (August 10, 1980). "Landlord Strategy: Divide and Conquer Rent Control". The New York Times. Retrieved August 13, 2014.
  4. Freeman, Gerald (September 7, 1980). "Rent Controls: A Plea to Dump Them". The New York Times. Retrieved August 13, 2014.
  5. Capek, Stella; Gilderbloom, John (February 1992). Community Versus Commodity: Tenants and the American City. Albany: State University of New York. ISBN   978-0791408414.
  6. Appelbaum, Richard; Dolney, Michael; Dreier, Peter; Gilderbloom, John (1991). "Scapegoating Rent Control: Masking the Causes of Homelessness". Journal of the American Planning Association. 57 (2): 153–164. doi:10.1080/01944369108975484.
  7. Gilderbloom, John; Mullins, Robert (2005). Promise and Betrayal: Universities and the Battle for Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods. Albany: State University of New York. ISBN   978-0791464830.
  8. Marriott, Michel (August 4, 1996). "Taking Education Beyond the Classroom". The New York Times. Retrieved August 13, 2014.
  9. "Ph.D. Program Faculty". Ph.D. in Urban and Public Affairs. University of Louisville. Retrieved June 16, 2014.
  10. "Homepage". Department of Urban and Public Affairs at University of Louisville. University of Louisville. Retrieved June 16, 2014.
  11. "John I. Gilderbloom gets Major Award". Urban Affairs Association. Urban Affairs Association. Retrieved July 9, 2014.
  12. 1 2 "Rethinking Rental Housing". Temple University Press. Temple University Press. Retrieved July 9, 2014.
  13. Sennott, Stephen (2003). Encyclopedia of 20th Century Architecture. Routledge. ISBN   1579582435.
  14. Carswell, Andrew (2012). Encyclopedia of Housing (2nd ed.). SAGE Publications, Inc. ISBN   9781412989572.
  15. "Outstanding Reference Sources 2013 List". American Library Association. RUSA. January 29, 2014. Retrieved August 13, 2014.
  16. Chavan, Abhijeet. "Top 10 Books - 2005". Planetizen. Urban Insight, Inc. Retrieved July 25, 2014.
  17. Coutts, Brian; LaGuardia, Cheryl. "Best References of 2012". Library Journal. Media Source, Inc. Retrieved July 25, 2014.
  18. "Arena Profile: John Gilderbloom". Politico - The Arena. Retrieved July 17, 2014.
  19. "East Russell Partnership, Louisville, Kentucky". EPA. April 5, 2013. Retrieved July 17, 2014.
  20. Chura, Hillary (May 19, 2007). "Houseguests Who Pay, and Pay Well". The New York Times. Retrieved August 13, 2014.
  21. "Top 100 Urban Thinkers". Planetizen. Retrieved July 1, 2014.
  22. "Arena Profile: John Gilderbloom". The Arena. Politico. Retrieved August 13, 2014.
  23. "Administration recognizes faculty scholarship, creative activity, teaching". Louisville.edu. U of L Today. Retrieved July 1, 2014.
  24. Appelbaum, Richard; Gilderbloom, John. "Housing Supply and Regulation: A Study of the Rental Housing Market". Journal of Applied Behavioral Science. Retrieved August 13, 2014.
  25. Gilderbloom, John (August 19, 1993). "A New Lease on Life for Rent Control". Wall Street Journal.
  26. Lowe, Cary; Gilderbloom, John (December 11, 1979). "Fair Rent Initiative is Unfair to Tenants". Los Angeles Times.