Drilling Down in Baltimore’s Neighborhoods

LAI Baltimore Virtual Presentation Featuring Alan Mallach:
"Drilling Down in Baltimore’s Neighborhoods:
Changes in racial/ethnic composition and income from 2000 to 2017”

Please join Lambda Alpha International’s Baltimore Chapter for our June Virtual Presentation on Wednesday, June 17th from 12-1pm. The presentation will feature Alan Mallach, a senior fellow with the Center for Community Progress in Washington DC, presenting on the topic of "Drilling Down in Baltimore’s Neighborhoods: Changes in racial/ethnic composition and income from 2000 to 2017.”

Neighborhood change is a critical issue for Baltimore, a city that is seeing strong revival in some areas and continuing decline in others, a city that is both racially and economically polarized. What happens in Baltimore’s neighborhoods, whether they are gentrifying or declining, continuing to struggle or growing in strength, not only matters deeply in terms of the quality of life and prospects of Baltimore’s residents, but also in many respects defines what kind of a city Baltimore is, and what kind of city its residents and leaders want it to be.

The Abell Foundation's latest report, “Drilling Down in Baltimore’s Neighborhoods: Changes in racial/ethnic composition and income from 2000 to 2017” by urban researcher and author Alan Mallach, offers an overview of what has been happening in Baltimore’s neighborhoods since 2000—to what extent they have moved upward economically, moved downward, or stayed largely the same, and what that means in terms of population change, economic condition, and housing markets. The report finds that the largest single factor driving change in Baltimore is that Baltimore is losing its working- and middle-class families, but this trend plays out very differently across the city’s racial divide. Click here to read the full report. 

While Baltimore is losing both white and black families, it is gaining a young, high-earning white population, but not black population, through in-migration of families and individuals from outside the city. As a result, the white population is becoming more affluent, and the black population poorer. This reverberates through the housing market. Where white millennials are moving, housing demand is strong and prices are rising. Where working- and middle-class black families are leaving, housing demand is weak, prices are low, and abandonment is widespread. They are not the same neighborhoods.

While some of the findings in this report may be surprising and some may even be upsetting, the goal of this report is not to point fingers. 

If you have any questions, you can contact:

Matthew L. Kimball, President, Baltimore Chapter

mlkimball@nilesbarton.com, (410) 783-6354