RE: Time is Running Out to Make Your Voice Heard - 7

I have not been following all the emails, but when I saw this one I thought I would respond.

“Dormitories and such are group quarters, and thus out of scope for the AHS. Off-campus apartments are housing units and would be in scope. We do have a category of occupancy called “usual residence elsewhere,” which would include students living in apartments who did not consider the unit to be their permanent residence. However, we don’t ask specifically if occupants are students. Do you think that this would be useful to ask?”

Having data on where college students reside would be an excellent addition. A lot of neighborhood and community planning goes on around off-campus housing that could benefit from this data. This data would also be of use to college campus planners. One question that always arises is the issue of income (poverty) and the ability to distinguish between housing units comprised entirely (or primarily) of students and other types of units (families, individuals, groups of non-students). Being able to distinguish these types of units would be helpful in understanding neighborhood poverty concentration as well as student concentration in neighborhoods. Other information, such as rent levels and unit turnover that distinguishes student housing from other types would also be of interest.

Rosalind Kotz
kotzr@nycap.rr.com
518-631-9401