Cityscape: Volume 19 Number 2 | A Research Note: The Housing Choice Voucher Program and Access to Opportunity in Florida’s Nonmetropolitan Areas

A Research Note: The Housing Choice Voucher Program and Access to Opportunity in Florida’s Nonmetropolitan Areas

Rebecca J. Walter
Ruoniu Wang
The University of Texas at San Antonio

Previous research on the Housing Choice Voucher program has found that recipients tend to be clustered in high-poverty, minority concentrated areas. Although these findings are consistent across study areas, much of the research has been conducted in large metropolitan areas. This study accounts for all locations across the state of Florida, including small metropolitan, micropolitan, and rural areas, to examine if place matters for voucher holders’ ability to access high-opportunity neighborhoods. The findings reveal that voucher households in nonmetropolitan areas have lower incomes and tend to be younger with higher percentages of single mothers and families with children; however, nonmetropolitan voucher households are also less concentrated and access higher-opportunity neighborhoods. These differences in nonmetropolitan areas warrant the consideration of place for both future research and policy.