Unintended Consequences: Perpetuity Clauses in Affordable Housing

Title 42 U.S. Code § 12703 - Purposes of Cranston-Gonzalez National Affordable Housing Act, states, “to retain wherever feasible as housing affordable to low-income families those dwelling units produced for such purpose with Federal assistance” (US Constitution). Meaning, low-income houses should be valued as such only under reasonable circumstances. Affordable housing protection laws and policies like perpetuity clauses are resulting in unintended consequences. The intricacy of Law of the United States deploys a sense of justification, deposition, and perpetuation of structural violence via housing laws. How are selling and refinancing restrictions set forth by permanent perpetuity clauses on low income homes affecting the homeowners, their

My goal is to collect ethnographic data that pertains to the Moro Cojo home owners. I will closely examine their living situation—from their struggles at work to their inability to voice out their concerns—I will look at the hardships of low income families in relation to their housing situation. Since the Moro Cojo Community is comprised of about 161 families I will focus on only ten families. This way I can look into their problems in depth. Because most of these families are low income, Spanish speakers, and farmworkers, their stories might be redundant. To make sure I get a representative sample I will conduct a preliminary interview to select families. Once I have chosen the families I will have conversations over the telephone, via the internet, or in person if possible with them. These conversations will be once a week for ten weeks. Each week my focus will shift. For instance, one week I can focus on how and what they are doing to pay off their mortgage and the next week focus on any health complications they have had to face due to a lack of resources. By week eleven I expect to have a large pool of data to analyze and think about critically. By week twelve I should be finalizing my project, and revealing my findings. My ideal internship would be with a Cultural Anthropologist(s) that aims to understand structural violence. Since I am dealing with a primarly Latino/a community, another possible environment to carry abroad my research might be with an institute that deals with Latino/a societal issues. In brevity, any internship that deals with society, public policy, structural systems, housing policy, Latinos, farmworkers, or low-income households is the internship for