Innovation spotlight: Betterhood
By Matt Toddy
Rethinking housing as a tool for social equity
Jonathan BarnesJonathan Barnes earned his bachelor’s degree in environmental design from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and a Master in Architecture from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Barnes previously practiced with the Chicago office of Skidmore Owings & Merrill on new-construction and renovation projects in New York, Washington, San Francisco, and London, including the development of the NBC Tower, one of Chicago’s premier high-rise buildings. As managing and design principal with JBAD, Barnes has led design teams in architecture, planning, and interiors projects for over 24 years with award-winning results. At JBAD, Barnes has focused on urban mixed-use and infill projects in the private and public sectors, including multi-family, commercial office, retail, civic, and higher education projects.
Matt Toddy (MT): Can you explain the genesis of Betterhood? What is the 20-year goal for the organization?Jonathan Barnes (JB): Betterhood is a not-for-profit organization founded by Jonathan Barnes Architecture & Design (JBAD) as a way to bring innovative design concepts to bear on contemporary issues facing urban American neighborhoods through social entrepreneurship. The organization has served as an important outlet and point of leverage for a lot of the creative thinking that happens at JBAD. I’ve never had a 20-year goal for anything, but our expectations have always been focused beyond the virtual notoriety of Instagram and Twitter and on actual implementation and making a real difference in the lives of the residents of challenged neighborhoods.
MT: Why is the entrepreneurial housing concept so important in a city like Columbus?JB: The wealth gap that minority populations experience across the U.S. is multi-generational, persistent, and in large measure a result of unfair real estate practices, beginning around 1910 with restrictive deed covenants and later with redlining and contract-for-deed arrangements — all of these limiting where African Americans and other minorities could live and how they could benefit from real estate ownership like the rest of the country. From 1950 to 1970, African Americans lost nearly $4 billion in potential gains to these conditions. Many urban neighborhoods in Columbus have been similarly segregated by race and economics for decades, offering limited opportunities for residents in those communities to participate in real estate ownership and investment compared to other neighborhoods.
Entrepreneurial housing offers an important tool to help level the playing field.
MT: What are the benefits of an owner-based residency model for an economically challenged neighborhood?JB: Entrepreneurial housing was created as a paradigm shift in affordable housing and social/financial entrepreneurship. This concept targets the problems of low rates of housing ownership and of absentee landlords and substandard housing in economically challenged neighborhoods with an inside-out solution by creating resident landlords with a vested interest in their communities rather than by policing the offenders. This is achieved through real estate ownership opportunities, a landlord education program and new, high-quality rental housing. This new way of thinking replaces traditional large-scale neighborhood gentrification with a scalable infill approach that gives residents a profit and equity position in their communities and their futures.
MT: What challenges have you encountered in the development process and deploying this model in the City’s neighborhoods?JB: Like any new, innovative idea, the entrepreneurial housing concept was initially met with both acclaim and skepticism, mostly focused on the potential for people to embrace the business and social prospects of the model. With more opportunities to share the thinking behind the idea, communities, businesses, residents, and the city administration have become strong supporters. Developing the prototype project has had its share of challenges. The process of site selection revealed an inherent requirement of the project to operate in transitional neighborhoods where the project’s value could maintain a realistic level. The hybrid for-purchase/rental nature of the project presented challenges to lenders, which were overcome with some creative financing structures.
MT: This model challenges the traditional developer-architect-contractor-consumer model of economic development. What would you recommend to other architects looking to engage innovative models of practice, process, and development?JB: Yes, in this case, the project partnering team was created by and is led by the architect through Betterhood. In this way, the connections between both project initiation-implementation and architect-consumer are short-circuited, allowing a more effective application of the concept and a more direct dialogue between architect and end user. In order to seriously pursue alternative forms of practice, process, and development, architects must be able to see the connections between architecture, society, culture, and economics and school themselves in the motivations, the language, and the operations of those realms.
For more information on Betterhood and to stay up to date on the latest developments, visit Betterhoodusa.org. Plans, diagrams, and renderings illustrate the Taylor + Emerald Prototype project proposed for Columbus’s Near East neighborhood.
Author Bio:
Matt Toddy, AIA, NCARBToddy is a graduate of The Ohio State University and architect at Columbus, Ohio’s Design Collective. He is the 2020-21 Strategic Vision Director for AIA National’s Young Architects Forum.