Knowledgebase Collection
Social Equity
The planning profession is motivated by the desire to create better communities, with clean environments, affordable housing, open space, accessible transportation, and good educational opportunities. Planners have helped to create these conditions in many communities, but in many others, certain groups have been systematically excluded. Health, income, mobility, and other inequities are institutionalized in policies and practices that disproportionately limit opportunity and assign burden to groups based on race, age, gender, sexual orientation, immigration status, religion, or disability. Inequity can be observed when communities are displaced due to gentrification, when communities report higher rates of disease due to the presence of a hazardous waste facility or the absence of healthy food, or when communities are excluded from participating in the planning process due to language or logistical barriers. Planning for social equity means recognizing planning practices that have had a disparate impact on certain communities and actively working with affected residents to create better communities for all.
From this page you can search for resources that provide background, policy guidance, and examples of local plan recommendations and zoning standards for social equity from across the country. And you can filter these search results by various geographic and demographic characteristics.
APA Resources
Planning for Equity Policy Guide
This Policy Guide introduces the Equity in All Policies approach and shares policy guidance on the cross-cutting equity issues of gentrification, environmental justice, and community engagement and empowerment.
Planning with Diverse Communities
This PAS Report details how to engage communities of color in the planning process and outlines specific tools and strategies planners can use to improve economic opportunity, transportation, housing, health and safety, and placemaking in diverse communities.
Fair and Healthy Land Use: Environmental Justice and Planning
This PAS Report looks at how environmental justice can be incorporated into land-use planning processes to help alleviate the disproportionate exposure to pollution that low-income families and racial minorities face.
Integrating Gender Mainstreaming into U.S. Planning Practice
This edition of PAS Memo introduces the practice of gender mainstreaming and explores how it can be better integrated into U.S. planning contexts.
More and Better: Increasing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Planning
This edition of PAS Memo discusses the opportunities and challenges of making diversity, equity, and inclusion a regular and critical component of the urban planning profession.
Planning for Equitable Development: Social Equity by Design
This edition of PAS Memo defines equitable development and explores how it can expand choice and opportunity for all.
Inclusive Growth
This edition of PAS QuickNotes introduces the concept of inclusive growth and describes how public officials, planners, and community stakeholders can support an equitable distribution of community benefits through land use and development.
Planning and Fair Housing
This edition of PAS QuickNotes reviews federal fair housing laws and highlights three specific strategies for expanding fair housing access through local land-use policy.
A Framework for Promoting Equity Through Zoning
This edition of Zoning Practice discusses the challenges of current zoning approaches and shares reforms that could help support equitable development outcomes.
Zoning to Improve Health and Promote Equity
This edition of Zoning Practice considers how zoning can support the creation of healthy environments that include affordable housing and improved access to care.
Do Strict Land Use Regulations Make Metropolitan Areas More Segregated by Income?
This JAPA article finds that density restrictions are related to the segregation of the rich into enclaves and suggests that inclusionary housing requirements by regional and state agencies may help curb income segregation.
Lessons for LEED® for Neighborhood Development, Social Equity, and Affordable Housing
This JAPA article tracks why LEED®ND certification often fails on its social equity criteria.
Active Living and Social Justice: Planning for Physical Activity in Low-income, Black, and Latino
This JAPA article tracks the equity dimension of active living among low-income Black and Latino communities.
Paul Davidoff and Advocacy Planning in Retrospect
This JAPA article shares how Paul Davidoff attempted to translate APA's ethical mandate into institutional and individual accountability.
Refusing to Appropriate: The Emerging Discourse on Planning and Race
This JAPA article unapologetically claims that race cannot continue to be a taboo subject in planning and urges planners to create a more equitable planning process.
Some Observations on Race in Planning
This JAPA article includes anecdotes about working with Mayor Harold Washington of Chicago, demonstrating the importance of equity as a clearly stated political priority.
A Retrospective View of Equity Planning Cleveland 1969–1979
This JAPA article features Norman Krumholz speaking on his experience with equity planning in Cleveland in the 1970s.
Planning in the Face of Power
This JAPA article explores how information and misinformation are used to influence the planning process and proposes a new form of “progressive” planning practice.
The Ghetto as a Resource for Black America
This JAPA article exposes that current approaches to revitalization do not deal with the issue of power and proposes a new approach that focuses on solutions and community, dealing directly with power and control.
A Ladder of Citizen Participation
This JAPA article is a classic text that proposes a typology of citizen participation visualized on the rungs of a ladder, leading from manipulation to citizen control.
Advocacy and Pluralism in Planning
This JAPA article urges planners to engage in political processes, like advocates, and to facilitate the creation and presentation of plural plans.
Potty Talk With a Planner
This Planning article considers the importance of public bathrooms as an equity issue.
We Cannot Plan from Our Desks
This Planning article offers practicing planners and planning students a new approach to doing planning on the ground, in the communities they serve, called Embedded Planning.
We Must Champion Equity and Diversity
This Planning article advocates for planners to highlight equity and diversity in their work and describes how APA can help support these efforts.
A Need for Speed
This Planning article discusses how high-speed broadband can bridge the digital divide.
Car Sharing Can Drive Mobility Equity
This Planning article explores the equity dimensions of car share technology as a strategy to achieve mobility for all.
Connecting the Dots
This Planning article outlines some of the equity concerns around bike share and transit and includes case studies from four cities.
Immigrant City
This Planning article looks at immigration as a way to increase diversity in a community and as an economic development opportunity.
Infrastructure of Opportunity
This Planning article tracks Chattanooga’s evolution from “Rust Belt of the South” to healthy and booming tech hub and considers how the city is switching investment priorities to improve its human capital through education.
The People's Way
This Planning article shares how to plan with Native American communities to ensure that plans are just, equitable, and responsive to cultural differences.
Parks Are an Equity Issue
This Planning article argues that it is a pressing planning issue to ensure equal access to parks and recreation.
Planning's Role in Social Justice
This Planning article highlights planners’ ethical call to advocate for social justice.
Saving Social Capital
This Planning article urges planners to get involved in building a community’s social framework, not just physical infrastructure.
The Compton's Transgender Cultural District
This podcast features the story of the first transgender cultural district in the world, in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood.
Expanding Equity: "Stonewall Did That For Me"
This blog post includes a link to an NPR StoryCorps story where a planner shares his experience at Stonewall in 1969.
Planning for Equity in Parks with Green Infrastructure
This briefing paper discusses how ecosystem services from green infrastructure can support equity at the local and regional scale.
Prioritizing Urban and Community Parks Can Boost Health and Social Equity
This blog post connects park access to inequity and urges planners to advocate for more effective federal funding programs to support park access.
Great Places With an Eye for Equity
This blog post shares fives equitable development case studies from Albany, New York, Boston, Massachusetts, Flint, Michigan, Denver, Colorado, and Glencoe, Illinois.
Beyond Mobility: Transportation's Role in Achieving Equity
This blog post includes audio from a conversation between Mariia Zimmerman and Stephanie Gidigbi on the U.S. Department of Transportation’s focus on equity.
AICP Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct
This web page contains the AICP Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct.
Plan4Health
This web page shares various resources produced by the Planning and Community Health Center’s Plan4Health project.
Diversity and Inclusion Training Series
This APA Learn course introduces diversity and inclusion and shares strategies for addressing social justice issues in planning.
Plan4Health: Partnering for Equity
This APA Learn course stresses the importance of collaboration between planners and public health officials to achieve health equity.
Planning and Governing for Racial Equity
This APA Learn course provides guidance on how to address racial equity in the planning process, including how to normalize conversations about equity and how to value racial healing.
Defining Social Equity
PolicyLink defines equity as “just and fair inclusion into a society in which all can participate, prosper, and reach their full potential. Unlocking the promise of the nation by unleashing the promise in us all.” Unlike equality, which connotes sameness, equity is responsive to difference; equitable policies actively mitigate the disproportionate harm faced by certain communities. Three cross-cutting issues related to social equity in planning include gentrification, environmental justice, and community engagement and empowerment.
While measuring social equity can be difficult, several resources exist to help communities identify and monitor local inequities. These resources describe how to collect and analyze data on equity indicators from sources like the U.S. Census Bureau, CDC, and EPA. Quantitative data analysis can begin to expose some of a community’s equity issues but should be combined with qualitative surveys and interviews to gain a clearer understanding of how inequity is experienced by affected residents.
Social Equity and Ethics
The planning profession has played and continues to play a role in creating and reinforcing inequity. While openly discriminatory practices like redlining are illegal today, many communities are still struggling to recover from generations of targeted exclusion and disinvestment. As they try to recover, they face modern discriminatory practices like exclusionary zoning and the concentration of polluting industries.
The AICP Code of Ethics (2016) calls planners to do better: “We shall seek social justice by working to expand choice and opportunity for all persons, recognizing a special responsibility to plan for the needs of the disadvantaged and to promote racial and economic integration. We shall urge the alteration of policies, institutions, and decisions that oppose such needs.” Planners have an unambiguous ethical responsibility to alleviate inequities and to prioritize the needs of communities that are negatively impacted by historic and contemporary discrimination.
Equity in All Policies
An equity in all policies approach involves using an equity lens in all planning practices, including work on climate change and resilience, economic development, education, energy and resource consumption, public health, heritage preservation, housing, mobility and transportation, and public spaces. Planning for equity does not stifle growth or impede development. Instead, it expands opportunities to all members of a community and builds local capacity to respond to equity concerns moving forward.
An important component of the equity in all policies approach is improving planning processes to facilitate engagement from diverse stakeholders, perhaps through the use of language interpreters or by providing child care services. This requires planners to be cognizant of the power differences among various stakeholders and to advocate for the voices that are often silenced in these conversations. Besides improving the process, the content of plans and policies must also directly address inequities. Public officials can also require developers to complete a Social Impact Assessment (SIA) to improve understanding of the consequences of a project on the surrounding community. Any local strategy to address social equity must be informed by local planning history, the equity landscape, and the input of diverse stakeholders.
Background Resources
Advocacy and Pluralism in Planning
This JAPA article urges planners to engage in political processes, like advocates, and to facilitate the creation and presentation of plural plans.
All-In Cities Toolkit
This toolkit shares strategies and policy guidance for racial inclusion and equitable growth related to good jobs, economic security, homegrown talent, healthy neighborhoods, housing/anti-displacement, and democracy and justice.
City and Metropolitan Inequality on the Rise, Driven By Declining Incomes
This article unpacks the trend of growing income inequality and its consequences.
Local Governments, Social Equity, and Sustainable Communities: Advancing Social Equity Goals to Achieve Sustainability
This report uses data from a national survey to assess whether local governments are incorporating social equity into their sustainability efforts.
Policy, Planning, and People: Promoting Justice in Urban Development
This book includes a collection of essays on the topic of how to achieve equity, diversity, and democratic participation in urban policies and plans.
The Future of Equity in Cities
This resource belongs to the Autonomous Vehicles and Social Equity collections.
Clearinghouses
Community Commons: Equity
This clearinghouse shares tools and resources related to health equity from local, regional, and federal sources.
Program for Environmental and Regional Equity: Publications
This clearinghouse organizes resources by research area, including Environmental Justice and Climate Equity, Inclusive Economics and Regional Equity, and Governing Power and Social Movement Building.
Resources for Creating Healthy, Sustainable, and Equitable Communities
This clearinghouse lists environmental justice resources by topic, including technical assistance and funding opportunities.
Books
A Neighborhood Politics of Last Resort: Post-Katrina New Orleans and the Right to the City
This book tracks the messy politics of neighborhood associations in post-Katrina New Orleans.
As Long as Grass Grows: The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice, from Colonization to Standing Rock
This book discusses the relationship between indigenous activists and government and corporate interests through the lens of indigenized environmental justice.
Barrio Urbanism: Chicanos, Planning and American Cities
This book provides a historical overview of Latino urbanism in America.
Capital City: Gentrification and the Real Estate State
This book belongs to the Affordable Housing Programs and Social Equity collections.
Closing the Food Gap: Resetting the Table in the Land of Plenty
This book belongs to the Built Environment and Health and Social Equity collections.
Design as Democracy: Techniques for Collective Creativity
This book introduces the practice of democratic design and urges designers to update their participatory methods.
Reports
A Tale of Three Cities: The State of Racial Justice in Chicago Report
This report provides a comprehensive picture of the changing conditions of racial and ethnic groups in Chicago during the last half century.
Addressing Community Concerns: How Environmental Justice Relates to Land Use Planning and Zoning
This report discusses the relationship between land use planning and zoning and environmental justice.
All Aboard! Making Equity and Inclusion Central to Federal Transportation Policy
This report establishes core principles for achieving transportation equity and provides recommendations for federal policy.
America's Racially Diverse Suburbs: Opportunities and Challenges
This report studies the largest 50 metropolitan areas in the U.S. to create a typology of the racial diversity of suburbs.
America’s Tomorrow: Equity is the Superior Growth Model
This report lays out a framework for equity-driven growth that is responsive to economic and demographic changes.
Building Inclusive Communities: Cross-Canada Perspectives and Strategies
This report shares the results of focus groups hosted across Canada on the topic of creating more inclusive urban communities.
Briefing Papers
A New Social Equity Agenda for Sustainable Transportation
This briefing paper highlights the importance of social equity and environmental justice to transportation policy.
Cities Connect: How Urbanity Helps Achieve Social Inclusion Objectives
This briefing paper highlights the benefits of improving accessibility and opportunity for social inclusion.
Elevating Cultural Relevance and Racial Equity in Research and Evaluation
This briefing paper highlights the importance of researching and measuring racial equity in public and private projects.
How Neighborhoods Affect the Social and Economic Mobility of Their Residents
This briefing paper discusses quality services, crime, social networks, and employment as four causal mechanisms in which communities can undermine long-term life chances for residents.
In Pursuit of Health Equity: Comparing U.S. and E.U. Approaches to Eliminating Disparities
This report compares U.S. and E.U. policy approaches to addressing health inequities. It discusses the use of action plans, the identification of disadvantaged populations, the role of the health care system, the involvement of multiple sectors, the role of wealth, and the use of data.
Regional Planning for Health Equity
This briefing paper considers the social determinants health from a regional perspective.
Articles
6 Ways Cities Can Create Economic Opportunity for All
This article argues that cities need to revise their planning processes in order to achieve more equity, rather than looking for policy solutions.
A Call to Courage: An Open Letter to Canadian Urbanists
This article and online training encourages urbanists working in the Canadian context to respond to discussions of systemic oppression and anti-Black racism occurring across North America.
A Divided Neighborhood Comes Together Under an Elevated Expressway
This article tracks a group of New Orleans residents that are reclaiming a space stripped from their community decades ago.
A Ladder of Citizen Participation
This article is a classic text that proposes a typology of citizen participation visualized on the rungs of a ladder, leading from manipulation to citizen control.
A Retrospective View of Equity Planning Cleveland 1969–1979
This article features Norman Krumholz speaking on his experience with equity planning in Cleveland in the 1970s.
Active Living and Social Justice: Planning for Physical Activity in Low-income, Black, and Latino Communities
This article belongs to the Built Environment and Health and Social Equity collections.
Blog Posts
Equity and Urban Planning – Build Institutional Capacity and Culture
This blog post shares the third lesson from the Interaction Institute for Social Change and Horsley Witten Group’s effort to weave social equity into the RhodeMap RI regional planning process.
Equity and Urban Planning – Engage Those Most Directly Affected by Inequities
This blog post shares the second lesson from the Interaction Institute for Social Change and Horsley Witten Group’s effort to weave social equity into the RhodeMap RI regional planning process.
Equity and Urban Planning – Lead Boldly, Collaboratively, Authentically
This blog post shares the fourth lesson from the Interaction Institute for Social Change and Horsley Witten Group’s effort to weave social equity into the RhodeMap RI regional planning process.
Equity and Urban Planning – Weave Equity Into Process and Content
This blog post shares the first lesson from the Interaction Institute for Social Change and Horsley Witten Group’s effort to weave social equity into the RhodeMap RI regional planning process.
Heritage and Sustainability: The Role of Equitable Development in Preservation
This blog post considers how urban development contributes to the destruction of cultural assets, especially those of underserved populations.
Manifesto for an Intercultural Urbanism
This blog post defines intercultural urbanism and shares how it can help address the lack of diversity in urban planning and design.
Fact Sheets
Addressing Environmental Justice in EPA Brownfields Communities
This fact sheet introduces the EPA’s Brownfield Program and discusses the challenges and opportunities of brownfield revitalization.
Fair Play: Advancing Health Equity Through Shared Use
This fact sheet highlights shared use as a strategy to address health equity issues.
Jemez Principles for Democratic Organization
This fact sheet shares the Jemez Principles, six core values that emphasize the importance of inclusion and equity in the organizing process.
Principles of Environmental Justice
This fact sheet shares the 17 principles of environmental justice drafted and adopted by delegates of the First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit in 1991.
Racial Equity Impact Assessment Guide
This fact sheet discusses racial equity impact assessments and lists questions associated with each step of the process.
The Equity Manifesto
This fact sheet is a rallying cry for policy professionals to work together to reach a more equitable future.
Case Studies
Advancing Social Equity in Ann Arbor-Washtenaw County, Michigan
This case study examines how Ann Arbor-Washtenaw County has addressed social equity and sustainability.
Advancing Social Equity in Arlington, Virginia
This case study examines how Arlington, Virginia has addressed social equity and sustainability.
Advancing Social Equity in Clark County, Washington
This case study examines how Clark County, Washington, has addressed social equity and sustainability.
Advancing Social Equity in Dubuque, Iowa
This case study examines how Dubuque, Iowa, has addressed social equity and sustainability.
Advancing Social Equity in Durham, North Carolina
This case study examines how Durham, North Carolina, has addressed social equity and sustainability.
Advancing Social Equity in Fort Collins, Colorado
This case study examines how Fort Collins, Colorado, has addressed social equity and sustainability.
Online Training
A Call to Courage: An Open Letter to Canadian Urbanists
This article and online training encourages urbanists working in the Canadian context to respond to discussions of systemic oppression and anti-Black racism occurring across North America.
Building Better Futures: Innovations in Equitable Development
This recorded conference features over 15 speakers examining the topic of equitable development in presentations and panel discussions.
Building Cities of Opportunity for All: Policy Solutions for Equitable Economic Development
This recorded session features four mayors describing how to encourage equitable economic development through policy.
Building Equitable Cities
This recorded session features real estate leaders speaking about equitable urban development.
Building Healthy, Equitable Communities
This online training is designed for government and community leaders that want to address health equity at the local level.
Cities in the Time of COVID-19: How Do We Respond to Anti-Black Racism in Urbanist Practices and Conversations?
This video contains a conversation between five Black urbanists discussing their experience with anti-Blackness, racism, and other issues in the field of urbanism.
Video
11th Street Bridge Park - Equitable Development Task Force
This video highlights the work of the Equitable Development Task Force, part of the 11th Street Bridge Park project in Washington D.C.
An Urban Planner's Advice for Making Equity Your Focus
This video features Carlton Eley sharing advice on how students and young planners can expand their knowledge of social justice issues.
Cities in the Time of COVID-19: How Do We Respond to Anti-Black Racism in Urbanist Practices and Conversations?
This video contains a conversation between five Black urbanists discussing their experience with anti-Blackness, racism, and other issues in the field of urbanism.
Community Voices on Environmental Justice
These videos feature government, non-profit, and community leaders talking about their environmental justice work.
Environmental Justice: The Power of Partnerships
This video shows how the EPA’s Collaborative Problem-Solving Model has been applied in Spartanburg, South Carolina.
Equitable Development
This video features a conversation with Senior Program Officer Adam Kent from the D.C. office of Local Initiatives Support Corporation on equitable development.
Audio
D.C., Long "Chocolate City," Becoming More Vanilla
This audio recording describes the racialized process of gentrification occurring in Washington D.C.
Historian Says Don't "Sanitize" How Our Government Created Ghettos
This audio recording with Richard Rothstein addresses the legacy of government-sponsored segregation in America’s cities.
Ruth Glass and London: Aspects of Change 1964-2014
These audio recordings feature urban planners and geographers reflecting on Ruth Glass’s London: Aspects of Change in the context of contemporary London.
The Business of Gentrification
This audio recording discusses the business of gentrification through a case study of Highland Park, California.
Interactive Maps
EJSCREEN
This interactive map includes 11 environmental indicators, 6 demographic indicators, and 11 environmental justice (EJ) indexes.
Environmental Justice Atlas
This interactive map records global environmental justice conflicts.
Food Access Research Atlas
This interactive map uses supermarket accessibility data to show which census tracts are low access at different distances.
JusticeMap
This interactive map contains national race and income data from the US Census Bureau.
Mapping America's Rental Housing Crisis
This interactive map belongs to the Affordable Housing Programs and Social Equity collections.
Mapping Displacement Pressures in Chicago
This interactive map classifies Chicago neighborhoods as high-risk, moderate-risk, or low-risk for displacement.
Toolkits
All-In Cities Toolkit
This toolkit shares strategies and policy guidance for racial inclusion and equitable growth related to good jobs, economic security, homegrown talent, healthy neighborhoods, housing/anti-displacement, and democracy and justice.
Community Tool Box
This toolkit includes 46 chapters that address 16 core competencies related to community development.
Transformative Equitable Development for Healthy Communities
This toolkit aims to help Minnesota communities adopt transformative equitable development practices that directly address racial and economic inequities.
Guides
A Blueprint for Changemakers: Achieving Health Equity Through Law & Policy
This guide shares policy strategies for achieving healthier and more equitable communities.
A Local Official's Guide to Immigrant Civic Engagement
This guide identifies the obstacles to immigrant civic participation and lays out ten strategies for encouraging participation in public decision-making.
Advancing Racial Equity and Transforming Government: A Resource Guide to Put Ideas Into Action
This guide discusses six strategies for creating more equitable communities and shares eight case studies from cities and counties across the U.S.
Advancing Racial Equity in Your City
This guide outlines six steps local leaders can follow to improve racial equity.
Building Climate Equity: Creating a New Approach from the Ground Up
This guide discusses equity and climate change at the global scale and shows why it is relevant to local actors.
Creating Equitable, Healthy, and Sustainable Communities: Strategies for Advancing Smart Growth, Environmental Justice, and Equitable Development
This guide identifies seven strategies for linking smart growth, environmental justice, and equitable development.
Models
Draft Municipal Public Participation Ordinance
This model ordinance provides a template to help cities encourage active public participation.
Innovative Land Use Planning Techniques: A Handbook for Sustainable Development
This model belongs to the Active Transportation, Environmentally Sensitive Areas, Farmland Protection, Inclusionary Housing, Residential Infill Development, Scenic View Protection, Social Equity, Transfer of Development Rights, and Transit-Oriented Development collections.
Comprehensive Plans
Albany, NY, Albany 2030
This city's comprehensive plan belongs to the Age-Friendly Communities, Built Environment and Health, Community Visioning, Comprehensive Planning, Food Systems, Social Equity, Social Service Uses, and Solar Energy collections.
Boston, MA, Imagine Boston 2030
This comprehensive plan belongs to the Affordable Housing Programs and Social Equity collections.
Commerce, CA, 2020 General Plan
The city’s comprehensive plan lists Environmental Justice as an issue in the Air Quality element.
Eugene, OR, Envision Eugene
The city’s comprehensive plan addresses environmental justice and compatibility.
Flint, MI, Imagine Flint: Master Plan for a Sustainable Flint
This city's comprehensive plan belongs to the Built Environment and Health, Community Visioning, Comprehensive Planning, Food Systems, and Social Equity collections.
Fort Collins, CO, City Plan
The city's comprehensive plan belongs to the Age-Friendly Communities, Capital Improvements Programming, Community Visioning, Comprehensive Planning, Housing an Aging Population, Social Equity, and Solar Energy collections.
Functional Plans
Baltimore, MD, The 2019 Baltimore Sustainability Plan
This functional plan uses an equity lens to plan for a more sustainable future.
Decatur, GA, The Better Together Community Action Plan
This functional plan was developed after the city’s 2010 Strategic Plan to identify actions that various stakeholders can take to improve equity, inclusion, and engagement.
New York, NY, CreateNYC
This functional plan sets an agenda for improving New York City’s cultural ecosystem, with Equity and Inclusion as the first issue area.
San Francisco, CA, Racial & Social Equity Initiative Action Plan: Phase I
This functional plan summarizes actions that will be taken by the local government to improve internal and external equity, diversity, and inclusion in the city of San Francisco.
Seattle, WA, Equitable Development Implementation Plan
This functional plan was drafted in anticipation of Seattle 2035, the city’s comprehensive plan.
Standalone Policies
Austin, TX, Resolution No. 20170817-053
This standalone policy creates an Anti-Displacement Task Force to study issues related to displacement from gentrification.
Baltimore, MD, Charter Amendment - Equity Assistance Fund
This standalone policy creates an Equity Assistance Fund to support efforts that address race, gender, and economic inequity in the city.
Dallas, TX, Comprehensive Housing Policy
This standalone policy responds to the need for affordable housing and fair housing choices and patterns of segregation and concentrated poverty.
Executive Order 12898: Federal Actions To Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations
This standalone policy, signed by former President Clinton, was the first major federal action on environmental justice.
New York, NY, Local Law No. 60
This standalone policy requires that environmental justice areas be studied every five years by an interagency working group.
New York, NY, Local Law No. 64
This standalone policy amends the administrative code to add a chapter on Environmental Justice.
Regulations
Atlanta, GA, Code of Ordinances
This regulation belongs to the Active Transportation, Content-Neutral Sign Regulation, Food Trucks, Green Building, Social Equity, and Transfer of Development Rights collections.
Baltimore, MD, City Code
These regulations belong to the Complete Streets, Home Occupations, Inclusionary Housing, Rethinking Off-Street Parking Requirements, Social Equity, Transit-Oriented Development, Urban Agriculture, Zoning Reform and Code Writing, and Zoning Variances collections.
Federal Way, WA, Code of Ordinances
The city’s codified ordinances establish a diversity commission to advise the city council and staff on the needs of culturally diverse communities.
Minneapolis, MN, Code of Ordinances
This regulation belongs to the Accessory Dwelling Units, Active Transportation, Affordable Housing Programs, Built Environment and Health, Food Trucks, Green Building, Group Housing, Residential Infill Development, Rethinking Off-Street Parking Requirements, Social Equity, Solar Energy, Urban Agriculture, and Urban Livestock collections.
Newark, NJ, Environmental Justice and Cumulative Impact Ordinance
The city’s ordinance amends the zoning and land use regulations to include an Environmental Justice and Cumulative Impacts chapter.
Northampton, MA, Municipal Code
This regulation belongs to the Farmland Protection, Social Equity, and Urban Livestock collections.
Web Pages
CNU: Equity
This web page describes Congress for the New Urbanism’s stance on equity and provides links to their work on this issue.
Center for Social Inclusion
This web page shares resources for communities, governments, and other institutions to address structural racism by the Center for Social Inclusion.
Closing Equity Gaps in DC’s Wards and Neighborhoods
This web page allows users to view 17 different equity indicators for DC wards or neighborhoods and compare them with the city.
Community-Wealth.org
This web page shares information and resources related to community wealth building strategies.
Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative
This web page shares the work of the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative.
EPA: Equitable Development and Environmental Justice
This web page describes the relationship between environmental justice and equitable development.
Member STories
Implementing Cultural Competency in Urban Planning
It is imperative for the planning profession to go beyond lip service and put anti-racist and culturally competent strategies into practice. Four young and emerging planners share 4 strategies we actively use in our professional career.
Related Collections
Age-Friendly Communities
This collection catalogs resources that provide background and policy guidance or demonstrate how cities and counties are using plans, programs, and regulations to foster accessible and inclusive communities.
Built Environment and Health
This collection catalogs resources that provide background, research, and policy guidance or demonstrate how local and regional agencies are using plans, regulations, and programs to guide change in the built environment to improve health outcomes.
Inclusionary Housing
This collection catalogs resources that provide background and policy guidance or demonstrate how localities are using plans and development regulations to promote inclusionary housing.