Inside Boston's housing crisis
An exclusive Q&A with former Boston City Councilor Kenzie Bok, the newly appointed administrator for the Boston Housing Authority
Boston has faced struggles of discrimination, segregation and lack of tenant rights, but now, the city aims to regulate properties and private development while also preventing slumlords from corrupting neighborhoods citywide.
Boston citizens have encountered constant difficulties surrounding affordable housing for up to a century now, but these struggles are finally starting to gain focus, and politicians are beginning to take action. Boston became the first major city nationwide to add housing requirements to its zoning code, and the City Council now believes that this is the first step in restoring housing rights for all.
To give a brief overview, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Fair Housing Act in 1968, making discrimination against residents of any background illegal. President Obama strengthened this act in 2015, by mandating the Affirmatively Further Fair Housing, or, AFFH rule for cities across the United States. Since, Boston has adopted this amendment and implemented it into local politics with hopes to end past, present and future discrimination within the city housing system.
I spoke with Kenzie Bok — former District 8 city councilor who will soon take charge as leader of the Boston Housing Authority — to discuss affordable housing plans for Boston residents moving forward as well as what the new zoning regulations mean for the city’s tenants.
Note: This interview was conducted prior to Bok’s announced transition from the Boston City Council to the Boston Housing Authority. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
Everybody on the City Council seems to have their own primary focus that they are responsible for in order to help better Boston overall. Can you explain yours?
I represent a very comparatively wealthy district of the city, so it’s a big focus for me to get affordable units into those more traditionally wealthy and whiter neighborhoods.
Clearly Boston’s housing crisis is still prominent, so what specific steps have been taken to push for affordable housing in the city as of late?
We’ve been doing a bunch in the last couple of years on fair housing in the traditional sense, which is trying to catch that type of housing discrimination and nip it in the bud and say, “hey, you can’t do this,” to landlords and brokers and such. The city of Boston has actually funded a bunch of fair housing testing, which is where you send model clients in to try to rent an apartment, and see if different things happen for people with different characteristics. So, we’ve been funding some of that in partnership with Suffolk University. The big step that we took in 2020 was to pass this Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing zoning amendment. It's this federal policy where every city and state is obligated, more than just to not discriminate in housing, but to actively try to take meaningful steps to redress the housing federation and discrimination that we had in this country.
Can you give more information on the zoning amendment that was passed?
We [Boston] actually became the first city in America to put that into our zoning code, that commitment. What it's turning into is, when projects are under review, people are looking more at things like, “is this a neighborhood that’s been historically exclusive where people aren’t able to use vouchers? Well, let’s try to get more units that are accessible to voucher holders in here. Or maybe it's a neighborhood with really old housing stock and there’s nothing accessible for people with disabilities, so, let’s try to get more handicap units than the minimum required.” There’s also just the fact that affordable housing, and having affordable housing everywhere in the city, is a critical part to fair housing, because the reality is that affordability skews racially because of the racial wealth gap in Boston.
What kind of housing does Boston specifically need that would benefit its residents?
We need more housing that’s more affordable to people at every income level in Boston, and we also need the housing that exists to be equally accessible, because there's a lot of discrimination whether it’s for race or sexual orientation. If you have a voucher, it’s not supposed to affect you in Massachusetts, but a lot of people get turned away for having a voucher. A lot of families get turned away for having kids, so you can end up in a situation where you’re low income and you’re struggling to find an apartment that you can afford, and the apartments that you can afford won’t take you.
What can residents do to follow in your footsteps and fight for the rights of tenants?
I think a really important thing that people can do is to be actively in favor of projects to bring new housing, especially new affordable housing and accessible housing, to their neighborhoods. That continues to be a huge barrier, and it’s amazing how often still the community thinks, “there needs to be more of this, but just not right here.”
How crucial is it for new and affordable housing to be built in Boston currently?
It’s really important for people to think about housing as homes and think about the fact that housing is actually about people, not about units. Sometimes you’ll hear people say, “I can’t believe they want 100 units here,” it’s like, you mean actually provide homes for 100 families? We’re in a situation where, on the low income side of the spectrum, there’s a 40,000 family wait list for The Boston Housing Authority. It’s just insane. So we can’t get there from here in terms of a more affordable society without sort of a shift in tempo and a collective willingness to get this done, where we really create a lot more housing.
To change the dynamic and thought process of privileged citizens who feel that “nowhere is the right place,” Bok argues that people must step up and realize, “everywhere is the right place.” The City Council has taken $200 million of their federal recovery funds and dedicated it to affordable housing projects and efforts, but Bok says that everybody within Greater Boston has to push in this new direction for legitimate change.
With this recent zoning amendment being passed, Bok and her colleagues are working toward taking major strides to help all struggling citizens, with the shared belief that housing is a human right and nobody should be forced out of their homes on behalf of skyrocketing rent rates.