Evanston Unattractive to Minorities: Study

If Evanston were considered a metropolitan area in the United States, its rank in “attractiveness” to minorities would be pretty low.

That’s according to a study on a study conducted by the city’s International City/County Management Association fellow, Oscar Murillo. Murillo took a recent Center for Opportunity Urbanism study on social mobility for ethnic and racial minorities across 52 U.S. metro areas and applied the data to Evanston.

The result showed that Evanston ranked in the bottom half of the 52 cities for each of the three minority groups: African-Americans, Hispanics and Asians.

According to Evanston Now, the original study was based on “home ownership rate, median household income, level of self employment and population growth” from 2000 to 2013.

Among the 52, Evanston would rank 31st in attractiveness to African-Americans, 32nd for Hispanics and 41st for Asians.

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In looking at the local data, Murillo suggested the city could take step to make it more attractive to minorities by taking “housing affordability into account when considering land-use issues.”

The local study also recommends to “increase the accessibility of small business ownership, base transit investments on serving cost-effectively those who most need it, and utilize market-oriented land-use policies rather than prescriptive central planning.”

City Manager Wally Bobkiewicz noted in an email to media that the Asian population in Evanston rose by about 75 percent during the 13-year period of the study. Population numbers for African-Americans, Hispanics and whites were more steady during the time frame.