Although challenges in water and sanitation access are often assumed to be issues of low- and middle-income nations, over 400,000 homes in the United States still lack access to complete indoor plumbing. Previous research has demonstrated that the remaining plumbing challenges are more prevalent in communities with high Black and brown populations. This study hypothesizes that the 1930s practice of redlining by the Home Owners' Loan Corporation (HOLC), which systematically denied loans to minority populations, is linked to present-day inadequate plumbing access (i.e. defined as incomplete plumbing above the national average). Digitized HOLC maps for 202 urban areas across the country and US Census data from the 2016-2020 American Community Survey were combined to interpolate the modern-day plumbing access for historic neighborhoods (n=8871 communities). Analysis via binomial logistic regression demonstrated that nationally, redlined communities (HOLC Grade "D") are significantly more likely to have a rate of incomplete plumbing above the national average as compared to greenlined communities (HOLC Grade "A") (0.1352; CI= +0.036). This finding was also observed for three of the nation's four census sub-regions (Northeast, Midwest, West). Slight differences by region in relationships between the proportion of specific racial/ethnic populations on rates of incomplete plumbing demonstrate the need for targeted place-based interdisciplinary examinations of exclusionary practices. The demonstration of the present-day impacts of redlining after nearly 90 years emphasizes the need to intentionally mitigate past injustices to ensure modern-day equity. / Master of Science / Access to water is a prevailing issue in underserved communities. Over 400,000 homes in the United States still lack access to complete indoor plumbing. This condition is called incomplete plumbing which is defined by the US Census Bureau as not being able to use running water, or flush a toilet, or bath. Redlining is the historical practice of denying loans to homeowners in a certain area based on their race or economic status. Our study sought to discover whether redlining has negatively affected the presence of plumbing in homes. To do this we examined whether incomplete plumbing in 2020 was above the national average in areas that were previously redlined. We found that redlined communities are significantly more likely to have a rate of incomplete plumbing above the national average as compared to greenlined communities. The same trend was found in three of the nation's four census sub-regions (Northeast, Midwest, and West). These findings show that racist practices such as redlining have had a lasting effect on modern-day infrastructure such as plumbing.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/117243 |
| Date | 20 December 2023 |
| Creators | Sterling III, Charles W. |
| Contributors | Biological Systems Engineering, Hession, William Cully, Winling, LaDale C., Pingel, Thomas |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | ETD, application/pdf, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
Page generated in 0.0021 seconds