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With rising sea levels and increasing risks of floods throughout the country, there are nearly 24,500 affordable housing units at risk, according to a report published in the Environmental Research Letters journal. The country is already facing a shortage of more than 7 million affordable units, according to Fast Company, and climate change could intensify the situation even more. By 2050, nearly 24,500 affordable units could be at risk of flooding with a large portion experiencing more than four floods per year. And climate change puts many homes at risk, but affordable housing tends to be lower quality and older, reports the study’s researchers.
Homes in any coastal area are at risk of flooding, but affordable housing is especially vulnerable, the researchers say, because it tends to be older and of lower quality than other housing. And people who live in affordable housing are more likely to be disabled and single parents, and might not have the savings to bounce back from an emergency like a flood.
“[General] housing is also at risk, but the important point is that people living in affordable housing units are low-income and have less resources to deal with impacts from flooding,” says Lara Cushing, an environmental health sciences professor at UCLA and co-author of the research. “That’s really want we wanted to highlight here: The impact will be worse among families in affordable housing than it would be to others in the general housing stock.”
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