Volume IX, Number 3, Fall 2003

Issue Topic: Evaluating Community-Based Initiatives

Promising Practices

Using Geographic Data for Neighborhood Revitalization

Josh Kirschenbaum and Victor Rubin from PolicyLink reveal what has been learned about effective practices and potential uses of community mapping.¹

Geographic information systems (GIS)—computer-based applications that map and analyze information and data relative to geography or location—have gained national attention as a powerful resource for supporting neighborhood revitalization and community development. The central value of a map is that it quickly tells a story about what has happened or is currently happening in neighborhoods or larger communities. Effective maps do more than illuminate key indicators, trends, or relationships among factors. Their accessibility and appeal can draw new people into the discussion of plans, policies, and programs. This broadened access and understanding improves local decision making and consensus building, which translates into improved program design, policy development, organizing, and advocacy.

Community mapping is also extremely valuable to evaluators of local initiatives, and this value should increase greatly over the next several years as more systems gather data covering longer periods of time about neighborhood conditions and program performance. Many of the best community mapping systems are linked to neighborhood indicators projects. Such projects are repositories of data on housing conditions, land uses, population characteristics, local assets, human services, public safety, and other categories of information relevant to many evaluations.² Such neighborhood data are useful as context for an evaluation of a local initiative or project, or they may represent the key outcomes to be measured. Also, over time the evaluators of community initiatives may reciprocate by contributing data that they have collected to local indicators projects.

The keys to successful application of GIS in community settings are technology, time, staff expertise, and funding. Most community-based organizations do not have the staff or resources to build their own GIS applications base. Instead, broad partnerships of technology intermediaries, municipal governments, and community groups are being formed in many cities. Community-based organizations play key roles in these partnerships, including determining what data needs to be mapped and how the maps are used for improving neighborhood conditions. In this arrangement, the community development practitioners shape the GIS systems and outputs; they operate as “map shapers” and “map users,” rather than as “map developers.”

Community maps can take several forms ranging in complexity. Context maps, the simplest, represent one variable distributed across a unit of neighborhood geography (e.g., income level shown for census tracts) and mainly provide background information. Display maps are relatively more complex, illustrating single or multiple variables distributed across a neighborhood for much smaller units of geography, usually a single household or building (e.g., the conditions of individual properties at the parcel level). Analytical maps are the most sophisticated, layering and analyzing relationships among multiple variables in the same area. An analytical map might combine income at the census tract level and condition of individual properties at the parcel level and highlight how the two variables relate to each other.

Mapping for community development and social services purposes involves five broad steps that begin and end with the voice of local communities:

1. Identify community issues. Authentic community mapping starts with community-based organizations and residents applying their in-depth understanding of local conditions to identify assets and issues, set goals and outcomes, and determine the appropriate types of geography and presentations. Designing and leading the mapping process allows residents and organizations to ensure that the maps accurately reflect the community’s needs.
2. Determine appropriate geography. Community mapping projects can use a range of geographic units for mapping, ranging from individual parcels to census tracts to entire neighborhoods. Most initiatives will include several different levels of geography.
3. Collect data. Community mapping initiatives are only as strong as the data on which the maps are built. Maps that are most useful in a community context will likely consist of information from many sources, including public statistics, administrative data, commercial data, and survey data.
4. Create maps using GIS. The production process involves hardware, software, data, people, and methods. Many community organizations partner with technology or mapping intermediaries, such as universities, to maintain the GIS technology.
5. Use maps to promote community building and neighborhood revitalization. The ultimate purpose of community mapping is to improve programs, policy advocacy, and research. Effective community groups will use GIS outputs and maps as a foundation for campaigns to promote community building and transform data and spatial analysis into action.

¹ This article is drawn from Kirschenbaum, J., & Russ, L. (2002). Community mapping: Using geographic data for neighborhood revitalization. Oakland, CA: PolicyLink. A similar version, including numerous links to mapping websites that illustrate the points made here, can be found as part of the Equitable Development Toolkit at www.policylink.org.
² See the website of the National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership, a project of the Urban Institute, at www.urban.org/nnip.

Josh Kirschenbaum
Senior Associate
Email: jfk@policylink.org

Victor Rubin
Director of Research
Email: vrubin@policylink.org

PolicyLink
101 Broadway
Oakland, CA 94607
Tel: 510-663-2333
Website: www.policylink.org