This article is adapted from the recently released ULI report 10 Principles for Embedding Racial Equity in Real Estate Development . Click here to read the report on Knowledge Finder.
This article and the report use a definition of racial equity from Racial Equity Tools: Racial equity is “the condition that would be achieved if one’s racial identity no longer predicted, in a statistical sense, how one fares. When we use the term, we are thinking about racial equity as one part of racial justice, and thus we also include work to address root causes of inequities, not just their manifestation.” Additional definitions are available in the report glossary.
Nearly two years after the murder of George Floyd, many ULI members are beginning to assess whether the intensified push for racial equity was a moment or a movement. As real estate professionals we have an obligation to ensure that racial equity becomes a lasting priority, not a one-time “moment,” because race is a central, if often unacknowledged, aspect of our industry’s work. The fact that race and real estate are so intertwined creates an obligation to apply a racial equity lens to our work in order to fulfill the ULI mission commitment to inspire best practices for equitable and sustainable land use.
The tools to facilitate more equitable outcomes within the industry and the communities in which we work exist, but for many of us there is still uncertainty about how to incorporate racial equity into our day-to-day development decisions. In addition, many seek to understand how applying an equity lens can deliver business returns in addition to generating social impact. To help members obtain the knowledge and tools to advance equity, I chaired a November 2021 ULI workshop that identified 10 principles for making racial equity a central part of real estate development. The resulting report, 10 Principles for Embedding Racial Equity in Real Estate Development, shares these guiding ideas, best practices, and case studies for practitioners.
The workshop convened members and other industry experts who have been actively working on and thinking about issues of racial equity and real estate. This focus on racial equity (as one aspect of social equity, a broader concept) is necessary because racist policies and practices such as redlining, urban renewal, and predatory lending have historically shaped land use. Their legacy continues to undermine the health, wealth, and economic opportunity of marginalized communities in the United States, and current practices often perpetuate or exacerbate inequities. As Shawn Barney, one of my fellow panelists and managing director of CLB Porter, said: “We can’t use race-neutral solutions to solve race-based problems.” Only by understanding and addressing the role of race in land use can we move toward greater equity.
The principles reflect this understanding of racial equity in the context of ULI’s mission to shape the future of the built environment for transformative impact in communities worldwide, the historical and ongoing role of land use policies and industry practices in creating and perpetuating inequality, and the workshop participants’ expertise and experiences.
The 10 principles that the workshop participants identified are:
- Embed racial equity across all aspects of your real estate development practice.
- Commit to building your knowledge and optimizing your personal and institutional power.
- Articulate the racial equity business case.
- Use data to ensure equitable processes and outcomes.
- Leverage capital to drive equitable change.
- Understand and address current and historical context.
- Recognize the power of language.
- Create a community-centered development process.
- Build trust, transparency, and credibility.
- Form strong, intersectoral partnerships.
The principles provide a framework to help members to apply an equity lens to their work in order to drive more equitable community outcomes, increase equity within the real estate industry, and improve project and business performance.
JBG SMITH, where I am the head of Social Impact Investing, is a leading investor, owner, developer, and manager of real estate properties in the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Area. We are applying many of these principles to drive increased equity and business performance.
- In 2020 we launched our multi-year Diversity and Inclusion strategy, which is guided by five Strategic Pillars that are aligned to our corporate mission and help us to more fully embed equity into all aspects of our business.
- We’ve trained our development teams to understand and address historical context within communities as a way to advance more equitable and less lengthy and less costly pre-development processes.
- We are using our institutional power to drive more equitable contracting, expanding opportunity and diversifying supplier risk.
- We have formed strong, intersectoral partnerships to help us build a more diverse and inclusive organization, adding new perspectives that provide us a more holistic view.
- We have leveraged our capital to drive equitable change by launching an affordable housing business centered around equity; providing housing that is not only affordable but also located in high opportunity neighborhoods where residents are more likely to flourish, and real estate values are more secure.
All of these efforts are aligned with our strategic objectives and deliver both social and financial returns.
Although industry leaders have the greatest responsibility to motivate change, everyone can play a role. The principles are designed to be actionable for a broad range of real estate professionals: everyone can use them, but they will show up differently in your work based on your geography, profession, sector, and other factors.
ULI is an organization of thought-leaders and practitioners with awesome power to shape the built environment and, through that environment, society itself. Just as the racial covenants and Urban Renewal concepts the ULI put forward in the past perpetuated inequity, our actions today will have significant ramifications for who benefits, who is burdened, who is include, and who is excluded long into the future. We all have an awesome responsibility and a tremendous opportunity to live into the mission of ULI and shape the future of the built environment for transformative impact in communities worldwide. My hope is that the 10 Principles will help all of us within the industry to live into that mission in a more equitable way.
