I live in Flushing, Queens. The Flushing village is located in the north-central part of New York City. The majority of the Flushing community members is considered middle-class people. Their diversity is reflected by the different ethnic classes that live there, including Hispanic, Asian people, Middle Eastern, African American ancestry and Europeans. Being a middle-class community, Flushing relates well to other communities in the New York City. For instance, the high-rise apartment buildings, common in Flushing, Jackson Heights, Long Island and Astoria communities.
There are public policies regarding housing and homelessness in the New York City, and thus, they also extend to the Flushing Community. Being a middle-class community, the Flushing village faces the problem of homelessness frequently. However, there are legislations and programs that aim to control the problem of homeless people. For example, there are legislations that limit the use of public activities for living activities such as sitting or sleeping. Also, there are programs that target to remove homeless people from particular areas. These public policies concerning the housing and homelessness are similar to those described in chapter one of the book. This is because the public policies discussed in chapter one also relate to criminalizing homelessness in the city of Los Angeles (Hogan & Kleniewski 14).
Among the theoretical models discussed in chapter two, I think the Burgess’s model most closely fit the city of New York. This is because the very centre of the New York City is high-priced and mostly used for business and entertainment activities. However, most residential areas of the city are located further away from the centre, in waves depending on the expense of commuting to the centre from various distances. Therefore, just like the Burgess’s model, the outskirts of New York City are mainly dominated by high-priced houses, while the working-class and middle-class communities live nearer to the centre.
Work Cited
Hogan, Tiffany L., and Nancy Kleniewski. "Cities, Change and Conflict: A Political Economy of Urban Life". Teaching Sociology 26.2 (2010)
