City Futures is celebrating as part of UNSW’s recent ‘5’ rating 'well above world standard’ on Urban and Regional Planning, conferred in the latest (December 2012) Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) evaluation. ERA assesses research quality within Australia's higher education institutions using a combination of indicators and expert review by committees comprising experienced, internationally-reputed experts.

Grants totaling some $500,000 were awarded to City Futures in the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute’s 2012 funding round, as announced in December. Led by Professor Hal Pawson and Dr Ilan Weisel, respectively, the team’s two successful proposals were ‘Cost effectiveness and client outcomes in social housing’ and ‘Social housing exits. Building on recently completed and currently ongoing CF studies (including social housing pathways and public housing stock transfers), these projects will also involve colleagues from other AHURI Network universities including Swinburne and Curtin.

City Futures was once again well-represented at the 7th Australasian Housing Researchers’ Conference held in Fremantle, WA in February. Team members presented 9 papers which showcase the ongoing collaborative work from within the Centre as well as with our colleagues elsewhere in Australia. One key theme was social outcomes of housing, with Bruce Judd presenting findings from his AHURI project Downsizing: motivations, processes and outcomes for older Australians. This paper was co-authored with Catherine Bridge, who also presented Houses as places of self-care and enablers of bathing: Beyond bricks and mortar; and with Edgar Liu, who presented on Multigenerational households in Australian cities: Evidence from Sydney and Brisbane at the turn of the twenty-first century (co-authored with Bruce, Hazel Easthope and Ian Burnley). Emily Mitchell's presentation co-authored with Susan Thompson was entitled The Healthy Neighbourhood Audit instrument: Understanding the environmental and socio-cultural conditions to support healthy, happy and resilient residential communities.

Drawing on the Centre’s social housing research and continuing with the social focus, Hal Pawson's paper asked How can tenant participation thrive in an increasingly pressurised social housing system? Likewise, Vivienne Milligan presented her collaborative work with Swinburne University on the paper How are Australia's leading housing not-for-profit organisations embracing social enterprise and hybridity?
Also presenting at the conference were two CF Visiting Fellows. David Lilley (Social sustainability: An idea whose time has passed? and The research-policy-practice nexus: A dangerous liaison involving a housing practitioner, an academic and a tenant advocate). And Judy Stubbs (Can we go much further? Delivering ‘Affordable Housing’ in Greenfield Sites in Outer Perth and Sydney).

Refereed papers related to these presentations will be available on the conference website this year.

Congratulations are due to Associate Professor Simon Pinnegar who has been appointed Discipline Director for Planning within the Built Environment faculty. However, although his role will now be largely concerned with teaching programs, Simon retains his position heading CF’s Urban Planning and Policy team and will continue to be an active researcher.

On behalf of Housing NSW, City Futures has recently completed evaluations of the Building Stronger Communities estate renewal program and the Waterloo Green Neighbourhood Project.

The Home Modification Information Clearinghouse will be celebrating the ten year anniversary of the website with an event at NSW Parliament House, and launch of the new website by the Honourable Andrew Constance MP Minister for Ageing and Minister for Disability in early March.

We are taking this opportunity to welcome the newest member of the team, Tara Laughton who will manage web content and administration for the www.homemods.info project. Tara is part time.

Dr. Ann McAfee FCIP (Retired Co-Director of Planning, Vancouver, Canada) - 'Turning NIMBY into YIMBY: People Making Plans'

April 11th, 12pm. UNSW-Red Centre West Wing. Room 4035

Laurence Loh Kwong Yu (Associate Professor, University of Hong Kong) - 'Spirit of Place'

April 16th, 4.30pm. UNSW-Red Centre West Wing. Room TBC

Prof. Suzanne Fitzpatrick (Heriot Watt University, Edinburgh) - 'Housing as a welfare good: UK welfare reform and notions of entitlement'

May 8th, 12pm. UNSW-Red Centre West Wing. Room 4035

Dr. Judith Stubbs (CF Adjunct Senior Lecturer) - 'Can We Go Much Further? Delivering ‘Affordable Housing’ in Outer Perth and Sydney'

May 22nd, 12pm.UNSW-Red Centre West Wing. Room 4035

A team led by UNSW’s Dr Shannon McDermott (Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences) has been commissioned by Housing NSW to evaluate the Camperdown Common Ground Project. The Project, opened in 2011 and based on a model originally developed in New York, aims to provide permanent, affordable accommodation and support services to 62 chronically homeless people.

The evaluation, also involving CFRC’s Professor Hal Pawson, will analyse the Project’s service delivery model and its effectiveness in facilitating sustainable housing for its target group.