A Geographic Account of Economic, Health, and Educational Disparities inHartford’s Sheff Region
Casey Cobb, Humboldt Journal of Social Relations 41: 82–98, 2019. Available here.
In the current study, I use geographic techniques to examine the distribution of key housing, eco-nomic, health, and educational indicators in metropolitan Hartford. I focus in particular on factors that bear upon the lives of children in this area, also known as the Sheff region—a reference to the long-standing Sheff v. O’Neill school desegregation lawsuit. The results reveal substantial disparities in the geographic distribution of important resources and outcomes across the racially and eco-nomically stratified region. Despite earnest school desegregation efforts, the opportunities, access,and resources available to children in municipalities across the metro Hartford region remain starklydifferent. Children of color living in central Connecticut’s poor urban communities are dispropor-tionately affected by a highly fragmented sociopolitical geography. Recommendations are made formore comprehensive, cross-sector policy interventions as well as regional collaboratives.