I’m the luckiest person here today I get
to talk about two of my passions first I
get to talk about data maps and
everybody’s favorite subject statistics
I have a secret to share with you I
speak to data and data speaks to me I I
simply use these equations to translate
the story that the data is trying to
tell and I try to tell that story using
maps my second passion is that I’m on a
journey I am on a journey to share my
secret with everyone so they can speak
with data and they can tell the story
that they’re hearing through maps one of
the most memorable moments for me was
creating this simple map for one of our
community partners when they saw this
map they were shocked because they
thought all the clients that came to
their Center for help were in South st.
Louis the very first question they asked
me was there a difference between their
clients that live in the suburbs under
clients who lived in the city in regards
to employment opportunities educational
opportunities and other resources I
became interested in social economic
differences across neighborhoods
growing up in discuss book Nebraska a
town of about 15,000 residents when I
was growing up about 17% of the
population was Latino at the age of 10 I
became aware of a spatial divide it was
called East Overland I lived in the part
of town that had a high concentration of
Latinos I asked myself why were Latinos
clustered in that part of town
why did some people consider East 9th
Street to be dangerous
was it the vacant lots the dilapidated
housing the dying trees I remember being
able to smell inequality because I never
did
of a mile of two different new packing
plants and on days when it was hot and
the smell was bad my mom made a special
effort to make fresh authentic Mexican
food I look back at those days and I
thank my mom for creating different
memories memories of love memories of a
strong sense of community
memories of resilience I later learned
on in college that these are all
concepts that lead to a concept called
social capital and social capital and
assets found in poor communities an
asset that can be used as a catalyst for
change I looked at the 2015 census data
for my town today Scott’s wife has a
population that is 32% Latino my
neighborhood was 30% Latino and 1980
today it’s 61% the spatial divide is no
longer Eastover win its 20th Street in
fact there’s one block group that’s 50%
white and 50% Latino in 1987 I moved 400
miles across the state to start college
at the University of nebraska-lincoln
imagine my surprise when I was
introduced to a new divide chi-town and
one of my classes we started to talk
about demographic concepts such as
concentrated poverty the isolation of
racial minorities and we always talked
about T town as an example we use census
tract tables to studies T town one day
at the library I was looking at this
table and I became so frustrated because
I knew that there was a corresponding
map for that table something moved me to
go ask the librarian if she could help
me find this man she came back a few
minutes later with this very big map or
like 6 foot by 6 foot and I laid it over
this reference table and then I started
to transpose that table in my mind
through this map it was that bad moment
something touched my soul
something touched my intellectual spirit
because I could see a pattern in that
map and then I said to myself if only we
made the effort and took the time to
take that table and visualize on a map
we would not only tell a better story
but we would tell the more accurate
story I made 14 figures for my final
paper for that class and I would like to
share two of them with you today the
first map is a map of concentrated
poverty there were two census tracts
that were identified as high poverty
neighborhoods one of the tracks was in
tea town and the other track I called
the invisible track because nobody ever
talked about it
my second map was my first attempt at
mapping racial segregation in Lincoln
Nebraska these maps are instructive to
me for two reasons
the ability to make professional maps
back then was limited to a few people
because you need a time money and
resources this was not empowering
especially to those individuals who
needed the data the most to ask for
resources to improve the quality of life
in their neighborhoods but second all of
the statistical applications I knew at
the time could not be applied to maps my
professor wrote a comment it appears you
have found a pattern of spatial
inequality I was disappointed with that
comment because I knew in my heart I had
found a pattern but I had no objective
evidence to show that the pattern really
mattered because all of the spatial
statistics I know today were not
possible to apply to maps when this was
made so I’m on a second journey to
change the words appears to have found
two the words you have found when I came
to st. Louis I was introduced to the
Dalmore divide so when the 2010 census
came out I wanted to map that divide
using black majority and white majority
blocks but then I started to look at
other data for st. Louis in the suburbs
and I
this map is probably not accurate so I
wanted to make a map of multi racial
segregation for whites blacks Latinos
Asians and other minorities so I used
the two equations that I presented that
to started my talk to create this map
the Delmore device stills exists
north of the divide contributes to
racial segregation but there’s a second
and third part of the city that also
contributes to racial segregation and
there’s a large part of the city that’s
shaded in blue that’s a fact racially
integrated when I saw this map I was
surprised because when I went to
meetings
everybody just talked about the Dalmar
divide but nobody talked about the other
divides that contribute to racial
segregation and very few people talked
about the neighborhoods that are in fact
racially integrated I was at a meeting
presenting this map and somebody asked
me if I could make a map of the quality
of parks and st. Louis I thought that
was a strange request until I started to
look at satellite images two images
stood out for me the first images of
fairground park a very large park but
not there many trees and lots of open
space that’s dedicated to sports the
second image is Corinth ilat Park again
a very large park but look at the amount
of trees in that park
I wanted to empirically measure the
difference between the two parks but I
didn’t know how to do it
so I asked a colleague out for lunch who
works with satellite images and he said
it was possible to empirically measure
the difference so I was excited because
I was going to be able to make this map
but then I started to ask myself what
other types of data does the community
want to better understand their
neighborhood so in 2012 I put together a
research team at st. Louis University
and we wrote a grant called mapping risk
and resilience and st. Louis the goal of
the grant was to collect data that the
community wanted to better understand
their neighborhoods they told that they
wanted data on crime and infant health
they wanted data on foreclosures and
homeownership they wanted data on
brownfields and vacant land and vague
homes and they wanted data on the tree
health and vegetation in their
neighborhoods these are just a few
examples that they wanted so we started
to collect the data and we had workshops
and campus to visualize the data that we
were collecting but then somebody made a
comment and it was a watershed moment
for me because for one brief moment I
heard my mom’s voice I heard a voice of
resilience because she said Nance
we can’t change a neighborhood we don’t
have the resources to change a
neighborhood but we can change a block
we can clean up a vacant lot we can
repair a broken house we can grow a
community garden and I said you’re right
why do we continue to give community
organizations data and maps that are not
on a human scale so we made an important
decision we decided that we were not
going to use census tract boundaries or
neighborhood boundaries which is the
dominant method in social science to
visualize and collect data we developed
a new methodology using grids to map
neighborhoods we call this methodology
micro demography now the advantage of
micro demography does that we are giving
the power of the map to the user the
user decides how they want to map their
neighborhood they can create a grid
that’s one block by one block or they
can create a grid that’s three blocks by
three blocks but the point of the
methodology is that the user makes that
decision the second advantage of this
methodology is that it forced us to
standardize all the data that we were
collecting because we were able to
standardize it it allowed us to create
different types of indices and one of
the indices we created we called the
social environmental disparity index it
looked at the total cumulative advantage
and disadvantage within these grids we
offer workshops on campus where we
invite the community to come in and
visualize and make maps with this data
one of the maps that they like to make
is the map of the city using the social
environmental
spirity index you could see there
appears to be a pattern in this map now
one of the difficulties of this map is
that there are over 2,600 grids if I
randomly pick ten people to come on
stage right now they would probably make
ten different maps of the grids that are
statistically significant so we teach
our participants to use spatial
statistics to make maps that show the
grids that are statistically significant
one of the maps that they like to make
is the map of the areas of the city that
contribute to racial segregation and so
here we are able to make a map of only
the grids that are statistically
significant but you can start to see a
pattern now emerging one part of the
city
that’s racially segregated has grids
that have low values next to low values
and another part of the city has high
values next to high values this allows
individuals to really focus in on what
they can do as a neighborhood or as a
citizen through our workshops we
encourage our participants to make as
many maps and to take the data back to
their neighborhoods to start a dialogue
on what actions are necessary to start a
change on their block I’ve come to
realize that unleashing the power of
maps comes in two forms first we are
working in the era of big data we can
now work with social economic ecological
and environmental data and because the
maps were able to synthesize it and
we’re able to integrate it but we can
now apply spatial statistics to these
maps to identify the patterns that
really matter and we can use those maps
to prioritize our time our treasure and
our talent to not only tackle the
challenges in our neighborhood but to
embrace the opportunities in our
neighborhood but the second form of
Elysion to power maps is our ability to
empower everyday citizens to be the
catalyst of change to take the data and
to visualize their neighborhoods in new
innovative and refreshing ways when our
clients saw this map they were excited
they wanted to make more maps
because they wanted to use these maps to
improve the quality life of their
clients when they saw this map they
finally understood the role that
neighborhoods played in the day-to-day
lives of their clients they were able to
see for the first time how much access
their clients had to grocery stores
banks and other resources that had no
access to the car and as we discovered
in the research project having access to
the car not only improved quality of
life but a reduced day-to-day stress
this story reflects my passion to go to
the office every day yes we need to
continue to make innovation in our
spatial statistics to identify the
patterns that matter but we need to give
data and maps to everyday citizens and
community organizations that are on a
human scale so they can visualize their
neighborhoods the way that they
understand their lives on a day to day
basis we need to give them the resources
to envision a future that they want a
future where everybody has the
opportunity to live a dignified life
together we can work side-by-side to
change unequal spaces one block at a
time thank you
[Applause]
to talk about two of my passions first I
get to talk about data maps and
everybody’s favorite subject statistics
I have a secret to share with you I
speak to data and data speaks to me I I
simply use these equations to translate
the story that the data is trying to
tell and I try to tell that story using
maps my second passion is that I’m on a
journey I am on a journey to share my
secret with everyone so they can speak
with data and they can tell the story
that they’re hearing through maps one of
the most memorable moments for me was
creating this simple map for one of our
community partners when they saw this
map they were shocked because they
thought all the clients that came to
their Center for help were in South st.
Louis the very first question they asked
me was there a difference between their
clients that live in the suburbs under
clients who lived in the city in regards
to employment opportunities educational
opportunities and other resources I
became interested in social economic
differences across neighborhoods
growing up in discuss book Nebraska a
town of about 15,000 residents when I
was growing up about 17% of the
population was Latino at the age of 10 I
became aware of a spatial divide it was
called East Overland I lived in the part
of town that had a high concentration of
Latinos I asked myself why were Latinos
clustered in that part of town
why did some people consider East 9th
Street to be dangerous
was it the vacant lots the dilapidated
housing the dying trees I remember being
able to smell inequality because I never
did
of a mile of two different new packing
plants and on days when it was hot and
the smell was bad my mom made a special
effort to make fresh authentic Mexican
food I look back at those days and I
thank my mom for creating different
memories memories of love memories of a
strong sense of community
memories of resilience I later learned
on in college that these are all
concepts that lead to a concept called
social capital and social capital and
assets found in poor communities an
asset that can be used as a catalyst for
change I looked at the 2015 census data
for my town today Scott’s wife has a
population that is 32% Latino my
neighborhood was 30% Latino and 1980
today it’s 61% the spatial divide is no
longer Eastover win its 20th Street in
fact there’s one block group that’s 50%
white and 50% Latino in 1987 I moved 400
miles across the state to start college
at the University of nebraska-lincoln
imagine my surprise when I was
introduced to a new divide chi-town and
one of my classes we started to talk
about demographic concepts such as
concentrated poverty the isolation of
racial minorities and we always talked
about T town as an example we use census
tract tables to studies T town one day
at the library I was looking at this
table and I became so frustrated because
I knew that there was a corresponding
map for that table something moved me to
go ask the librarian if she could help
me find this man she came back a few
minutes later with this very big map or
like 6 foot by 6 foot and I laid it over
this reference table and then I started
to transpose that table in my mind
through this map it was that bad moment
something touched my soul
something touched my intellectual spirit
because I could see a pattern in that
map and then I said to myself if only we
made the effort and took the time to
take that table and visualize on a map
we would not only tell a better story
but we would tell the more accurate
story I made 14 figures for my final
paper for that class and I would like to
share two of them with you today the
first map is a map of concentrated
poverty there were two census tracts
that were identified as high poverty
neighborhoods one of the tracks was in
tea town and the other track I called
the invisible track because nobody ever
talked about it
my second map was my first attempt at
mapping racial segregation in Lincoln
Nebraska these maps are instructive to
me for two reasons
the ability to make professional maps
back then was limited to a few people
because you need a time money and
resources this was not empowering
especially to those individuals who
needed the data the most to ask for
resources to improve the quality of life
in their neighborhoods but second all of
the statistical applications I knew at
the time could not be applied to maps my
professor wrote a comment it appears you
have found a pattern of spatial
inequality I was disappointed with that
comment because I knew in my heart I had
found a pattern but I had no objective
evidence to show that the pattern really
mattered because all of the spatial
statistics I know today were not
possible to apply to maps when this was
made so I’m on a second journey to
change the words appears to have found
two the words you have found when I came
to st. Louis I was introduced to the
Dalmore divide so when the 2010 census
came out I wanted to map that divide
using black majority and white majority
blocks but then I started to look at
other data for st. Louis in the suburbs
and I
this map is probably not accurate so I
wanted to make a map of multi racial
segregation for whites blacks Latinos
Asians and other minorities so I used
the two equations that I presented that
to started my talk to create this map
the Delmore device stills exists
north of the divide contributes to
racial segregation but there’s a second
and third part of the city that also
contributes to racial segregation and
there’s a large part of the city that’s
shaded in blue that’s a fact racially
integrated when I saw this map I was
surprised because when I went to
meetings
everybody just talked about the Dalmar
divide but nobody talked about the other
divides that contribute to racial
segregation and very few people talked
about the neighborhoods that are in fact
racially integrated I was at a meeting
presenting this map and somebody asked
me if I could make a map of the quality
of parks and st. Louis I thought that
was a strange request until I started to
look at satellite images two images
stood out for me the first images of
fairground park a very large park but
not there many trees and lots of open
space that’s dedicated to sports the
second image is Corinth ilat Park again
a very large park but look at the amount
of trees in that park
I wanted to empirically measure the
difference between the two parks but I
didn’t know how to do it
so I asked a colleague out for lunch who
works with satellite images and he said
it was possible to empirically measure
the difference so I was excited because
I was going to be able to make this map
but then I started to ask myself what
other types of data does the community
want to better understand their
neighborhood so in 2012 I put together a
research team at st. Louis University
and we wrote a grant called mapping risk
and resilience and st. Louis the goal of
the grant was to collect data that the
community wanted to better understand
their neighborhoods they told that they
wanted data on crime and infant health
they wanted data on foreclosures and
homeownership they wanted data on
brownfields and vacant land and vague
homes and they wanted data on the tree
health and vegetation in their
neighborhoods these are just a few
examples that they wanted so we started
to collect the data and we had workshops
and campus to visualize the data that we
were collecting but then somebody made a
comment and it was a watershed moment
for me because for one brief moment I
heard my mom’s voice I heard a voice of
resilience because she said Nance
we can’t change a neighborhood we don’t
have the resources to change a
neighborhood but we can change a block
we can clean up a vacant lot we can
repair a broken house we can grow a
community garden and I said you’re right
why do we continue to give community
organizations data and maps that are not
on a human scale so we made an important
decision we decided that we were not
going to use census tract boundaries or
neighborhood boundaries which is the
dominant method in social science to
visualize and collect data we developed
a new methodology using grids to map
neighborhoods we call this methodology
micro demography now the advantage of
micro demography does that we are giving
the power of the map to the user the
user decides how they want to map their
neighborhood they can create a grid
that’s one block by one block or they
can create a grid that’s three blocks by
three blocks but the point of the
methodology is that the user makes that
decision the second advantage of this
methodology is that it forced us to
standardize all the data that we were
collecting because we were able to
standardize it it allowed us to create
different types of indices and one of
the indices we created we called the
social environmental disparity index it
looked at the total cumulative advantage
and disadvantage within these grids we
offer workshops on campus where we
invite the community to come in and
visualize and make maps with this data
one of the maps that they like to make
is the map of the city using the social
environmental
spirity index you could see there
appears to be a pattern in this map now
one of the difficulties of this map is
that there are over 2,600 grids if I
randomly pick ten people to come on
stage right now they would probably make
ten different maps of the grids that are
statistically significant so we teach
our participants to use spatial
statistics to make maps that show the
grids that are statistically significant
one of the maps that they like to make
is the map of the areas of the city that
contribute to racial segregation and so
here we are able to make a map of only
the grids that are statistically
significant but you can start to see a
pattern now emerging one part of the
city
that’s racially segregated has grids
that have low values next to low values
and another part of the city has high
values next to high values this allows
individuals to really focus in on what
they can do as a neighborhood or as a
citizen through our workshops we
encourage our participants to make as
many maps and to take the data back to
their neighborhoods to start a dialogue
on what actions are necessary to start a
change on their block I’ve come to
realize that unleashing the power of
maps comes in two forms first we are
working in the era of big data we can
now work with social economic ecological
and environmental data and because the
maps were able to synthesize it and
we’re able to integrate it but we can
now apply spatial statistics to these
maps to identify the patterns that
really matter and we can use those maps
to prioritize our time our treasure and
our talent to not only tackle the
challenges in our neighborhood but to
embrace the opportunities in our
neighborhood but the second form of
Elysion to power maps is our ability to
empower everyday citizens to be the
catalyst of change to take the data and
to visualize their neighborhoods in new
innovative and refreshing ways when our
clients saw this map they were excited
they wanted to make more maps
because they wanted to use these maps to
improve the quality life of their
clients when they saw this map they
finally understood the role that
neighborhoods played in the day-to-day
lives of their clients they were able to
see for the first time how much access
their clients had to grocery stores
banks and other resources that had no
access to the car and as we discovered
in the research project having access to
the car not only improved quality of
life but a reduced day-to-day stress
this story reflects my passion to go to
the office every day yes we need to
continue to make innovation in our
spatial statistics to identify the
patterns that matter but we need to give
data and maps to everyday citizens and
community organizations that are on a
human scale so they can visualize their
neighborhoods the way that they
understand their lives on a day to day
basis we need to give them the resources
to envision a future that they want a
future where everybody has the
opportunity to live a dignified life
together we can work side-by-side to
change unequal spaces one block at a
time thank you
[Applause]
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