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Situating Data Sets: Making Public Data Actionable for Housing Justice

Anh-Ton Tran, Grace Guo, Jordan Taylor, Katsuki Chan, Elora Raymond, Carl DiSalvo

TL;DR

The paper investigates how aggregated public eviction records can be made actionable for housing justice organizers through an ethnographic case in Atlanta. It applies Data Feminism and standpoint theory to shift researchers from data intermediaries to data accomplices, producing two data visualizations (the Address-based Evictions Tracker and the Starwood Map) that adapt to organizers’ evolving needs. It articulates three design implications—becoming domain novices, pursuing data actionability, and evaluating artifacts by social impact rather than mere functionality—to guide HCI scholars working with grassroots communities. The work underlines the importance of context, labor, and relational practices in open data projects aimed at social justice and offers a grounded methodology for community-engaged data design in housing advocacy.

Abstract

Activists, governmentsm and academics regularly advocate for more open data. But how is data made open, and for whom is it made useful and usable? In this paper, we investigate and describe the work of making eviction data open to tenant organizers. We do this through an ethnographic description of ongoing work with a local housing activist organization. This work combines observation, direct participation in data work, and creating media artifacts, specifically digital maps. Our interpretation is grounded in D'Ignazio and Klein's Data Feminism, emphasizing standpoint theory. Through our analysis and discussion, we highlight how shifting positionalities from data intermediaries to data accomplices affects the design of data sets and maps. We provide HCI scholars with three design implications when situating data for grassroots organizers: becoming a domain beginner, striving for data actionability, and evaluating our design artifacts by the social relations they sustain rather than just their technical efficacy.

Situating Data Sets: Making Public Data Actionable for Housing Justice

TL;DR

The paper investigates how aggregated public eviction records can be made actionable for housing justice organizers through an ethnographic case in Atlanta. It applies Data Feminism and standpoint theory to shift researchers from data intermediaries to data accomplices, producing two data visualizations (the Address-based Evictions Tracker and the Starwood Map) that adapt to organizers’ evolving needs. It articulates three design implications—becoming domain novices, pursuing data actionability, and evaluating artifacts by social impact rather than mere functionality—to guide HCI scholars working with grassroots communities. The work underlines the importance of context, labor, and relational practices in open data projects aimed at social justice and offers a grounded methodology for community-engaged data design in housing advocacy.

Abstract

Activists, governmentsm and academics regularly advocate for more open data. But how is data made open, and for whom is it made useful and usable? In this paper, we investigate and describe the work of making eviction data open to tenant organizers. We do this through an ethnographic description of ongoing work with a local housing activist organization. This work combines observation, direct participation in data work, and creating media artifacts, specifically digital maps. Our interpretation is grounded in D'Ignazio and Klein's Data Feminism, emphasizing standpoint theory. Through our analysis and discussion, we highlight how shifting positionalities from data intermediaries to data accomplices affects the design of data sets and maps. We provide HCI scholars with three design implications when situating data for grassroots organizers: becoming a domain beginner, striving for data actionability, and evaluating our design artifacts by the social relations they sustain rather than just their technical efficacy.
Paper Structure (23 sections, 4 figures, 1 table)

This paper contains 23 sections, 4 figures, 1 table.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Related Works
  3. Data Feminism and Critical Data
  4. Critical Data Studies
  5. Critical Visualization and Counter-mapping
  6. Critical Visualization
  7. Counter-mapping
  8. Community-Based Research and Housing
  9. Background: Eviction Records
  10. Evictions and Court Data
  11. Methods
  12. Early Engagement
  13. Contextualizing the Court Data
  14. Address-based Evictions Tracker
  15. Deeper Engagement
  16. ...and 8 more sections

Figures (4)

  • Figure 1: Timeline of the projects.
  • Figure 2: An overview screenshot of the second workshop activity where participants brainstormed questions for affinity mapping. Two questions are magnified in this screenshot: (1) "What are our political identities?" and (2) "What political identities are most conducive to tenant organizing?"
  • Figure 3: The Address-based Evictions Tracker consists of three visualizations and a control panel. From top to bottom: 1) A map of evictions in each ZIP Code within Atlanta. 2) A map of evictions at addresses within Atlanta. Each point represents an address where one or more evictions took place. 3) A histogram visualizing the total count of evictions in Atlanta over time. Users can zoom in on both maps to see the data in greater detail. To the right of the visualizations is a control panel that allows users to filter by date, ZIP Code, County and Street Address. Clicking on an area or a point displays a tooltip with information about that particular location and a histogram of past evictions there.
  • Figure 4: The Starwood Map. A map visualizing the locations of all Starwood Capital Properties in Atlanta. On load, the map is zoomed in on a 1-mile red circle centered on the address of a tenant member of HJL. Users can zoom in further for a more detailed view or zoom out for an overview of all Starwood Capital Properties evictions in the greater Atlanta area. Clicking on a point also brought up a tooltip with the specific address and the data provenance.