How systems thinking is guiding El Tímpano’s reporting on health & overcrowded housing
We can design our reporting to be valuable to multiple stakeholders, build on local expertise, uncover areas in need of investigation, and identify opportunities for change.
By Sonya Lustig May 12, 2021, 10:28 a.m.
May 12, 2021, 10:28 a.m.
Three months ago, El Tímpano began investigating the prevalence of overcrowded housing in Oakland’s Latino and Mayan immigrant communities and how those housing conditions affect the health of residents, throughout and beyond the Covid-19 pandemic.
We knew from the start that this project demanded an unconventional approach to reporting. The crisis of overcrowded housing particularly as it affects undocumented immigrants and intersects with public health touches upon a web of public policies, economic structures, and social ideologies that cannot be neatly separated from one another. If we wanted to examine how overcrowding impacts public heal