Data! Data! Data! What’s New on PolicyMap for August!
Data! Data! Data! What’s New on PolicyMap for August!
Welcome to our update for August 2013. Check out the list below for a summary of the many indicators that have either been updated or added to PolicyMap. To see them for yourself, just go to www.policymap.com, select the area of the country you’d like to explore and start adding data. It is that simple.
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Real Estate
Home Sale Data: Year-end home sale statistics for 2012 and 4th quarter 2012 are now available in PolicyMap! Understand how home sale activity in neighborhoods across the country has changed since 2006 on an annual or quarterly basis. Find the number of home sales, median sales amount and changes in home sale activity by block group, census tract, zip code and more! To understand just how valuable this market data can be in your work, read more on our blog. Our home sale data is proprietary and available for subscribers only. To check it out for yourself, just sign up for a 7-day free trial. You’ll find this data in the Real Estate tab above the map.
Historic Tax Credits: This is a new address-level data set featuring historically significant building rehabilitations that received a 20% federal tax credit for redevelopment costs. Data are available for 2001-2010. You’ll find basic information about each project, including the total cost of the rehab, year the tax credit was approved, and use category. Find it in the Housing and Real Estate section under Add Sites.
Health
Deaths from Disease: Data from the Center or Disease Control (CDC’s) Center for Vital Statistics showing death rates from the four leading causes of death in the U.S. is now available. Data is available for deaths from coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, and chronic lower respiratory diseases for counties and states 2000 through 2010. Find this in the Health tab above the map.
Births and Prenatal Care : Data has been updated to 2010 on PolicyMap. The data is from the CDC and can be found in the Infant & Maternal Health section of the Health tab. You’ll find stats on births, births by young mothers, as well as data regarding the percentage of mothers who receive prenatal care. The data is at the county and state level.
Infant Deaths: Also updated are statistics on infant deaths, now available for 2003 through 2009 for states and select counties.
HIV Prevalence: This new data on PolicyMap reveals the HIV diagnosis rate by county and is available for 2010.
Federal Guidelines
Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) Eligibility: PolicyMap users looking for an easy way to see which census tracts are Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) eligible are in luck: tract eligibility status, as of 2013 has been updated, along with the Tract Median Family Income percent. As part of CRA evaluations, financial institutions are evaluated by the extent to which they serve low and moderate income areas, as well as areas experiencing economic duress. The CRA eligibility data on PolicyMap, located in Federal Guidelines, makes it easy to quickly determine whether a particular census tract is CRA eligible and whether it’s low, moderate, middle or upper income. Read more.
New Market Tax Credit Eligibility Data for 2013: All of the latest eligibility data for the NMTC program are available on PolicyMap. You’ll find eligibility as well as all of the necessary primary and secondary criteria available in the Federal Guidelines menu under CDFI Fund NMTC Data. While many of the indicators are actually unchanged by the CDFI Fund for 2013, some of the severe distress secondary criteria were updated. These include Delta Regional Authority Distressed Counties, HUBZones, Appalachian Regional Commission Distressed Counties, and tracts with Brownfields. Also updated is the ERS/USDA Food Desert indicator, which was changed from an older 2006 USDA study to a new 2010 study.
Bank Enterprise Award (BEA) Distressed Communities: These have been updated on PolicyMap with the most recent designations that were released earlier this week by the CDFI Fund. Eligibility is based on population, poverty, and unemployment criteria, and a tract can either fully or partially qualify, or not qualify at all. Also, as of this year, some tracts can fully qualify as long as the specific investment is located within an American Indian Reservation. These designations will be applicable for the next 5 years and can be found in the Federal Guidelines tab under Federal Incentive Designations.
Jobs & Economy
County Business Patterns: We’ve updated our County Business Pattern data from the Census to include 2011 data. This data has information about the number of employees who work in different industry sectors, going down to the county and zip code level. This data can be viewed in the Jobs & Economy menu under Jobs & Wages – Industry Concentrations.
Unemployment: June unemployment data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics is now on PolicyMap. You can access this data in the Jobs & Economy tab under Unemployment (BLS).
Points of Interest
Libraries: Updated points for over 17,000 public library outlets are now on PolicyMap, in the Schools and Libraries section of the Add Sites menu. You can now filter the libraries by type (central, branch, bookmobile, mail order) and see information about operating hours. This data is from the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
Bank Closures: Now updated on PolicyMap is our point-level dataset of banks closed by the FDIC. It’s an interesting way to visualize the financial collapse of the recent recession. You can find the dataset in the Add Sites section, under the Banking menu, as FDIC Bank Failures.
Income
Low Mod (Low to Moderate Incomes): Updated “Low Mod” data is now on PolicyMap. This shows income levels as a share of the Area Median Income (“Area” being the metro area if it’s in a metro area, or state otherwise). This is an informal calculation of Low Mod, and is different than HUD definitions, which will be updated soon. You can access this data in Money & Income under Low Mod.
Supplemental Security Income (SSI): Not to be confused with Social Security, Supplemental Security Income is a program for people with disabilities, those who are blind, or aged who can no longer work. You can find it in the Demographics tab, in the People with Disabilities submenu. The data is now updated to 2012, and is available at the county level.
TRF Analytics
TRF’s Market Value Analysis (MVA) of Baltimore, MD: The latest analysis conducted by TRF of Baltimore’s real estate market is now available on PolicyMap for 2011. Check out sub-neighborhood typologies like Regional Choice, Middle Market and Distressed areas within the City of Baltimore.
We updated quite a lot of datasets! Have a question or want to learn more? Just give us a call at 1-866-923-6277 (MAPS).