Profile
Background and Research
Vincent Reina is an associate professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of Pennsylvania, and the Faculty Director of the Housing Initiative at Penn. Reina is a Stoneleigh Foundation Fellow as well as the editor in chief of the journal Housing Policy Debate. His research focuses on urban economics, housing policy, and community and economic development, and has been published in various peer-reviewed journals. This work has been recognized with several awards, including article of the year by the Journal of the American Planning Association, and the Association of Public Policy and Management’s Best Dissertation Award. He was also given the Rising Scholar Award by the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning.
Reina established the Housing Initiative at Penn, which collaborated with the multiple cities, including Philadelphia and Los Angeles, as well as the County of Los Angeles and the State of California to evaluate their emergency rental assistance programs. HIP produced a community-wide housing strategy for Cincinnati and Hamilton County, Ohio in 2020, and the City of Cleveland’s Ten-Year Housing and Investment Plan in 2021. HIP also conducted a nationwide survey of 220 emergency rental assistance programs and interviewed program administrators. A collaboration with the National Low Income Housing Coalition and the NYU Furman Center, their work resulted in multiple policy-informing reports and papers. Previously, Reina and his team helped the City of Philadelphia develop its framework and strategy for preserving its stock of existing subsidized housing and worked with the Local Initiatives Support Corporation to write Philadelphia’s first citywide housing plan.
Reina was a Visiting Scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, a Lincoln Institute for Land Policy Scholar, and a Coro fellow. He was a Steering Committee member for the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Committee on COVID-19, Housing, Foreclosure, and Eviction, and is on the Social Science Advisory Council for the Poverty Race & Research Action Committee. Reina was the Dean’s Distinguished Visiting Professor at Penn’s School of Nursing, and a Visiting Scholar at the NYU Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy. Reina previously worked at the Local Initiatives Support Corporation and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Courses Taught at the Weitzman School
CPLN 500: Quantitative Planning Analysis Methods
CPLN 540: Introduction to Property Development
CPLN 644: Housing Policy
Education
PhD, Public Policy and Management, University of Southern California
MBA, New York University
MSc, Comparative Social Policy, University of Oxford
BS, Urban Studies, Cornell University
Recent Publications
Reina V., Pritchett, W., and S. Wachter (Eds.). 2020. Perspectives on Fair Housing, University of Pennsylvania Press.
Reina, V. J., & Aiken, C. (2022). Moving to opportunity, or aging in place? The changing profile of low income and subsidized households and where they live. Urban Affairs Review, 58(2), 454-492.
Aiken, C., Ellen, I. G., Harner, I., Haupert, T., Reina, V., & Yae, R. 2022. Can Emergency Rental Assistance Be Designed to Prevent Homelessness? Learning from Emergency Rental Assistance Programs. Housing Policy Debate, 1-19.
Acolin, A. and Reina, V.J., 2022. Housing cost burden and life satisfaction. Journal of Housing and the Built Environment, pp.1-27.
South, E.C, MacDonald, M., Reina, V.J. 2021. The association between structural housing repairs for low- income owners and neighborhood crime. "Association between structural housing repairs for low-income homeowners and neighborhood crime." JAMA network open 4.7: e2117067-e2117067.
Preston, G., & Reina, V. J. 2021. Sheltered From Eviction? A Framework for Understanding the Relationship Between Subsidized Housing Programs and Eviction. Housing Policy Debate, 1-33.
Landis, J. and Reina, V.J., 2021. Do Restrictive Land Use Regulations Make Housing More Expensive Everywhere?. Economic Development Quarterly, 35(4), pp.305-324.
Reina, V., and C. Aiken. 2020. “Fair Housing: Comparing Asian and Latinx Experiences, Perceptions, and Strategies,” RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, 7 (2), 201-223.
Kontokosta, C., Reina, V., and B. Bonczak. 2020. “Energy cost burdens for low-income and minority households: Evidence From Energy Benchmarking and Audit Data in Five U.S. Cities,” Journal of the American Planning Association, 86(1), 89-105.
Reina, V., and B. Winter. 2019. “Safety net? The utility of vouchers when a place-based rental subsidy ends?” Urban Studies, 56(10), 2092-2111.
Reina, V. 2019. “Do Small Area Fair Market Rents Reduce Racial Disparities in the Voucher Program?” Housing Policy Debate, 1-15.
Reina V., Guerra, E., and J. Wegmann, 2019. “Location affordability and fair housing on a collision course?” with E. Guerra and J. Wegman. Cityscape, 21(1), 125-142.
Reina, V., Bostic, R., and A. Acolin. 2019. “Section 8 vouchers and rent limits: Do small area fair market rent limits increase access to opportunity neighborhoods?” Housing Policy Debate, 29(1), 44- 61.
Reina, V. 2019. “Affordable Housing, but for How Long? The Opportunity and Challenge of Mandating Permanently Affordable Subsidized Housing,” Fordham Urban Law Journal, 46(5), 1267-1294.
Landis, J., and V. Reina. 2019. “Eleven ways demographics and economic change is reframing American housing policy,” Housing Policy Debate, 29(1), 4-21.
Reina, V., and C. Kontokosta. 2017. “Low hanging fruit? Regulations and energy efficiency in subsidized multifamily housing,” Energy Policy, 106, 505-513.
Lens, M.C., and V. Reina. 2016. “The impact of housing subsidy expirations on access to opportunity neighborhoods,” Housing Policy Debate, 1-19.
