"There is a lack of quality affordable housing in metropolitan Maryland. Simply put, too many people cannot afford to live here. State government and local governments are failing to meet the demand for affordable housing."

UMBC: You were a member of a team of seven graduate students that created a groundbreaking "capstone" project while in the public policy program. Explain what a capstone project is.

SS: The capstone project is a course team-taught by two faculty members in the public policy program. It is a "finishing" course that takes all the classes you've taken in the policy core and brings those skills together in a group project with the other students in the class.

UMBC: You chose to do your project on affordable housing. How was the topic selected?

SS: My professors recommended the topic because they have a connection with Greg Shupe, the director of the office of transitional services in the Maryland Department of Human Resources, a social service agency that deals a lot with homelessness and homelessness issues. Affordable housing is an issue that goes hand-in-hand with homelessness. Shupe was our mock client.

UMBC: Even though he was a "mock client," you came out with some very real findings. Summarize your findings for us.

SS: We chose metropolitan Maryland, which has more than half of the population. That includes Montgomery and Prince George's counties, Baltimore City and Baltimore County, Howard, Harford, Carroll and Anne Arundel counties. We looked at each county and the affordability of housing in each income range using census statistics to examine what percentage of each group's income went to pay for housing. If you pay over 30 percent of what you make on housing--which includes mortgage, insurance, heating, cooling--you technically have unaffordable housing.

We found through our analysis that there is a lack of quality affordable housing in metropolitan Maryland. Simply put, too many people cannot afford to live here. State government and local governments are failing to meet the demand for affordable housing. Our analysis provides the following policy alternatives that may alleviate the problem: increasing funding to the Maryland Affordable Housing Trust; increasing loans opportunities to first-time homebuyers; and a moderately-priced dwelling unit program in developing counties.

UMBC: Were you surprised by what your research revealed?

SS: As we were looking at these counties, we definitely started to see how difficult it is for families in the lower income brackets to find affordable housing. Up to 70 percent of them or higher didn't have affordable housing. Something else we looked at was the middle class burden. Middle income people also have a difficult time getting affordable housing, so we examined some careers that people might have--police, teacher, nurse--in a certain county, and found that they would not be able to afford to live in that county they worked in. For example, starting teachers in Howard County really can't afford to live there.

UMBC: Is it common for a capstone project to illicit the strong response you have received?

SS: Usually not. We're getting a lot of press attention for this; it's a very pertinent issue and we struck while the iron was hot. Maryland housing prices are rising. The work we did was from Census 2000 data, and if you've seen the newspaper lately, housing prices are going up incredibly in this region so families are feeling the stretch. So it's important and we have gotten a lot of attention. We were featured in The Daily Record and on NPR's "Day Break" program. We've visited a couple of places and given presentations, including the Governor's Affordable Housing Commission, the Baltimore County Office of Community Conservation, as well as UMBC's Public Policy Advisory Board and the Maryland Policy Academy on Homelessness.

UMBC: How are you and your classmates handling your new-found popularity?

SS: We think of it as a chance to get our names out there, meet people and learn what public policy is all about. It's an opportunity to bring our findings to a lot of people.

UMBC: Why do you think it is important that your class distinguished itself by taking on such a real-world problem?

SS: I'm very happy with the class in itself and the learning experience. I really believe the group project teaches you how real public policy occurs, what it will be like in the real world after we get our master's degrees. I'm also very happy that we did something pertinent, something real and important to the day. People understand what I'm talking about because we did an important topic where I feel we might actually help people.