Orlando, Florida: Using FEAT to Conduct Door-to-Door Outreach

In early 2021, New America and DataKind released Displaced in the Sunbelt, a report that contained census tract level eviction heat maps for Orange County, Florida. The release led to a partnership with Central Florida's Evictions and Foreclosures Group (EFG), a multi-stakeholder coalition of municipal staff, judges, banks, real estate developers, housing providers and community development leaders convened by Bright Community Trust in 2020 to respond to Covid-era housing insecurity.

After presenting our maps at an EFG working group meeting, we were contacted by State Representative Anna Eskamani, who was racing to distribute Emergency Rental Assistance funds in Orlando. The deadline to apply for rental assistance was days away and the city had funds remaining. If they didn’t spend the funds, the funds would be clawed back by the U.S. Treasury Department.

At Rep. Eskamani's request, DataKind produced heatmaps that showed the Orlando neighborhoods with the highest eviction rates.

Rep. Eskamani's team used those heatmaps to leave flyers on the doors of households in the neighborhoods with the highest eviction rates, to alert them that this money was available.