In September 2020, the city council of Alexandria, Virginia, met to discuss whether to move forward with an affordable housing project. On a few acres in the city’s residential West End neighborhood, a developer proposed to build townhouses and condos priced for first-time homebuyers, with a few units reserved for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Neighbors who lived in the single-family homes nearby showed up to the meeting, and they had questions. One of the biggest: What would happen to their property values?