Agencies in charge of housing New Orleans' poor prefer not to
October 30, 2006
Sara Gran
Former residents of New Orleans public housing, along with housing activists
and attorneys, have filed a lawsuit against the Housing Authority of New
Orleans and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. They've
sued for former housing project residents' right to return home.
No one thinks the projects are ideal. But rents have nearly doubled in some
parts of New Orleans since the hurricane. It's harder to get housing now,
not easier. And yet it's now, just when they're needed the most, that HANO
and HUD seem to have lost interest in low-income housing entirely.
To hear HANO's side of the story, it's doing the plaintiffs a favor by
locking them out of their homes. In the Oct. 18 Times-Picayune, HANO
described its holdings as "deteriorated, obsolete" housing located in areas
of racial isolation and poverty. Gee, that sounds terrible. No wonder they
don't want to let people back in. Wouldn't it be great if there was someone
whose job it was to keep public housing undeteriorated, clean and safe?
Oh, that's right, it is someone's job: It's HANO's. This agency seems
perplexed as the rest of us as to where public housing went wrong. But HANO
and HUD were the ones who were supposed to be making it right, and they
failed.
According to recent news reports, HUD spent more than $1 billion dollars in
New Orleans between 1981 and 2001. And yet officials with the agency seem to
feel no responsibility towards the poor and working-class families they
exist to serve. They also seem to feel no responsibility for the billion
dollars they spent.
In the same newspaper article an attorney for the housing agencies says,
"HANO certainly has no duty to provide plaintiffs with housing in New
Orleans." Really? Then why on earth does HANO exist? HANO officials seem to
be entirely unaware that that is exactly their duty: to provide poor people
with housing in New Orleans. It's hard to imagine what else an operation
called the Housing Authority of New Orleans could do.
But the housing authorities have made it clear what they think their job is:
the sexier, more appealing business of working with third parties to build
mixed-income housing, where the poor and working-class get subsidies to live
in developments alongside the middle-class and rich, who pay market-rate
rents.
It isn't a bad idea. But the housing agencies' job is not to provide
market-rate housing. Their involvement in market-rate housing should exist
-- and in theory does exist -- for one reason only: to better serve the
needs of the poor by welcoming them into mixed-income communities. People
who can afford market-rate rents don't need taxpayers' help.
Unfortunately, officials with the housing agencies seem to have forgotten
this. The River Gardens development, which replaced the 1,600-unit St.
Thomas project with much fanfare (and which officials want to make a model
for future development) is not a good model for public housing in New
Orleans -- because it isn't public housing. It's a nice place, but it has
only about 200 units of low-income housing, and fewer than 100 units are
occupied by former St. Thomas residents.
That's not mixed-income. That's a market-rate development with a couple of
subsidized units thrown in.
Yet again, we need to remind the housing authorities that their job isn't to
provide for the middle-class and rich. It's to provide for the poor and the
working-class, dull as that may be. The rich need housing assistance like
Wal-Mart needs a tax break -- another of the housing authorities' great
ideas.
Building new middle-class developments might be a whole lot more fun than
administering housing for the poor, but ultimately, that isn't these
agencies' job.
Luckily, the two are not incompatible. Officials can re-open some housing
project units, or purchase other units and make them available, while they
build the mixed-income housing they're so excited about. Ultimately, there's
no reason both sides can't prevail here.
In the long term, the housing agencies are probably right, and we will all
better served by mixed-income housing in the future. That's no excuse for
not providing low-income housing today.
. . . . . . .
Sara Gran is a writer who lives in New Orleans. Her most recent book,
"Dope," was published by Putnam this year. Her e-mail address is
sara@saragran. com.