215 families in Flint

EVENT

Between Flint Mayor Don Williamson and the City Council the circus continues. The parody is startlingly close to the truth.

Meanwhile, the costs are real, with real miseries slipping by, almost unnoticed.

* * * * *

from the Flint Journal:

Officials say voucher evictions not necessary
The Flint Journal First Edition
Friday, March 25, 2005
By Marjory Raymer
mraymer@flintjournal.com ? 810.766.6325

FLINT - More than 200 area low-income families are being forced out of their homes, and federal officials say the Flint Housing Commission should have done more to prevent it.
"We are concerned that the housing authority has decided to pursue evicting families," said Donna M. White, spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, who called the move very unusual. The Flint Housing Commission sent letters earlier this month telling 215 low-income families who receive vouchers to help them pay rent that they'd be cut off as of May 1 and put back on a waiting list. Most of the families already waited for years before being granted the voucher.
The cuts mean at least 25 percent of families receiving vouchers will likely lose their homes.
"We went from happy we got this house ... to you are going to be homeless," said Jessica Jordan, 28, who has six children and got emergency entrance into the program five years ago after fleeing a violent relationship. "We have no idea what we're going to do."
The Flint Housing Commission blames HUD for the cuts, saying it needs $800,000 more than the $3.4 million it received to fully fund the Housing Choice Voucher Program, previously known as the Section 8 program.
"FHC is aware of the devastation this will cause the families affected," Executive Director Clyde Caldwell said in a letter to The Flint Journal. "Staff has been working diligently to find alternative solutions."
The Flint Housing Commission is offering priority placement in 100 public housing units.
But HUD said it gave housing commissions several options on how it could reduce costs without reducing the number of vouchers.
"Flint, it seems, has decided not to do that," White said.
Among the options was a special waiver used by other housing agencies nationwide to negotiate with landlords to reduce rents, White said.
"They are definitely not looking at options. I think that would make them work," said Jordan, who said utility reductions also make sense considering the approach of summer and the number of other agencies that can help with those bills.
White said the agency has known since December how much funding it would receive and continued to grant additional vouchers to people who are now being put out.
Officials from the housing commission could not be reached for comment beyond Caldwell's letter.
The housing commission's funding is based on the number and cost of vouchers in use over a three-month period last year plus inflation.
"It's not too late for the housing authority to give some of these options a try," White said. "The last resort that anyone including the federal government wants are evictions."
U.S. Rep. Dale E. Kildee's office has received several complaints about terminating the vouchers, and he is encouraging the housing commission to work with HUD to find an alternative solution, said Peter Karafotas, press secretary for the congressman.
Tamekia Bolds, 25, pays $211 of her $500 rent plus utilities, which are several hundred dollars a month in the winter.
She was especially angry over the abrupt cancellation of the voucher because she gave up a low-rent apartment in a nice neighborhood when she got the voucher a year ago, so she could have a house with a yard for her 6-year-old daughter to play in.
"Now they are leaving us out in the cold," said Bolds, who works part time at a group home making $8 an hour. "What can I do? I don't have a deposit to move again."
The average housing assistance payment made to landlords in Flint is $440, according to Caldwell's letter. Voucher recipients also often pay an additional amount.
The voucher program started in 1976 and helps families making less than 50 percent of the median income as well as the elderly and disabled.
Caldwell indicated seniority is being used to determine who is allowed to keep their voucher.
"There are people that I know that have been on for years and years. Shouldn't these people have their life together already?" Bolds said.

* * * * *

There is so much that's fucked up about this that it's difficult to know where to begin.

SMALL PRAISE, HIGH CONDEMNATION

The fact that I know about this occurrence at all is to the credit of the Flint Journal. They recently published an editorial (characterized by particularly weak logic) on April 7th, which prompted me to purchase an online copy of the article printed above, dated March 25th.

It's not enough.

This is the biggest news story in Flint right now, but with just one day's local coverage and a belated editorial, it's received a fraction of the coverage it deserves.

Meanwhile, take a glance at some of this past week's leading articles:

Coffee Beanery's growing film credits bring perks
Commuters contend with I-75 construction
High prices fuel irony of lower profits
Aspiring actors get prime exposure
Burned again: Lighter's banned in carry-on, checked bags

This is newsworthy?

The public housing story should be in the news day after day. It should cling to the front pages until it is dealt with. It should hover in the wings, I suppose, if it must, so we can see the latest brawl between Williamson and Coleman, but right afterwards this story should be back at front, nosing its way in.

Not only has the Journal allowed the Coffee Beanery to upstage a very real crisis involving many hundreds of citizens, they've attended to it in such a way that shows almost a contemptuous lack of thought. HUD shoud be held accountable, not the Flint Housing Commision?! The Journal says so, but they don't say why. Certainly HUD didn't request a cut in funding, nor does the Journal cite any significant mismanagement on the federal level.

Shame on the Flint Journal for making such a mess of their responsibility.

Shame on the Flint Journal for ceding opportunities to provide accountability.

For ceding the chance to be relevant.

* * * * *

THEY'RE BOTH WRONG.

But conservatives are more wrong.

The argument they make is that simply adequate funding will not resolve housing crises among the urban, working poor. They are correct. Just throwing money at a problem won't make it go away, and the debacle that has been housing projects this half-century is a pretty powerful example.

But conservatives beat out the Democrats for error if they think there is any way to resolve the crises without funding. Furthermore, they are absolutely wrong if they think they themselves will benefit from this track, in the long run, whatsoever.

Bear in mind that Americans are the most able consumers of American products.

Bear in mind that Jessica, or Tamekia at $8 an hour, can be stable and contributing parts of the economy, and might even aspire to economic mobility, but not if they and their children are homeless.

Bear in mind that those thrown out will be disproportionately minorities and children, while it is the older, white population that is still leaving Flint today. By depriving its growing demographic of housing, and through it, the stability necessary for a solid education and growth into a contributing member of society, Flint suffers as a whole. When Flint suffers, as the core of a rapidly expanding metro area, the entire county suffers.

* * * * *

WHEN DID THE ALTRUISTIC IMPULSE DIE?

Answer: In the eighties, when the advent of political correctness exposed the paternalism and condescension in most "altruistic" actions, and when Reagan immasculated generosity (a double insult). Unfortunately, it seems we took the easy out, and decided to just stop caring. Anymore, even liberals hesitate to suggest we take economic action "because it's the right thing to do."

Confronted honestly, with warts and limitations, isn't that the best reason?

Shouldn't we strive to uphold the dignity of humanity whenever possible, and shouldn't that effort (granted, a very, flawed, biased, and unbalanced effort) be its own reward for us?

As the Journal article points out, public housing tends to create conditions unsanitary, inaccessible, and unsafe for its residents. As Barbara Ehrenreich points out, the poverty rate is still calculated by the cost of food, while the cost of housing in particular has exploded in the last thirty years. As a result, now one in five of the homeless is working full time...

So shame on conservatives for their short-sighted and materialistic outlook that curtails their own economic future and shows a blatant disregard for both the working poor and the unemployed.
Shame on them for thumping a Bible in my face that doesn't once mention abortion or gay marriage, but that invokes the misfortunes of the poor in practically every book.
Shame on them for upholding the "sanctity of life," but for hypocritically waving through policies that predictably show an utter disregard for human needs and mutual respect.

* * * * *

AND WHERE IS OUR MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT?

There are too many coincidences.

Clyde Caldwell, the director of the Flint Housing Commission shares his name with another Clyde Caldwell. Clyde Caldwell the second wrote books for the Dragonlance saga, a favorite series of mine containing the title "Flint, the King." Thus, an online search of "Flint" and "Clyde Caldwell" yields the writer, never the director.

Having read three accounts of this housing debacle, I see no reason to fault HUD and every reason to fault the Flint Housing Commission.

Finally, in desperation, I thought I'd appeal to make a donation. To post a destination on this blog. Maybe we could help them out a little. It's too bad. The Flint City Website doesn't even have an entry for the FHC, and any numbers yielded in numerous searches (online and by phone) only provides old numbers to crumbling projects where nobody picks up.

Even after 24 rings.

So, shame on the City of Flint and the Flint Housing Commission for such disengenuousness. For their unjustifiable inefficiency and flagrant disregard for their own citizens and tenants.

* * * * *

SO, SALEM

I'm compelled to do something small, at least.

The Salem Housing Community Development Corporation and the Salem Housing Community Task Force have provided housing in Flint for low-income families for over twenty years. Housing involves the restoration of vacant houses, and is dependent on prospective owners contribution of labor towards their own houses and others'. Their state funding was recently suspended by Don Williamson's administration for fiscal mismanagement... this is the same administration that is unable to provide, on its website or elsewhere, a working number or email for its own housing commission.

Salem is worthy of a donation. And this is an issue of critical importance.

Salem Housing CDC
3216 Martin Luther King Blvd.
Flint, MI 48505

Cheques can be made out to: Salem Housing CDC.

~ Connor