The November 14 edition of the print-only City Edition has a long article by Paul Spicer on the current discussion on the future of public housing in Richmond.
Much of the article is informed by the point of view of Marylin Olds, Tenant Council President of Creighton Court on the RRHA‘s Board of Commissioners and life-long Creighton Court (.pdf) resident.
The article also quotes Sheila Hill-Christian, reiterating the RRHA’s commitment to its 5-year Strategic Plan (.pdf) and stated objectives that include “develop mixed use/mixed income planned communities” and to “deconcentrate poverty”.
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The recent stories in the press about PH in Richmond, along with the news of the recent shootings, led me to the RRHA web site.
A cursory examination of the RRHAs demographic report from 2001 revealed that of the 9000 residents in the city’s non-elderly developments, over 5000 (55%) are children under 18 (the city average, removing PH residents is 21%). There were a grand total of 26 married couples in these developments in 2001. The average income for a household was $9200 (which resulted in an average rent payment in the non-elderly apartments of $180 a month). Public housing residents comprised 25% of the city’s poverty total of 38000. The average length of stay was around 8 years. There were but 2 non-minority headed households out of the 3240 non-elderly households in 2001.
So, if these places are so bad, why is there a large (and recently re-opened) waiting list to get into one of these developments? I am guessing that $180 in monthly rent for a roof over your family’s head transcends any thoughts on the future social and economic impacts that living in these developments portends for your household. Or, is it much different from the life chances you get from most low income neighborhoods. Thus the question..is public housing itself the culprit, or does the demographic composition of its residents predict its failure? While research on poverty deconcentration programs has revealed mixed/positive results, one thing is sure, doing nothing virtually guarantees failure.
A related story on nbc12.com doesn’t really say much:
Here’s a story in Sunday’s Philadelphia Inquirer about their efforts at reforming public housing (Rising from Ruins).