JP Smith of the Waco Tribune-Herald has been closely following this story.  His stories tell the tale better than we can:

• 2/28/10 Parkside Village apartment complex under fire with bankruptcy, failing inspections
• 3/13/10 State, federal officials to take long look at Parkside Village Apartments
• 3/21/10 Parkside owners will not invest more in ‘underwater’ low-income apartments
• 4/9/10   Relocation of Parkside Village tenants likely after repeated failed inspections

The last TDHCA board meeting contained a passing discussion of this property.  In that discussion, Patricia Murphy, Chief of Compliance and Asset Oversight at TDHCA, pointed out that the Department does not have the authority to condemn or force a property to close, a power reserved by local code enforcement officials.

The board asked to be kept apprised of the problems at this property, so expect this to be discussed at the next TDHCA board meeting in May.  Hopefully they can address the time lag between the original failing score in 2008 and action needed to provide the residents of Parkside Village housed with safe, code-compliant, affordable, housing.

Eric Dexheimer at the Austin American Statesman followed up on the story this morning, adding some insight about American Housing Foundation, the owner of one of the lowest scoring properties in the state.

If you haven’t followed the stories, be sure to click through to the Statesman’s earlier pieces on AHF.

56 of 388 properties inspected (14%) by HUD in 2009 received a failing score (i.e. less than 60 on a 0-100 scale) .

The ten lowest scoring properties in Texas are:

The entire PIS dataset can be downloaded here.

Heather K. Way of the UT Law School says cities should use receivership laws to clean up apartment developments.

Heather K. Way, director of the Community Development Law Clinic at the University of Texas School of Law, read my comments about Mayor White’s recent efforts to stop a Houston landlord from abandoning 1000 low-income renters living in a run down Houston apartment project. Her reaction was that Houston needed to more aggressively use receivership provisions in state law to deal with irresponsible apartment owners.

Here are Heather’s comments…

As Houston struggles to fix its apartment habitability crisis, it should start using its receivership powers. More aggressive use of receivership could prevent future deaths and other tragedies in these complexes from occurring.

Some Background: Receivership is a critical tool used around the country to repair severely blighted multifamily properties. Receivership gives cities and community-based nonprofits the means by which to address these problem properties when the property owner has abandoned his or her responsibilities as an owner and, as a result, the properties are creating an imminent risk of harm to the tenants and the surrounding community.

When a property owner refuses to comply with court orders to repair a severely dilapidated property, the city can ask the court to appoint someone, under Chapter 214 of the Local Government Code, to step into the shoes of the owner and bring a property back into compliance with health and safety codes. After a finding by a judge that the property is posing an imminent risk of harm to the tenants or surrounding community, the judge can appoint the receiver to take control and repair the property. The receiver is able to recoup its costs in the form of a lien placed on the property. If the owner fails to pay the costs of repairing the property, the court can order a sale of the property.

Dallas is the only city we are aware of that has been exercising its receivership powers. In at least three instances, the city was able to recently appoint a receiver to successfully repair or demolish apartments in deplorable condition. Other cities in Texas should look to what Dallas is doing. Ohio, Baltimore, and Illinois are also doing innovative things with receivership.

The Clinic is in the process of drafting improvements to the Texas receivership laws that would increase nonprofit engagement in the receivership process and expand the usefulness of this important tool. We welcome input from everyone.

Our Community Development Clinic has also developed a comprehensive manual of best practices and tools to deal with blighted and abandoned properties, that includes a discussion of receivership and how it can be used under Texas law and is used in other states. The manual is available on our website at: http://www.utexas.edu/law/academics/clinics/community/workhighlights.php. We prepared this for a community group in Dallas, but we hope others in Texas can utilize the tools in this manual as well.

Tens, if not hundreds, of thousands and lower income Houston families are packed into cheaply built and rapidly deteriorating apartments lo catted in massive apartment ghettos.  These apartments have become socially and physically a poor housing option for struggling families.

The City of Houston has adopted a policy of providing modest amount of funds to the owners of these apartment projects to patch them up and keep them occupied.  In the case of the now infamous La Casita Apartments a $1.3 million government loan was provided.  Despite this the tenants report that repairs are not being made and the apartments are in increasingly bad shape.  The situation was aggravated by wind and water damage from Hurricane Ike.

Mayor White did what he needed to do to keep the La Casita apartments open.  In fact, he acted far more decisively and responsibly that we would expect of most Texas big city mayors.  With the shortage of affordable housing aggravated by Hurricane Ike refugees the need to prevent 1,000 low-income low-income Houstonians is critical.

This seems to be a product of the increased attention to enforcement actions and oversight of low-rent apartments put in place by Mayor White in response to the highly publicized deaths of children in dilapidated apartments in the past several months.  The system is not prefect however.  The Houston Chronicle reports that the city learned about the impending absconding of the management of the La Casita Apartments only after the managers called Houston police for help when a mob of the tenants refused to let the manager’s moving van leave to complex.  The City of Houston’s new system also failed to coordinate with the Houston Housing Authority when it relocated a number families receiving Section 8 Housing Choice Vouchers from La Casita because of the substandard conditins that management failed to address.

In this case the vigilante action of the tenants is the main factor that prevented the tenants from being cast out on the street.

Just how long will the leadership of the city of Houston rely on this terribly flawed answer to the affordable housing needs of the poor and low-income working class before developing a viable alternative?

The developments with the lowest scores were:

Corpus Christi     South Bluff Apts                     16c*
Fort Stockton      Stockton Village                     19c*
Longview           Penwood Apts                         19c*
Hillsboro          Crestridge Apartments                20c*
Fort Worth         Spanish Gate Apartments              21c*
Dallas             Glen Hill I @ Ii                     23c*
Dallas             Field Stone Crossing, Llc            23c*
Dallas             Rosemeade Court Apts.                24c*
Houston            Sunflower Terrace                    27c*
Mission            El Rosario Homes                     27c
Waco               Parkside Village                     27c*

An overall numerical score is given as a value from zero to 100.  A score below sixty is considered failing.  An asterisk indicates that health and safety deficiencies were found with respect to smoke detectors. The lower-case letter indicates whether or not other kinds of heath and safety deficiencies were observed, as follows:

• The letter “a” is given if no health and safety deficiencies were observed other than for smoke detectors.
• The lower-case letter “b” is given if one or more non-life threatening H&S deficiencies, but no exigent/fire safety heath and safety deficiencies were observed other than for smoke detectors.
• The lower-case letter “c” is given if one or more exigent/fire safety (calling for immediate attention or remedy) health and safety deficiencies were observed.

A full listing of Texas REAC scores is available.  Below is a listing of the Texas HUD subsidized developments with a score of less than 60 on the most recent published HUD REAC report.

City               Development Name                     Score

Alice              Alice Housing                        47c
Alvin              Alvin Memorial Gardens               56c*
Amarillo           Amarillo Gardens Apartments          54c*
Athens             New Haven Apartments                 49c*
Austin             Charles Place Apts                   31c*
Beaumont           Park Shadows Apartments              53c*
Beaumont           Seville Apartments                   51c
Beaumont           Sunlight Manor Apartments            44c*
Cedar Hill         High Pointe Village                  52c*
Center             Union Acres Trust                    55c
College Station    Southgate Village                    46c*
College Station    Grey Wolf Estates                    53c
Corpus Christi     Casa De Oro Apartments               55c*
Corpus Christi     Cliff Maus Village Apartments        45c*
Corpus Christi     Country Estates                      52c
Corpus Christi     South Bluff Apts                     16c*
Dallas             Casa Trevino                         39c
Dallas             Glen Hill I @ Ii                     23c*
Dallas             Lake June Village Apts               59c*
Dallas             Midpark Towers                       48c
Dallas             Oak Hollow Apartments                53b*
Dallas             Oakway Village Apts.                 46c*
Dallas             Prairie Creek Village Apartments     51c
Dallas             South Crest Apartments               40c*
Dallas             Woodland City Apts.                  54c*
Dallas             Cedar Glen Apartments                55c*
Dallas             Buckner Village                      35c*
Dallas             Rosemeade Court Apts.                24c*
Dallas             Claremont Apartments                 47c*
Dallas             Cimmaron Trail                       36c*
Dallas             Field Stone Crossing, Llc            23c*
Dallas             Reserve At White Rock Midrise        40c*
Dallas             Sphinx At Murdeaux Villas            59c*
Dallas             Buena Vista Townhouses               49c*
Dallas             City Park Lofts                      53c
Denton             Carriage House Assisted Living       43c*
Desoto             Williamsburg Village Healthcare      52c*
Elsa               La Hacienda Apartments               59c
Euless             Spring Valley Apartments             55c*
Fort Stockton      Stockton Village                     19c*
Fort Worth         Casa Inc.                            48c*
Fort Worth         Normandale Place Apartments          56c
Fort Worth         Sycamore Center Villas               57c*
Fort Worth         Spanish Gate Apartments              21c*
Galveston          Marina Landing Resort                55c
Grand Prairie      Willow Tree Apts.                    51c*
Hillsboro          Crestridge Apartments                20c*
Hillsboro          Hillsboro Housing Authority          54c
Houston            Evergreen Commons                    56c
Houston            Haverstock Hills                     55c*
Houston            Kings Row Apartments                 45c*
Houston            Long Drive Townhomes                 50c*
Houston            Sunflower Terrace                    27c*
Houston            Winkler Villas Apartments            57c*
Houston            Yale Village                         51c*
Houston            El Redentor Apartments Ii            59c
Houston            Silver Leaf Apartments               47c*
Houston            Leonora Apartments                   33c*
Irving             Treehouse Apts                       31c*
Jacksonville       Pine Creek Apts                      33c
Jasper             Hope Village Dba Pineview Apartments 59c*
Kerrville          Brookhollow Apartments               48c*
Lamesa             Northridge Ret Center                57c
Linden             Spring Creek {Le Town}               47c*
Longview           Autumnwood                           50c*
Longview           Jerusalem Apts                       43c
Longview           Penwood Apts                         19c*
Lubbock            Cricket Court                        45c*
Lubbock            High Plains-Lubbock                  53c*
Lubbock            Parkway Village Apartments           50c
Lubbock            Villa Del Norte Apartments           35c*
Lubbock            Cornerstone Homes                    51c*
Lufkin             Inez Tims                            59c
Lufkin             Lotus Lane Apartments                52c
Lufkin             Pinewood Park                        56c*
Malakoff           Cedar Creek Apts                     45c*
Mansfield          Spyglass Apts Of Mansfield           59c*
McAllen            Memorial Apartments                  51c
McAllen            Seville Apartments                   56c*
McAllen            Camelot Ret Com                      45c
Mercedes           Armory Housing Project               33c
Mercedes           La Merced Homes                      41c*
Mineral Wells      Sandstone Foothills                  58b
Mission            El Rosario Homes                     27c
Mission            Mission Palms Retirement Housing     38c
Odessa             Chaparral Village                    37c*
Palestine          Pinehurst Apts.                      59c
Pearsall           So Tx Care Center Asset Corp         56c
Plainview          Christian Manor                      57c
Plano              Colonial Lodge Of Plano              50c
Richardson         Lindan Park Care Center              48c
San Antonio        East Park Place                      46c
San Antonio        Pecan Hill Apts                      47c*
San Antonio        Villa De Amistad                     56c
San Antonio        Chapel Ridge Apts                    46c*
San Antonio        Mayfield Gardens                     53c*
San Benito         Lasby Park Terrace                   29c*
Sinton             Lulac Amistad Apts                   37c*
Snyder             Park Village {Nyder}                 38c*
Texarkana          Sunset Apartments                    42c*
Victoria           Salem Village                        44c*
Waco               Parkside Village                     27c*
Waco               Trendwood Apartments                 56c*
Waxahachie         Grove Park Terrace                   49c*
Whitehouse         Oak Brook Health Care Center         56c
Wichita Falls      Indian Falls Apts                    51c*
Winters            Senior Citizens Nursing Hme          38c

- a resident of the Pleasant Village Apartments in Dallas.

Three young children were shot at the Pleasant Village Apartments in Dallas. (Google Earth)

Something awful happened at Dallas’ Pleasant Village Apartments last Wednesday. Here’s the chronology as reported in the Dallas Morning News.

10:30 p.m. Tuesday: A fight between girls at the Pleasant Village Apartments spills onto a breezeway, and adults soon join the fray.

11:45 p.m.: A man fires a shotgun, and residents flee into their homes. Someone calls 911.

11:50 p.m.: Emerging from an apartment, the grandmother of one girl is struck by shotgun pellets.

Midnight: Police and paramedics respond to the apartment complex. The woman, complaining of chest pains, is taken to a hospital.

1:14 a.m. Wednesday: A resident warns police that people expect the shooting to continue after officers disperse.

About 1:30 a.m.: Many of the police officers leave the complex. Police say at least one officer remained.

Just after 1:30 a.m.: Gunfire sprays a car leaving the complex, wounding three children.

All the children, including a 10-year-old boy and a 4-year-old girl were expected to survive, but a 12-year-old girl remained in critical condition late Wednesday.

Residents are scared

“It was ridiculous – it just don’t make no sense,” said Latosia Gladney, who found herself at the center of the fight – a scuffle between pre-teen girls – that sparked the unfolding bloodshed.

We do not know who is responsible for this outrage.  Police have not announced any arrests.  So apportioning blame to tenants or outsiders will have to wait. But we do know that the security situation in and around these apartments is out of control.  This is not a new phenomena.

The media describes the apartments as extremely dangerous. “Dallas police officers don’t respond to calls from the Pleasant Village Apartments alone anymore. They’ve seen tense situations there attract crowds, lacing moments of conflict with the potential for violence,” the Dallas Morning News reports.

The Dallas Observer said, until recent renovations, the Pleasant Village Apartments was “…one of the worst apartment complexes in southern Dallas.”

Community activist Michael Davis has blogged, “Everybody who knows anything about those two places knows that they don’t care one lick about their tenants. Every summer they’re on TV because their tenants haven’t had A/C for weeks. Both complexes cater to thugs which hold good tenants hostage, and do nothing about it.”

At least some residents back up this assessment. Bryan Pope, 38, said he’s lived at the complex since October and fears every day for the safety of his three children. “I pray for this household,” he said. “That these walls, these windows – that nothing comes through.”

In the wake of the shootings Deputy Chief Patricia Paulhill, commander of the Dallas police southeast patrol division asked for SWAT team members to beef up patrols at the complex this week.  When the regular cops have to get the SWAT team to patrol an apartment complex it is not an acceptable environment for children.  When the other children in the apartments hear that their playmates have been shot at their home what does this do to them?

We need to review how we got into this development

Now I am going to admit up front that I know basically nothing first hand about life in the Pleasant Village Apartments. I hope over the course of the coming weeks to learn more. But there is clearly something seriously wrong at Pleasant Village.

Part of what’s wrong clearly lies with some of the people who live or hang out at the apartments. Some of the problem lies with law enforcement or the lack thereof.  But, since this is a subsidized development, housers must explore issues about the housing development itself that may have contributed to this tragedy.

I’m not going to recommend specific solutions for this particular development until I can learn more. But I do know about subsidized housing policy so I want to add some information about the financing of this development and to discuss how some of the conditions that may have contributed to this tragedy might be mitigated in the future with the application of some of the current best housing practices.

Let me be very clear.  I am not ready to point the finger of blame at government agencies, the property owners or anyone besides the criminal who shot these children.  There have been favorable media reports on the efforts of the new owners to improve the apartments.  But press reports indicate that the residents feel this development is still unsafe and they feel they are trapped in it.  We owe it to the children and others living in this and other similarly situated developments to consider what sort of housing policy actions can mitigate their feelings of insecurity, enhance their safety and, hopefully, prevent the recurrence of this type of senseless crime.

Pleasant Village Apartments

Rehabilitating the Pleasant Vilage

As an older, privately owned and managed, HUD financed property, Pleasant Village has changed ownership from time to time. Most recently it was purchased in 2004 by Guardian Management LLC, an Oregon-based real estate management company.

The Dallas Business Journal reported that the new owner said the apartments were “drug-infested” and “on the verge of losing their HUD backing.”

“We’re always looking for owners who are willing to invest in their properties,” Patricia Campbell, spokeswoman at the Fort Worth regional office of HUD told the Business Journal. “We certainly want these units to remain in the affordable housing inventory, as long as they can be well-maintained.”

The Pleasant Village Apartments is a property originally developed forty years ago by private owners with financing from HUD.  The development was built in 1968 and is comprised of 12 buildings.  It was the recipient in 2006 of $6 million in tax exempt bond financing from the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs along with low income housing tax credits in the amount of $3,701,520. The 200 unit apartment development, located at 378 N. Jim Miller Road in South Dallas, also has 130 Section 8 project based housing vouchers.

When the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs reviewed the application submitted by the new owner for Low Income Housing Tax Credits on July 21, 2006 the state agency noted, “The buildings are currently 91% occupied and generally in poor condition.”

The state reported that the owner’s cost of acquiring the apartment development was about $2.9 million (about $14,500 per apartment). The hard costs of rehabilitation was about $3.5 million (about $17,700 per apartment).

The state’s underwriting analysis showed that for the first year of operation after rehabilitation the property would have a gross income of $1,350,636, total expenses of $827,219, net operating income of $523,417, debt service of $431,676, for a net cash flow of $91,741.

The developer’s fee stated in the underwriting report was $1,120,536.

So what is the public purpose of spending millions to revive a crime and drug plagued 40 year HUD project in poor condition?

It is those 130 Section 8 vouchers that make this a priority property for preserving. If the apartments get torn down, the HUD commitment to provide the 130 Section 8 vouchers goes away. In a city like Dallas with a waiting list for Section 8 of 8,000 families and where the waiting list has been closed for new applications for four years, hanging on to Section 8 vouchers is a priority.

What was the cost to the government of the Pleasant Village Apartments? First, there is the cost of the Low Income Housing Tax Credits – $3,701,520. Second, there is the cost of the tax exempt bonds. (I can’t find a formula to calculate this cost). Then, there is the cost of the Section 8 rents paid on behalf of the tenants. There is no data for this particular development to use to derive an accurate figure for this, but I would estimate $700,000 per year would be reasonable ($400 per month X 130 tenant households).

Not an example of best housing practices

If the rules and regulations were not in place linking the Section 8 vouchers to this property, today’s housing policy should probably dictate that the public subsidies be used for funding affordable housing in places other than Pleasant Village.  There are four reasons.

1) Generally speaking, housing policy today does not favor linking large numbers of Section 8 vouchers to a particular development. The quote at the beginning of this post from the tenant saying, “I just don’t know how to get out” is based on the fact that Section 8 is tied to the property in this case. With vouchers linked to the property, if tenants, move they lose their Section 8 subsidy.

Permitting tenants to choose where to live is the preferred option today. I need to point out however, as I have written many times before in this blog, that tenants’ real life choices about where to live are severely constrained because most landlords refuse to rent to Section 8 voucher holders – a form of discrimination that is legal in Texas.

2) Housing policy today would discourage large concentrations of extremely low income tenants (incomes <30 percent of median) in a single development. With the number of project based Section 8 units linked to this development, it is almost guaranteed to have at least 65 percent of its households with extremely low incomes.

3) The development size is too large. This is more my opinion than prevailing housing policy but 200 low income apartments is too large of a development.

4) New affordable housing should usually not be constructed in a segregated neighborhood. Once again this my opinion and that of most researchers and critics. It is not always current practice. Interestingly, it has been suggested that Pleasant Village might have been originally constructed and operated as a segregated all white apartment development in 1968. The property then transitioned to a largely African-American development.

As a community we have an obligation to get outraged and work to fix the situation at the Pleasant Village Apartments. To the extent that housing conditions played a role, we housers have a special responsibility.

Houston crime map shows crime is high in downtown and Southwest areas.

Today’s dangerous housing problems in the Southwestern part of Houston have been greatly exacerbated by the actions of Houston city government in the settlement of large numbers of Katrina evacuees in the area. But the problem does not lie solely in past actions.  The City of Houston, in violation of provisions of the 1968 Fair Housing Act, continues to act to concentrate the predominately low-income, African-American evacuees in these deteriorated, high crime, segregated apartments.  So far neither the state or the federal government has acted to stop the city’s actions.

Let’s look back to 2005 to see how this developed.  Faced with a huge influx of Katrina evacuees the City of Houston assumed principal responsibility for finding apartments to accept the evacuees from Hurricane Katrina.  When the city sought vacant apartments a large number were found in southwest Houston in an area containing very high densities of Class C (older, poor condition) apartments originally constructed during the 1970′s and 1980′s in the wake of the Oil Boom.  These apartments already had substantial physical problems and were largely segregated with low-income families made up of ethnic and racial minorities.

According to the Houston Chronicle…

Driven by housing patterns, economics and sometimes the desperate desire to find a safe new home, roughly one-fourth of the 83,300 Hurricane Katrina evacuees occupying government-financed apartments have gravitated to high-crime neighborhoods on the city’s southwest side.

The city and Mayor White have received praise for their prompt handling of the huge task of rehousing the evacuees.  This praise is deserved.

But it should have been clear from the beginning that the concentration of a poor and minority population in this already deteriorating area of high density apartments would produce problems if the evacuees stayed put for any length of time.  There is virtual unanimous agreement in affordable housing policy today that for low-income multifamily housing to succeed two things are needed: the resident population should be economically and racially diverse within the development and the housing itself should not be located in high crime, high unemployment, low performing school areas.  The relocation of the Katrina evacuees to the Southwest area of the city violated these principles for low-income housing success.

Problems quickly developed.  Crime in the area soared.  The already substandard quality of the area’s apartments further deteriorated.

Faced with this problem the clear solution should have been to work with the federal government to secure funds to reduce the densities of evacuees in the area.  This large new population of extremely low income families financially propped up many marginal slumlords in the area by guaranteeing a renter market for any type of cheap apartments, no matter how unsafe and crime ridden.

The reports of problems in the segregated neighborhoods of Katrina evacuees produced public discontent in Houston.  Evacuees were blamed for all these problems and political leaders sought to respond.  City leaders, having created a segregated ghetto found it suddenly in their interests to maintain it as a way to contain public fears of Katrina evacuees.

The once hopeful promises of integrating the evacuees into the city economically and socially were replaced by an official city policy of containment and continued concentration.  To justify this city policy makers engaged in some appallingly fallacious historical revisionism to describe how the Katrina evacuees came to be concentrated in the Southwest.

This revisionism soars in the proposal the City of Houston and Harris County submitted to the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs (TDHCA) and the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to spend $60 in Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds earmarked by the state and federal governments to help provide permanent housing for the Katrina evacuees. The city wrote in the plan…

Houston and Harris County take some pride in our efforts to encourage evacuees back into the mainstream of our nation’s life, rather than segregating these citizens in particular apartment complexes or makeshift trailer camps.  So, the most cost-effective use of CDBG funds is to address the incremental need for affordable rental units and housing safety services caused by a rise in population in the areas where a high concentration of the evacuees have chosen to live.

- page 2

The circular reasoning employed by the city is almost comical if not for the serious consequences..

Furthermore the idea that evacuees “have chosen to live” in Southwest Houston is pure fiction.  They were relocated from shelters to apartments identified by the city government as available and suitable for them.  Most had no knowledge of the city to call upon to base an independent apartment search.  The evacuees have been presented no alternatives for housing over the ensuing three years.

And now the city proposes use more federal funds to keep the Katrina evacuees bottled up in the Southwest.  Under the proposed plan no assistance will be provided for those who would like to get away from the deterioration and crime.  This city’s proposal to HUD and TDHCA make this clear…

All of the City of Houston spending will be allocated to affordable rental housing programs in areas where it can be demonstrated that the population has seen a dramatic population increase due to an influx of Katrina evacuees.

- page 3

The city and Harris County have proposed dividing the federal funds for Katrina evacuees into three equal $20 million pots: apartment rehabilitation, more police in the Southwest ghetto and reimbursement for jails, MHMR and substance abuse programs to serve the Katrina evacuees arrested through the enhance policing of Southwest.

The apartment repair program is described in the city’s plan as follows…

THE STRATEGY BEHIND HOUSTON’S REQUESTS

Housing
Houston’s use of $20 million in the CDBG funds for housing will be undertaken in the most cost-effective and market-driven manner.  These funds will be plugged into an existing Apartment-to-Standard Program in an area where a large number of evacuees have chosen to live.  The rehabilitation of existing multi-family housing stock at approximately $20,000 per unit can be implemented much more quickly and cost-effectively than the construction of new apartments.  By increasing the supply of affordable housing units in an area, we increase the availability of good quality housing at a reasonable price point available to evacuees.

The best way to target housing assistance for an evacuee population will be to concentrate this assistance in the geographical submarket within Houston where the highest concentration of evacuees have chosen to reside and get on with their lives.  (See Attachment A.)  Specifically, Houston will target the funds in and around the Fondren/Southwest area, the geographical area south of IH 59 outside Loop 610, in the southwest part of the City.  In that area, public school enrollment increased by 2,840 students between September 2005 and January 2006.
- page 5

The enhanced policing is also targeted toward the Southwest…

Housing Safety
The $20 million intended for housing safety efforts in and around multi-family complexes is based on similar principles.  Violent crime rose dramatically in multi-family complexes located within four Police Districts that contain the high percentages of evacuees. Murder rose 62%, rape rose 20 %, robbery rose 3%, and aggravated assault rose 20% in multi-family complexes in these districts. These figures do not include crime that spilled over into the neighborhoods near these hot zones. (Attachment B).

…

Crime analysis by the Houston Police Department has shown that residents of lower-income, multi-family apartment complexes are disproportionately the victims of violent crime.  This CDBG program will provide an officer liaison for fifty apartment complexes located primarily in Police Districts in the Fondren/ Southwest, west, and Greenspoint areas where a concentration of evacuees reside and a disproportionately high rate of violent crime has developed.  The program is intended to decrease the number of crime incidents in and around multi-family apartment complexes in these districts.  Overtime police programs previously funded by Justice and FEMA have allowed deployment of more officers into these hot spots, making numerous arrests, and heading off what would have been an even more shocking rise in the violent crime rate.  Houston continues to shelter more than 100,000 persons displaced by Hurricane Katrina.  Safe housing remains a need for these evacuees.

- pages 5-6

So to summarize the city’s vision for the long term housing of Katrina evacuees, there will be funds to make modest repairs to 1,000 of the tens of thousand run down apartments in the area, there will be police liaisons assigned to fifty apartment complexes and finally the City of Houston and Harris County propose to reimburse themselves for the incarceration of the Katrina evacuees swept up in the violent crime the city knows has resulted from the long term segregation of the evacuees.  Once again I quote the city’s plan…

Coordinated Housing Safety Program-Multi-Family Community Liaison Program

Funding in the amount of $6,707,000 will be used to provide expanded public services through the Coordinated Housing Safety Program with the City of Houston. Harris County’s participation in the Coordinated Housing Safety Program, more fully described under the City of Houston’s Multi-Family Community Liaison Program, will be limited to expanded services to evacuees arrested as a result of the increased security and public safety efforts in the identified target apartment complexes. The County will provide expanded services to such evacuees by contracting for additional bed space for treatment of substance abuse and mental health issues to reduce the recidivism rate of evacuees who are arrested and incarcerated. The County will add 144 beds specifically for substance abuse and mental health treatment of inmates who are evacuees. Additionally, the County will hire by contract six (6) reintegration counselors to re-establish eligibility in Social Security Income (SSI) programs, Medicaid, Mental Health Mental Retardation Authority (MHMRA) programs, housing and other similar programs to ensure continuity of services upon release from jail.  Based on 2006 statistics, the Harris County correctional facilities processed an estimated 3,600 evacuees through its system. It is anticipated that approximately 20,000 evacuees will be incarcerated in the County jail as a result of the proposed Multi-Family Community Liaison Program.

- page 11

Mayor White and the City of Houston did amazing things for Katrina evacuees in the days following the hurricane.  But today they are failing the evacuees.  In the course of this deliberate policy of segregation they have compounded the tragedy of Hurricane Katrina and have consigned an entire section of the city to rapid deterioration, decay and crime.

The city and county’s proposed plan is more than outrageously bad public policy.  It is a clear violation of the Fair Housing Act. The state and federal government have an obligation to put a stop to it and order the city to come up with a plan to allow the evacuees to exercise the housing choice they are legally entitled to but have for so long been denied.

For the past two days I have been exploring in this blog ways to deal with the massive problem of substandard apartments that has emerged in Houston.  The challenge is to get the land(slum)lords to repair and maintain their property.

The current approach taken by the City of Houston, whereby the city issues citations that landlords simply ignore is clearly not working.  Yesterday I suggested the the city commit an adequate number of city attorneys to criminally prosecute the worst offenders and plan to seize and demolish the worst apartments.

I noted that the problem with this is that both cost the city money. You would assume that since these are issues effecting the heath and safety of many citizens the city would be willing to spend the money to deal with the problem. But based on past experience this might not be the case.

Today I want to explore two other solutions I outlined in my earlier posting that offer a way around this problem. These two approaches transfer financial responsibility from the city government to a community based nonprofit organization or directly to the tenants.

First, I suggest getting a new, more responsible owner for the worst properties…

11) The Texas Legislature needs to pass a law allowing community based nonprofit organizations to force apartments with serious and repeated code violations into receivership so that responsible new owners can take over the apartments and get them torn down or completely rehabilitated.

As I see it the most egregious problems are with properties where the landlords will never willingly maintain their apartments in a safe and decent manner.  The key to addressing these worst properties is to get them into the hands of a responsible owner.  The city clearly does not want to play this role.  So I recommend turning to a nonprofit to take over.

Here is the way this would work.  Once a certain number of citations had accumulated and the owner fails to act, a new state law would permit the city to designate a nonprofit corporation to take title to the property.  State law would permit the voiding of any outstanding liens on the property so the nonprofit could secure financing against the property to make repairs.  Covenants as to the maintenance and performance of the nonprofit, enforceable by the city, would be recorded.

The premise is that the solution is to replace a landlord who does not care to maintain the property with a new landlord who does.  The nonprofit could seek out government grants and private financing to complete the rehabilitation.

The other tool I suggest places some power in the hands of the tenants to get a recalcitrant landlord to make repairs…

12) The Texas Legislature should pass a law allowing residents in apartments with serious health and safety violations to withhold their rent and place it in a court approved escrow fund until the code violations are addressed.

Many states (but not Texas) allow tenants to place their rent in escrow rather than paying the landlords if reairs are not made.  By requiring approval of the JP court before a tenant could withhold rent the landlords would be protected from arbitrary actions of tenants.

Aerial view of Southwest Houston neighborhood with concentrated low income apartments

I was proud to present Houston Mayor Bill White an award in 2007 on behalf of the National Low Income Housing Coalition for his work on behalf of the survivors in the early days following Hurricane Katrina.

I am sorry to say the mayor’s response to the death of two children from a collapsed staircase at a low income Houston apartment building that had not been inspected by the city for a dozen years shows a lack of leadership and what appears to be a strange ambivalence toward the safety of low-income Houstonians.

Houston Chronicle reporters Matt Stiles, Ruth Rendon and Mike Snyder reported today…

The mayor, speaking by phone from a conference in Colorado, said the collapse that killed two children at the Westwood Fountains apartments shouldn’t worry other Houstonians living in older complexes. He declined to speculate whether a more recent inspection might have prevented the collapse.

The series of articles that the Houston Chronicle reporters have been writing for weeks about the severely substandard conditions in low income apartments in Southwest Houston contradicts the Mayor’s reassurance.  Of course people should be worried when the city government fails to do its job to ensure the safety of its citizens.  This is a city government that allows hundreds of safety violations to stack up on low-income apartment projects and has failed to take any meaningful enforcement action against slumlords according to the Houston Chronicle’s investigation.

Yesterday I outlined twelve initiatives the city should undertake to deal with the slum apartment problem.  Today I want to explore four of those recommendations in detail.

1) Send the City building inspectors out right now to sweep through the apartments in this area, and ultimately through the entire city, and give landlords no more than 24 hours to fix major health and safety issues.

2) Establish a division in the Houston City Attorney’s office with adequate staff to take landlords to court who ignore orders from building inspectors to repair apartments.  Seek jail time for landlords who willfully violate repair orders.

Mayor White, in response to the newspaper publicity about the lack of inspections, announced one month ago that the city would hire more inspections and change the current system from one that only inspects apartments in response to complaints or (incredibly) at the request of the landlord to a system the inspects on a regular cycle.  This is a step in the right direction.

But this process is expected to take several months to get up and running.  Enforcement needs to begin today.

More importantly, there are a number of landlords with large numbers of outstanding citations that have ignored orders to make repairs.  The city should give these landlords a 24 hour deadline and if they don’t make the repairs then take them to court and seek criminal convictions and jail time.

The present lack of consequences for violating the law does not seem to be adequately corrected in the mayor’s new plan.  To start, the city must assign a sufficient number of attorneys in the city attorneys office to prosecute the slumlords. Hiring more inspectors to write citations will not be useful if the citations are not enforced.  Aggressive enforcement of recalcitrant landlords by city attorneys should include asking judges to jail non compliant landlords.

Next on my list of recommendations…

3) Condemn and demolish at city expense the worst apartments and provide the tenants relocation assistance.

4) Establish a tenant relocation fund to relocate tenants from apartments that threaten their health and safety while repairs are made.

Laws are on the books that permit Texas cities to condemn and demolish the worst apartments.  Yet most cities don’t use these powers even in the most extreme cases of slum housing.  The reason — it takes time for city attorneys to go to court and condemn the offending properties and it costs cities money to pay for the demolition.  So the implementation of an aggressive demolition program depends on the mayor and city council having the will to pay for it.

Along with demolition the relocation of the tenants should be paid for.  This requires additional money from the city.

I’m not going to let go of this issue until the City of Houston gets serious about this problem.  I’ll explore more of my twelve proposed solutions in depth tomorrow.

A staircase fell at a Houston apartment complex killing two children. Click the picture to watch video.

It happened again last night.

More kids were hurt, this time killed, in the slum apartments the city of Houston tolerates in the Southwest section of the city.

It should not have happened.  The City of Houston has long known about the deplorable living conditions in this area.  The Houston Chronicle has splashed it over the front page of the paper in feature stories in recent months.

Last night a stairway collapsed at the Westwood Fountains apartments killing two boys, ages 10 and 4.

This week’s story is almost too sad to read.

You may want to watch this video of conditions in these apartments.  Keep in mind this is not a uniqe situation.  These type of grave heath and safety problems are widespread and are not being addressed by the City of Houston.

So what needs to be done?

1) Send the City building inspectors out right now to sweep through the apartments in this area, and ultimately through the entire city, and give landlords no more than 24 hours to fix major health and safety issues.

2) Establish a division in the Houston City Attorney’s office with adequate staff to take landlords to court who ignore orders from building inspectors to repair apartments.  Seek jail time for landlords who willfully violate repair orders.

3) Condemn and demolish at city expense the worst apartments and provide the tenants relocation assistance.

4) Establish a tenant relocation fund to relocate tenants from apartments that threaten their health and safety while repairs are made.

5) The City of Houston should pass an ordnance licensing landlords, collect a fee and use the proceeds to conduct regular inspections.

6) Establish and publicize a phone number to allow tenants to call and file complaints anonymously so they do not have to fear retaliation from their landlords. Pass an anti-retaliation ordnance protecting tenants who file complaints.

7) Establish a Mayor’s Task Force to investigate the extreme levels of racial and economic segregation present in the City of Houston and come up with a plan to breakup concentrations of poverty and substandard living conditions.

8 )  Establish a fair housing counseling and “Moving to Opportunity” program in Houston to overcome the segregation of Katrina evacuees created by the temporary housing program in these Southwest Houston apartments.

9)  Seek funding from the federal government to provide rent vouchers allowing the relocation of Katrina and Rita evacuees from the segregated southwest Houston apartments they were located in immediately following the hurricanes.

10) Houston needs new and better apartments to replace these slum apartments.  Congress needs to give Texas the flexibility to award additional Low Income Housing Tax Credits (a 160 percent increase) to developers who agree to rent up to one-third of their apartments to very low-income families. This way, the state can adjust the credits to produce apartments with deeper subsidies that rent to families earning between roughly $18,000 and $26,000 a year.

11) The Texas Legislature needs to pass a law allowing community based nonprofit organizations to force apartments with serious and repeated code violations into receivership so that responsible new owners can take over the apartments and get them torn down or completely rehabilitated.

12) The Texas Legislature should pass a law allowing residents in apartments with serious health and saftey violations to withold their rent and place it in a court approved escrow fund until the code violations are addressed.

To read this story headlined “Operators of squalid apartments ignore the law to prey on the thousands of Houston’s poor desperate for shelter Life in places of last resort” is to be infuriated at the slumlords and the the City of Houston.

A Houston Chronicle analysis of city records shows that inspectors issued at least 2,300 citations to owners of about 300 Houston apartment buildings the past two years, alleging violations of health, building, fire or electrical codes – or for neighborhood “nuisances.” …

The citations are criminal complaints, heard in Municipal Court, that often follow one or more notices instructing owners to correct problems. One quarter of the citations the Chronicle reviewed alleged that owners failed to maintain structural standards requiring, for example, that stairways be safe and that floors and walls be sturdy enough to safely bear weight.

Despite this record of criminal citations it was April 2007 before the City of Houston acted to shut down the first offending apartment project. The City took action only after 240 citations were issued and “two months after two children were hospitalized with burn marks after being shocked by an unsecured electrical transformer there,” according to the Houston Chronicle story.

I daresay that the Houston Police Department would make a point to arrest an individual who had other types of criminal citations issued against him that had not been taken care of. But in this case an apartment owner is allowed to accumulate 240 violations while continuing to operate an apartment complex with human beings living in it in dangerous conditions before the city takes any action.

Please read this story and get angry.

Update…

Since writing this posting I see from a story in the Houston Chronicle yesterday that Houston Mayor Bill White has responded to the stories in the Houston Chronicle with a promise to increase enforcement against noncomplying apartment projects

The mayor’s office has announced that it plans to spend up to $1 million a year on additional inspections. According to the Chronicle:

The goal is to get the city’s apartment enforcement on a routine inspection cycle, especially at properties with the worst conditions, replacing a system that is inconsistent and driven largely by complaints.

Yet the point of the story was not that there were not enough inspections. Some of the apartment developments had as many as 300 citations against them. The point was that nothing was being done after a citation was issued. If the city is serious about cleaning up this problem it needs to get serious about enforcing the citations that its inspectors issue.

Nevertheless, congratulations to the Houston Chronicle and its team of reporters who worked on the story for getting the mayor’s attention.