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Damaged housing projects to be rebuilt as mixed use, mixed income
Associated Press (AP) ^ | Wednesday, November 2, 2005

Posted on 11/03/2005 2:47:11 PM PST by caryatid

Housing projects destroyed by Hurricane Katrina will be rebuilt as mixed-use, mixed-income neighborhoods, with $1.8 billion planned to begin work in Louisiana and Mississippi, U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson said Wednesday.

"Within the next two weeks, we will begin to see results," he said, without giving details.

The $1.8 billion is part of President Bush's request for $17.1 billion for long-term recovery along the Gulf of Mexico. "It will be the first of many" allocations, Jackson told reporters after meeting with four City Council members whose districts include housing projects.

He said the type of redevelopment was chosen by Mayor Ray Nagin and City Council, not by HUD: "I'm not here to dictate to the mayor and council."

The C.J. Peete development in Central City will be the first development to be redone, once health and safety inspectors deem it safe, he told reporters at the Fischer project, half of which has been torn down for new mixed-use development.

Before Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans had 7,500 public housing apartments, about 5,100 of them occupied. Another 4,700 families used federally subsidized vouchers to rent apartments around the city.

All public housing units are currently locked and boarded; a notice on the Housing Authority of New Orleans' Web site gives phone numbers for tenants who want to collect their belongings. The locks are to be sure nobody steals residents' belongings or moves into a place that isn't safe, Jackson said.

Some buildings were only lightly damaged but don't yet have utilities; mold is also a worry, he said.

Jackson reiterated that the developments would have fewer tenants even if they were being remade as the vast tracts of high- and low-rise apartment buildings erected in the 1940s-60s.

Half of the Fischer project has been torn down, and smaller buildings are going up. One-third will be small apartment buildings to be rented at the market rate, one-third low-income apartment, and one-third single-family houses for sale.

"We will eradicate that type of development," Jackson said, pointing across the street to a building that stretched for blocks. "We don't want to isolate people because they're low-income."

He said he has visited nine shelters, asking public housing tenants at each if they wanted to return and emphasizing that HUD would do all it could to make such returns as easy as possible.

"I've talked to some 500 hundred people. Some 60 to 65 percent say they're not coming back," Jackson said.

(Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press)


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events; US: Louisiana
KEYWORDS: housingprojects; hud; katrina; la; louisiana; neworleans; nola; publichousing
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1 posted on 11/03/2005 2:47:12 PM PST by caryatid
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To: caryatid

Public housing units are a big mistake. The object should be recorded home ownership, even if the gov't gives them away.


2 posted on 11/03/2005 2:50:02 PM PST by RightWhale (Repeal the law of the excluded middle)
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To: caryatid

Now how mixed will a economically "mixed" housing project be in 2 years?


3 posted on 11/03/2005 2:51:16 PM PST by arthurus (Better to fight them over THERE than over HERE.)
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To: arthurus

un-mixed and probably in serious disrepair.


4 posted on 11/03/2005 2:52:00 PM PST by SusaninOhio
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To: arthurus

Answer: It wont. I say 1 year, if that long.


5 posted on 11/03/2005 2:52:31 PM PST by L98Fiero
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To: caryatid

Mixed income public housing? A disaster waiting to happen!


6 posted on 11/03/2005 2:53:15 PM PST by Continental Soldier
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To: caryatid

Prediction: this idea will be a mess.


7 posted on 11/03/2005 2:53:48 PM PST by Bahbah (Tony Schaffer is a hero)
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To: caryatid

So they are going to build a new ghetto? On purpose? Why?


8 posted on 11/03/2005 2:54:37 PM PST by surely_you_jest
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To: surely_you_jest

absolutely...............HUD has long been the largest slumlord in the United States.


9 posted on 11/03/2005 2:58:56 PM PST by fisherman90814
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To: Continental Soldier
I seem to recall that some High End Condo Developers in Chicago received a HUD Loan to build Upscale Lofts and after a Law Suit were required to Open a portion of the complex to low income families.

The People that paid 500k to 1m for a Loft were very upset.
10 posted on 11/03/2005 2:59:03 PM PST by H. Paul Pressler IV
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To: RightWhale

Make no mistake, folks, the indigents will return to weight the vote!


11 posted on 11/03/2005 3:07:01 PM PST by stuckinloozeeana
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To: H. Paul Pressler IV

"after a Law Suit were required to Open a portion of the complex to low income families.

The People that paid 500k to 1m for a Loft were very upset."

Do they have to reduce the price, or just make it available?


12 posted on 11/03/2005 3:08:58 PM PST by bk1000 (A clear conscience is a sure sign of a poor memory)
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To: stuckinloozeeana

They will, but public housing is a step towards third-world status, which is an odd thing for the most capitalist country to even think of doing.


13 posted on 11/03/2005 3:09:05 PM PST by RightWhale (Repeal the law of the excluded middle)
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To: bk1000

The Section Eight people had very low rent while the people that paid a million for their loft saw their values fall.


14 posted on 11/03/2005 3:12:05 PM PST by H. Paul Pressler IV
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To: surely_you_jest

Because it is racism not to rebuild back the slums. Nagin and others have said so loud and clear.


15 posted on 11/03/2005 3:16:50 PM PST by Great Caesars Ghost (The Fault, dear Brutus, lies not in the Stars, but in Our Selves.)
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To: surely_you_jest
So they are going to build a new ghetto? On purpose? Why?

[1] Because of enormous political pressure; and,

[2] So that their "base" will be available to vote for them and keep them in power.

16 posted on 11/03/2005 3:22:20 PM PST by caryatid (Way down yonder in New Orleens ...)
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To: caryatid
EATH TO LIBERALS: MIDDLE CLASS WAGE EARNERS WILL NOT LIVE WITH LOW CLASS WELFARE BUMS AND CRIMINALS. END TRANSMISSION.
17 posted on 11/03/2005 3:29:39 PM PST by pabianice
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To: caryatid

If we absolutely, positively "must" provide subsidized housing (not a legitimate government function in my opinion, but realistically we'll never get rid of it), the subsidies should be in the form of "housing stamps" or vouchers, allowing the beneficiaries to apply the vouchers toward privately developed rental units, or toward private mortgages.

Building new slums (government housing projects) is not the answer, no matter how "integrated" (in two senses of the word) they are with middle-income housing.

But, of course, it gets back to the plantation mentality, and recreating the political bases of Dem mayors, state legislators, and Congresscritters with creatively drawn districts.


18 posted on 11/03/2005 3:37:32 PM PST by southernnorthcarolina ("Shut up," he explained.)
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To: arthurus
Now how mixed will a economically "mixed" housing project be in 2 years?

That depends on the ratio of subsidized to affordable to market rate. Our community has 10%, 10% and 80%. It works well. These ratios have been in place for 10-15 years.

19 posted on 11/03/2005 3:38:16 PM PST by speekinout
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To: pabianice
MIDDLE CLASS WAGE EARNERS WILL NOT LIVE WITH LOW CLASS WELFARE BUMS AND CRIMINALS.

Probably not willingly.

20 posted on 11/03/2005 3:44:41 PM PST by caryatid (Way down yonder in New Orleens ...)
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