Public housing at The Banks: 'ill-timed'
BY GREGORY KORTE | GKORTE@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Mayor Mark Mallory angrily swatted down demands for public
housing at The Banks Wednesday, saying it was ill-timed and
counterproductive to affordable housing efforts in the region.
“How dare they? How dare CMHA,” Mallory said testily, the day after the
Cincinnati Metropolitan Housing Authority voted to insist that the $1
billion riverfront development set aside a ****tion of the project for
subsidized housing.
The mayor was particularly upset that he was blindsided by the proposal,
coming as it did the week before heavy equipment is to begin moving dirt
between the stadiums on the Ohio River – and a decade after the project
was first proposed.
Mallory’s sentiments were echoed by Hamilton County commissioners, who
either flatly dismissed the idea or declined to answer questions as
“inflammatory.”
But those same officials also conceded that they can’t keep low-income
housing out of The Banks if CMHA forces the issue. The housing agency
could buy units at market price, and then lease them at subsidized rates
to low-income residents.
That would mean federal taxpayers would be paying market rates for
low-income residents to live at The Banks.
If nothing else, CMHA’s belated entry into The Banks debate exposed the
deep divisions over housing policy throughout the region. All day on talk
radio and on Enquirer.com, critics assailed the idea – saying it would
sabotage efforts to get condo buyers and businesses to invest in what’s
been called one of the most im****tant economic development projects in the
city’s history.
Pete Witte, the Price Hill neighborhood leader and housing commissioner
who authored the Banks resolution, made clear Wednesday that the proposal
was not rhetorical. CMHA’s official policy, he said, is to push for
low-income housing at The Banks – though he said the details were open to
negotiation.
But he also said he hoped to prompt a broader discussion about housing
policy – particularly the Section 8 vouchers that allow low-income
families to pay below-market rents from private landlords throughout the
county.
Witte, one of three West Side residents who now form a majority on the
independent housing agency, believes that those vouchers have depressed
property values in just a few city neighborhoods.
“It’s been quite enlightening hearing and reading the comments of people
about low-income individuals. They want low-income families penned up in
low-income neighborhoods, and that’s not happening anymore,” he said from
his engraving business on Glenway Avenue. “The Banks needs to take its
fair share, just like Mount Lookout, just like Hyde Park, and just like my
friends in Symmes Town****p – wherever that is.”
A 2003 Republican candidate for Cincinnati City Council, Witte said he
knows his proposal has no political sup****t.
“It’s a total political hot potato. They cringe at the thought of having
to deal with this issue,” he said. “We’ll give it a few weeks to settle
down bit, and then we’ll sit down and talk about it. We’re here, and we’re
ready to talk.”
Mallory said he’s willing to do just that. In remarks while touring the
Cinergy Center in advance of his youth job fair today, Mallory tossed out
a litany of frustrations with the housing authority.
He said the destruction of project-based public housing – particularly in
English Woods on the West Side and Lincoln and Laurel Homes projects in
the West End – have had a devastating impact on residents and surrounding
neighborhoods.
“If CMHA wants to come in to my office and demonstrate to me that they are
having so much trouble developing affordable housing in Hamilton County, I
would be happy to enter into a discussion with them about how to achieve
those goals,” Mallory said, emphasizing the word “county.” “Those are
goals that we share.”
http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080416/NEWS01/304160049
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