Oregon: If working people can’t afford to stay in the housing, it’s not affordable housing

September 27, 2024 by Leave a Comment

Martha Rosler, Housing Is a Human Right, short animation produced by The Public Art Fund, “Messages to the Public,” 1989

What exactly is affordable housing? There’s much discussion these days, and finally, concerning an affordable housing crisis, the lack of affordable housing, the vast and growing numbers of households, families, individuals and communities living and struggling with housing insecurity, paying more than 30% of monthly income on household expenses and/or expecting to be evicted or foreclosed on within the next two months. So, what does affordability actually mean? This question came roaring to the surface in a new study, Eviction in Oregon’s Subsidized Affordable Housing, which looked at eviction filings and evictions from January 2019 to December 2023. On one hand, eviction filings against residents of subsidized affordable housing made up a relatively small fraction of all eviction filings in Oregon. However, once the eviction case was filed, subsidized tenants were more likely to get an eviction judgment. The vast majority of these filings were for non-payment. The vast majority of non- or late payment was because, simply, the tenants, the residents of supposedly affordable housing, could no longer afford the affordable housing. As a concept, policy, and lived reality, what then is affordable housing?

As in most areas, the majority of evictions are filed by a small number of entities. In this instance, as in so many other places, third-party corporate management companies were responsible for a disproportionate number of evictions. As noted in the report, “The difference in eviction filing patterns between third-party managers and internal managers … can be attributed to variations in their lease enforcement strategies …. While third-party managers commonly operate under compliance-oriented lease enforcement policies similar to the private sector, internal managers from the housing authority tend to adopt strategies designed to promote housing stability among low-income households.” In other words, internal managers, managers committed to affordable housing rather than profit, create leases, policies and practices that recognize various difficulties residents might encounter and find or create financial and social services to support those residents.

For many, once the filing occurs, the damage is done. Many algorithms used by landlords, and especially corporate landlords, don’t differentiate between eviction filing and eviction, and so, irrespective of the court’s decision, having an eviction filed can have long-lasting catastrophic impact. Securing “affordable housing” shouldn’t condemn a person and family to a lifetime of trauma.

The word “afford” originally meant to promote the well-being of a person or thing. Affordable meant that which enhanced and promote a person’s well-being. At some point, affordable shifted to mean that which one could reasonably purchase. What if affordable housing meant the enhancement and promotion of people’s and individual’s well-being? At the very least, publicly supported and subsidized affordable housing should be based on the value of dignity and well-being. If working people can’t afford to stay in the housing, it’s not affordable housing.

 

(By Dan Moshenberg)

(Image Credit: Martha Rosler / Housing Is a Human Right, March 1989)

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In Vancouver, why is the rent too damn high? (Hint: it’s not inflation or market changes)

August 27, 2024 by Leave a Comment

 

Like most cities, Vancouver is an expensive place to live in. Located in British Columbia, Vancouver is the third largest metro area in Canada. According to a recent report, Vancouver is also the third least affordable housing market in the world, after Hong Kong and Sydney, Australia. For each of the last 16 years, Vancouver has been the first, second or third least affordable major market. That’s some distinction. According to the report, Vancouver’s housing market is “impossibly unaffordable”. Impossibly … and in fact.

What happens in Vancouver does not stay in Vancouver: “Troublingly, impossibly unaffordable housing in the Vancouver market has also has spread to smaller BC markets in British Columbia …. From 2015 to 2023, housing affordability worsened by the equivalent of 2.5 years of median household income in smaller markets outside Vancouver, an even greater loss than the 1.2 years in the Vancouver market itself.” Troubling, indeed.

An equally recent report from British Columbia’s Office of the Human Rights Commissioner, noted the depth, breadth and centrality of the impossibly unaffordable housing crisis: “The collision of market forces with inadequate social supports has pushed thousands of B.C. residents into homelessness and left many more on the brink.” Unsurprisingly, homelessness and severe housing insecurity target women and children, Indigenous people, people of color, people living with disabilities, low-income people. According to the Commissioner, “In our research unaffordable, inaccessible and inappropriate housing quickly and unsurprisingly rose to the top of the human rights issues facing British Columbians.” Unsurprisingly.

Another unsurprising report, from BC Housing, the provincial housing agency,  considers the workings of two public agencies, Shelter Aid for Elderly Renters Program, SAFER, and the Rental Assistance Program. SAFER launched in 1977, the Rental Assistance Program started in 2006. The report found that both programs have done a fairly decent job until recently, but rapidly rising rents have threatened that success: “While SAFER and RAP help to make housing more affordable, a significant affordability gap for many SAFER and RAP recipients exists. …. Recipients of both programs are in danger of entering into homelessness or seeking affordable options that may result in living in unsuitable or unsafe housing should rents continue to increase …. The impact of these programs has declined over time as housing costs have increased dramatically across the province.”

Vancouver is impossibly unaffordable; unaffordable, inaccessible and inappropriate housing is the key human rights issue; and previously fairly successful assistance programs are now endangered, all thanks to rapidly rising rents. What is to be done? While all the authors of all the reports are committed to housing justice, to equal access to safe and dignified housing as a human right, they also all fall prey to the Great Market Forces Fallacy. Consider this statement, from the last report’s conclusion: “There is no doubt that both SAFER and RAP are helping to achieve greater affordability for many recipients …. However, the rent ceilings and the lack of indexing to inflation or market changes was readily identified by all as a barrier to affordability. For some, the lack of change in benefits has resulted in them being priced out of the rental market in their desired community. It has also limited their ability to move out of less desirable housing. The stress of possible evictions is high due to the inability of the benefit to adequately contribute to new rents should the household be required to move.” Clearly and unsurprisingly, recipients need subsidies to match rising rents. But then what? Rents are not rising because of inflation. Rents are rising because landlords, increasingly corporate landlords, are able and more than willing to raise rents precipitously. As long as homes are part of a “real estate market”, as long as public and social housing in considered an afterthought, as long as landlords are lords of the land, rents will continue to rise … rapidly.

In the late 1880s, looking around at the ways in which the new urban real estate market was carving up Manchester, Friedrich Engels noted, “The English bourgeoisie is charitable out of self-interest; it gives nothing outright, but regards its gifts as a business matter, makes a bargain with the poor, saying: `If I spend this much upon benevolent institutions, I thereby purchase the right not to be troubled any further, and you are bound thereby to stay in your dusky holes and not to irritate my tender nerves by exposing your misery. You shall despair as before, but you shall despair unseen, this I require, this I purchase with my subscription of twenty pounds for the infirmary!’” The barrier to affordability is not inflation nor market changes. It’s the unchanging cruelty of the market itself, unsurprisingly, impossibly, troublingly, and everyday.

 

(By Dan Moshenberg)

(Image Credit: Visual Capitalist)

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Millions of affordable homes have disappeared over the past decade

March 21, 2024 by Leave a Comment

“Millions of lower-cost apartments have essentially disappeared over the past decade, either through rising rents or by falling into disrepair” The New York Times March 21, 2024

Earlier this month, the National Low Income Housing Coalition came out with its annual report on the availability, or lack thereof, of affordable housing, The Gap 2024: A Shortage of Affordable Housing. “No state has an adequate supply of affordable rental housing for the lowest-income renters”. According to NLIHC, the current shortage is more acute than it was prior to the pandemic. There are currently 7.1 million affordable homes for 11 million households. “Of those. 7.0 million rental units, 3.3 million are occupied by higher income households, leaving only 3.7 million rental homes that are both affordable and available for extremely low-income renters.”

According to the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, “housing is unaffordable because wages have not kept up with rising rents. There is no county or state where a full-time minimum-wage worker can afford a modest apartment. At minimum wage, people have to work 86 hours a week to afford a one-bedroom. Even when people can afford a home, one is not always available. In 1970, the United States had a surplus of 300,000 affordable homes. Today, only 37 affordable homes are available for every 100 extremely low-income renters. As a result, 70% of the lowest-wage households spend more than half their income on rent, placing them at high risk of homelessness when unexpected expenses (such as car repairs and medical bills) arise.”

Wages are stagnant, rents increase. That contributes to the housing crisis. Almost half the affordable homes are occupied by higher income households. That also contributes to the housing crisis. But there’s more. Across the country, municipalities “fail”, or refuse, to create more affordable units: “No new affordable rental units were brought online in 2023, and no units were rehabilitated. Further, Des Moines failed to achieve, even in part, its goal of assisting 35 households facing homelessness with `rapid rehousing.’” Or take Millburn Township, a wealthy New Jersey suburb of New York City. Thanks to a landmark legal case years ago, New Jersey is ruled by the Mount Laurel legal doctrine which decrees that every town in the state has to make it possible to build lower-cost residences. Millburn Township decided it didn’t have to. So first it ignored repeated court decisions and then, more recently, it simply pulled out of a relatively modest affordable housing project. At present, Millburn Township has only 38 affordable homes. Refusal and failure, failure and refusal contribute to and intensify the affordable housing crisis.

A report issued today, suggests that for the next five years, renting will be 38% cheaper than buying. For the next five years, the pressure on the rental market to upscale, by raising rents and by remodeling for bigger units, will continue or increase. But what’s five years in a country in which people wait for federal housing vouchers for over a decade and then, when they’re “lucky” enough to finally catch one, landlords won’t accept them. Yes, that’s illegal. No, landlords don’t get punished. What’s five years in that context, in that nation?

Five years is half a decade. Again, over the past decade, millions of lower-cost, affordable and especially deeply affordable homes have disappeared. Many were allowed or even encouraged to “fall into disrepair”, encouraged by a market and society in which owners could make more profit by destroying their stock, often with the hopes of recouping the “loss” later through “redevelopment”. The rest were disappeared by rising and then skyrocketing rents. Millions of affordable and deeply affordable residences, homes, were disappeared, kidnapped, and working families across the United States were, have been, and are being held for ransom. What is justice in a nation that can countenance the destruction of millions of homes and the devastation of tens of millions of lives in such a short period of time?  Where once the alibi for forced removal of housing and populations was “blight”, today it’s just business as usual. Five years is half a decade, and, really, what’s a decade?

(By Dan Moshenberg)

(Image Credit: Amanda Williams, “Color(ed) Theory: Crown Royal Bag” / Smithsonian)

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In Montreal, Carla White re-writes the David-and-Goliath script

June 5, 2023 by Leave a Comment

Carla White outside her apartment building

“And there went out a champion out of the camp of the Philistines, named Goliath, of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span. And he had a helmet of brass upon his head, and he was armed with a coat of mail; and the weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of brass. And he had greaves of brass upon his legs, and a target of brass between his shoulders. And the staff of his spear was like a weaver’s beam; and his spear’s head weighed six hundred shekels of iron: and one bearing a shield went before him.”  King James Bible

 According to contemporary scholars, it was not David who killed the “champion” Goliath but rather Elhanan, son of Jair. Later, the story was revised by “supporters of the Davidic dynasty.” But what really matters, to these scholars, is the detailed representation of Goliath’s armor. In Montreal right now, a single tenant, Carla White, is resisting attempts by a major developer, Mondev, and she, like David or Elhanan, is undeterred by flashy armor and massive size. By accurately assessing the housing situation and her own position, Carla White has held up a luxury condo development for three years. Here’s her story.

After a series of eviction, Carla White finally found a place she could afford. That was ten years ago. The apartment is one room, has no working stove, and mostly filled with a bed and a small desk, and loads of plants. But, and importantly, Carla White pays $400, Canadian, a month. By law, the rent can’t be raised, and so Carla White has a secure and stable place, however diminutive, in which to live. Or she had one, until Mondev showed up, a few years ago. Mondev wants to demolish the building and build 176 luxury condos. They made offers to other tenants, who accepted. Others simply moved. But Carla White looked at the new skyscrapers in her neighborhood, looked at the apartment listings as well, and asked, “I look out there and say, where am I going now?” Rather than succumb to the inevitability of nowhere-to-go, Carla White stood her ground and entered into negotiations.

According to Mondev, they have made offers, which they describe as more than generous, for the past three years. The last offer was $20,000, Canadian. Mondev is portraying this as a more than reasonable offer, one that would ensure housing for Carla White for some time to come. Carla White responded, “How far will $20,000 go (at) $1,600 a month? I will be evicted within a year. I will be out on the roads.” Carla White’s attorney, Manuel Johnson, added: “She’s not trying to save the building. She knows it needs to be renovated. She just wants somewhere safe and affordable to live …. Whatever reasonable settlement Ms White needs for housing stability in no way will endanger the financial viability of their project. They don’t have any cash-flow problems, they’re going to be making millions of dollars on this development.” In other words, their armor is coated with mail.

Canada is in the throes of an affordable housing crisis, as it is in the midst of an eviction boom. British Columbia leads the race to the bottom, while Quebec, led by Montreal, has seen an explosion of `renovictions’. In the United States, starting in the late 1940s, blight and `urban renewal’ became the excuse to displace entire working-class communities of color. Contemporary Canada’s equivalent to `blight’ is `renovation’. Across Canada, tenants are forming tenant unions and engaging in rent strikes. As corporate landlords consume increasing portions of urban residential space and push for higher and higher rent increases, the number of rent strikes are expected to rise. From organized collective action to organized individual actions, everyone is asking the question Carla White is asking, “I look out there and say, where am I going now?”

(By Dan Moshenberg)

(Photo Credit: CTV Montreal News / La Presse Canadienne / Christinne Muschi)

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On Tuesday, across the United States, voters turned out to support affordable housing!

November 10, 2022 by 2 Comments

On Wednesday, a day after the mid-term elections, Diane Yentel, President and CEO of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, went to Twitter to announce, “Voters turned out to support affordable housing yesterday! @NLIHC is tracking nearly 100 affordable housing ballot measures advanced by our state and local partners – here’s what we know so far.” While some were fixated on the supposed, and dreaded, red wave or tsunami or tide or whatever it was, which happily never materialized, across the country, activists and organizers worked night and day to address the affordable housing crisis ravaging the country. Here’s what we know so far. First, most of the ballot initiatives supporting funding for affordable housing passed. Second, and equally important, many of them passed by large margins. For example, 70% of voters in Kansas City, Missouri; Austin, Texas; Columbus, Ohio approved initiatives for more, lots more, affordable housing. Want to watch a wave? Watch housing ballot initiatives across the country.

Let’s start on the West Coast and move eastward. California had 52 local ballot initiatives on housing. In the Bay Area, Berkeley authorized 3000 units of affordable housing. Oakland authorized 13,000 units and also expanded and extended eviction protections. Richmond passed a rent cap of 3% annually. That’s only in the Bay Area. In Los Angeles, voters weighed in on Measure ULA, United to House LA, which would raise taxes on home sales over $5 million. According to ACLU attorney Kath Rogers, “This city ballot initiative is a once-in-a-generation chance to end housing insecurity in Los Angeles. It will help keep people in their homes and support low-income seniors and disabled neighbors. Importantly, this measure will build the homes we need to reduce houselessness.” This initiative came from community-based organizations coming together to articulate their solutions and their visions for the future. The same is happening across the country. At last count, it looked like Measure ULA would pass and handily.

Voters in Flagstaff, Arizona, passed Proposition 442, which raises $20 million for affordable housing, by redeveloping city- and privately owned housing into affordable rental units.  Proposition 442 garnered over 60% of the votes.

Voters in Austin strongly backed a $350 million bond to be used for affordable housing acquisition, repair and rental programs.

In Missouri, Kansas City voters overwhelmingly approved $50 million for affordable housing: “According to the city, the $50 million will be Kansas City’s largest investment in affordable housing ever made.”

In Ohio, Columbia voters approved, again overwhelmingly, $200 for affordable housing: affordable rental construction; affordable home ownership; affordable housing preservation; homeless services.

In Florida, Palm Beach County voters approved a $200 million bond for affordable “workforce” units. In Orange County, Florida, 59% of the voters approved a rent control measure.

In North Carolina, 74% of Charlotte voters approved a $50 million bond for affordable housing. In Buncombe County, 62% of the voters approved a $40 million bond for affordable housing.

In Maryland, 82% of those who voted in Baltimore approved a $14 million bond for affordable housing.

Over the next few days, more results will come in, but the picture is already clear. From “overwhelming” to “strongly backing” to vote tallies showing 60 to 80% approval, the demand to provide adequate, decent affordable housing constitutes the wave. Yes, the country is divided, inequality continues to grow and intensify, `partisanship’ is expressed in both strident tones and acts of violence. But across the country, large majorities of people decided the time is now, housing is a right, make it happen. Housing is a human right. Support for adequate, decent, affordable housing is support for our basic, collective humanity. Join the overwhelming wave, vote for, work for affordable housing now.

(By Dan Moshenberg)

(Photo Credit: Martha Rosler, Housing Is a Human Right / e-flux)

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From Grenfell Tower to Philadelphia and New York to … the fire next time

January 10, 2022 by Leave a Comment

In 2017, 72 people died and 70 others were injured in the Grenfell Tower fire.  Afterward the British government extended benefits to the injured and displaced, terminated the management company’s contract, and began addressing similar flammable cladding hazards at other buildings. The British government’s response to Grenfell may not have been enough, but it was at least something.  And it should have been a wakeup call to the United States, which has neglected its crumbling public housing infrastructure for decades. Estimates of the cost to fix up our existing public housing stock now exceed $70 billion after prolonged disinvestment.  Much of the needed funds would have been included in the Build Back Better Act that Senator Manchin torpedoed just before the holidays. Now we have seen two fires in HUD-subsidized properties within a week.  12 perished in the Philadelphia fire and 19 died in the fire in the Bronx, in New York City.

Mass-casualty are extreme examples but substandard housing kills constantly.  Often it’s the child electrocuted by bare wires or the elderly person whose lungs can’t handle the mold or the fall from the porch that finally gives way. This is to say nothing of the untold numbers of non-fatal, yet serious injuries that unsafe housing causes.

The dangerous condition of much U.S. housing stock in the 1920s and 1930s was a major catalyst for the original development of public housing.  Now we are seeing it again – dangerous housing for lower-income households, whether publicly-owned or private.

If some good came come out of these fires, perhaps we will finally see the much-needed investments in public housing capital improvements that we have needed since the 1980s.  And perhaps building inspectors will start taking their duties more seriously. But if we do nothing, then the next fire is on you, Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema.

 

(By Eric Dunn) (Eric Dunn is Litigation Director at National Housing Law Project. He writes here in his own capacity)

(Infographic Credit: National Low Income Housing Coalition)

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When it comes to affordable housing, Alexandria continues its race to the bottom

February 21, 2016 by Leave a Comment


Since 2000, the very small city of Alexandria, Virginia, outside of Washington, DC, has “lost” 12,000 affordable apartments, most of whose residents were African American, Latino, and then African immigrants. In the past, the alibi was “development.” In the most recent episode, that of Ramsey Homes, it’s “heritage”. Either way, the result is the same.

Ramsey Homes is 74 years old and in terrible shape. It was originally built for African American defense workers, and so was always “very Spartan”. It has no air conditioning, inadequate heating and electricity, deteriorating plumbing, and the list goes on.

The residents want and deserve better. Many want to tear down the buildings and start anew, with promises that they will be among the new. They know the history of `urban renewal’ in Alexandria, and they know it hasn’t included them. But they believed that if they could make their case, this time the City would act differently.

It didn’t. Along with much bungling among city agencies responsible for housing, the City Council couldn’t move forward because some of its members listened to a call for `historic preservation.’

Charkenia Walker, a resident of Ramsey Homes, has tried to get the City Council and other city agencies to understand the situation: “It’s hard to believe the historic significance and relevance outweighs the standard of living in 2015. I just want neighbors to understand the construction of new units will benefit us as a whole. There are working-class citizens who cannot afford to live in the neighborhood in which they have grown, me included … The units are old. Think of an aging person. When you get old, you don’t walk as good as you used to, you don’t climb stairs as good as you used to, your mechanisms begin to change. The same thing is happening inside of these units, they are falling apart.”

Ramsey Homes is the architecture of affordable housing in Alexandria: disregarded by public officials and public policy for decades, crumbling, and toxic. The residents have struggled to secure decent housing, here and now, here where they live and have roots and commitments, and now. The residence may be Spartan, but the neighborhood is home.

Once again, the City has failed them, and this failure is nothing new. It’s systemic, longstanding and part of the plan. It’s time, it’s way past time, to reverse the past two decades of loss and violence.

 

(Photo Credit: Alexandria Times)

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