Hahn Puts Up $1 Million to House San Diego’s Poor

When downtown San Diego’s biggest developer and James Rouse, the man known as the “Robin Hood of Real Estate,” get together, it could mean major changes for some of the city’s poor.

Ernest Hahn, developer of Horton Plaza, has donated $1 million to the Enterprise Foundation, a nonprofit group that helps communities across the nation renovate decaying city neighborhoods and build affordable homes for the poor.

Hahn, a member of the foundation’s board of directors, pledged the money on the condition that it would go to create housing for San Diego’s poor.

“I’m very interested in providing housing for the poor,” Hahn said.

Along with the foundation’s president, Edward Quinn, Hahn met with community leaders Monday to let them know what sort of help they might receive for their neighborhoods.

He described the program as a “partnership with community groups.”

The Enterprise Foundation, based in Columbia, Md., was founded by Rouse, who designed such city marketplaces as Boston’s Faneuil Hall and Harborplace in Baltimore.

In 1979, he began offering grants, low-interest loans and technical assistance to impoverished neighborhoods.

Ernest Hahn is helping to bring Rouse’s vision to San Diego. “We’ve got our share of poor,” Hahn said.

“I think in the downtown and barrio areas we’ll find people with incomes below $9,000.” One of the foundation’s requirements is that the housing be for families with an annual income less than $10,000.

Working with people in the neighborhood is a vital part of the philosophy, according to Quinn.

“When people have a stake in a neighborhood, they’re more likely to take pride in it and take care of it.”