Carter Unveils Tijuana Housing Effort

A group of school girls recited a ballad of welcome in his honor. Residents of a poor neighborhood presented him with a plaque for his recognition that decent housing is a “human right.” The people gave his wife, Rosalynn, a bouquet of white lilies and red carnations.

“We’re here to make friends,” a smiling Jimmy Carter, shirt sleeves rolled up, told the excited residents of the Tijuana community known as Mariano Matamoros Sur. “We want to build some houses and learn what we can do to help,” said Carter, making a well-appreciated effort to speak Spanish.

The former president came to Tijuana and San Diego Tuesday with a mission: As a representative of a Georgia-based volunteer group called Habitat for Humanity, which provides housing for the needy in the United States and more than 2 dozen other nations, Carter unveiled plans for the construction of 100 homes in Tijuana and up to 10 more in Southeast San Diego.

The homes, Carter said, will be largely completed during the week of June 18-23 of next year. The Carters and up to 1,000 more volunteers will participate in what Carter said was the most ambitious Habitat effort to date, surpassing programs in places as diverse as New York City’s Lower East Side and the Andean villages of Peru.

“It sounds almost impossible,” he said afterward during a press conference at the plush Hotel del Coronado.

Carter’s appearance as a volunteer, one questioner noted, contrasted considerably with former President Ronald Reagan’s visit to Japan, for which he was reportedly was paid $2 million by a Japanese sponsor. Carter declined to criticize his successor, saying only that “that kind of post-presidential career” didn’t interest him.

Carter has been closely identified with Habitat since leaving the presidency in 1980. He spoke glowingly of the organization’s methods and goals. Future residents are required to help construct their dwellings, a process often referred to as “sweat equity.” They repay Habitat for building materials, but the money is paid back without interest over a long term--10 to 25 years--and Habitat makes no profit. The funds are plowed back into more housing.

“We don’t give away anything,” Carter noted at the Coronado press briefing, which was followed by a combination informational dinner and fund-raiser.

Habitat survives on donations, accepting no government funds, Carter said. It was hoped that Tuesday’s dinner, which included a roster of influential guests from both sides of the border, would help raise enough funds to put a dent in the $1.6-million expense for the Tijuana-San Diego house-building extravaganza in June.

Habitat itself, Carter noted, is not connected to any political party or government. Various religions are represented, he said, but there is no religious requirement for homeowners.

Speaking on a range of topics, Carter expressed outrage at the funding and influence-peddling scandals that have emerged from the Reagan Administration’s Department of Housing and Urban Development, an agency supposedly dedicated in part to providing housing to the poor. “Absolutely disgusting,” Carter said of allegations that “rich friends of the President” reaped huge profits for minimal consulting duties.

Carter, who is still widely respected in Latin America for his stand on human rights, recalled proudly how he and Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega--a pariah to the Reagan and Bush administrations--had “laid bricks together (and) handed out Bibles together” during Carter’s recent visit to Nicaragua, where Habitat has numerous projects.

Explaining his interest in Habitat, Carter noted that the volunteer program offers a singular possibility for rich and poor to rub shoulders. He described the labor in spiritual terms, urging all listeners to pick up a pick and shovel next June and join the work crews.

“It’s an experience you’ll never forget,” said Carter, who added that he and his wife will probably be living in a work camp.

In Tijuana, Habitat has built more than 2 dozen homes since its program began 18 months ago. There was excitement Tuesday in the neighborhood of Mariano Matamoros Sur, about 15 miles east of downtown, where most of the new homes are to be built.

Like so many other communities in the fast-growing city of almost 2 million, Matamoros has limited electricity and running water for its 1,600 families. Residents, mostly migrants from the Mexican interior, “invaded” what was government land three years ago, arriving as squatters in a pattern now familiar throughout much of Mexico.