Homeless Housing Plan Splits Opinions : Shelter: A builder calls a proposal to allow the poor to occupy vacant properties ‘stupid.’ Advocates praise the experiment.
A proposal to place low-income families in vacant houses in North Hollywood is being condemned as “outrageous . . . stupid” or praised as “a win-win situation” by those who would be affected.
Called Recycle a Neighborhood, Los Angeles City Council President John Ferraro’s proposed experiment would allow low-income families to live virtually rent-free for up to six months in vacant houses awaiting demolition by developers.
Neighborhoods would be safer and more attractive because working families--carefully screened by a nonprofit housing agency--would replace drug dealers and vandals who now illegally occupy the houses, according to Ferraro.
Meanwhile, developers who make vacant houses available to the poor while awaiting demolition permits would receive quick approval for their projects from city building authorities, and they could avoid potentially costly safety and health code violations.
Ferraro said the project would at first operate on a small scale--only five or six houses at a time would be used--and might later be expanded if successful. The councilman said the program, which received preliminary approval from a City Council committee last week, could eventually be implemented throughout Los Angeles, though there are currently no plans to do so.
The plan is expected to come before the full council for a vote in the next two weeks, Ferraro said.
But despite its appeal as a weapon in the war on homelessness, the plan has so far received a mixed, and in some cases hostile, response from several developers and neighbors who might be asked to participate in the voluntary program.
“It’s an outrageous idea. A stupid idea,” said Robert Johnson, president of Bloomfield Development Corp., which owns two boarded-up, vacant houses on Bloomfield Street in North Hollywood that the city would like to use as temporary homeless shelters. “I don’t think any developer would want to risk having a family in there and not being able to get them out.”
Johnson said he expects to bulldoze the houses in about two months to make way for a nine-unit condominium.
Neighbors of Johnson’s property, meanwhile, said they worry about the types of people who would move in.
“Aren’t those the kids that cause the problems--the kids of families that are out of work?” asked one resident, who asked not to be identified. “Aren’t they the ones that will take my hubcaps to support their families?”
Representatives of several nearby homeowner groups called the plan a free ride for developers.
“It comes down to the old love affair between the city and developers,” said Bob Carcia, president of a local slow-growth organization. He said the city contributed to the homeless problem by approving high-rent apartment projects and condominiums that replaced older, affordable apartments and single-family houses.
Advocates for the homeless, however, hailed the shelter project as a creative and relatively inexpensive way to provide short-term affordable housing in a city plagued by high rents. They said they knew of no similar projects in the United States, though several cities require developers to pay into a fund for homeless housing as a condition of getting a building permit.
“I think it’s really a potentially positive impact . . . because they have a place to live and can take care of the property at the same time,” said Ruth Schwartz, executive director of the Shelter Partnership, which helps find housing for the homeless in Los Angeles County. “It’s a win-win situation when designed well.”
Joan Alker, assistant director for the National Coalition for the Homeless, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group, said the program, like all transitional housing, is a “Band-Aid measure” but should be given a try.
“Something is better than nothing,” she said. “I think it’s important that developers play a role in ensuring that affordable housing is available to people.”
Ferraro and advocates for the homeless said the criticism from developers and neighbors is unwarranted because organizers have gone to great lengths to ensure that only reliable people--who happen to have fallen on bad times--will be admitted to the program.
“Our belief is that when people are in the category of working poor families they are very good people,” said Mary Presby, an aide to Ferraro who has helped plan the project. “It’s just that housing in Los Angeles is very expensive.”
The plan calls for prospective tenants to be screened by L.A. Family Housing Corp., a nonprofit agency based in North Hollywood that helps the poor find housing and jobs and that provides health care, child care and mental health counseling. L.A. Family Housing would receive $10,000 in city redevelopment funds to run the pilot program.
Regarded as one of the leaders in the homeless assistance field, L.A. Family Housing will require that tenants hold jobs and are willing to submit to detailed credit checks, said Arnold Stalk, the agency’s executive director.
People with a history of homelessness, drug abuse or mental illness will not be admitted to the program, Stalk said.
“The families we would be putting in there are not the chronically homeless,” he said. “They are people that have lost their jobs and need some time to get back on their feet so they can afford the rents.”
Families will be recruited from the agency’s Valley Shelter Inc., a homeless shelter on Lankershim Boulevard in North Hollywood. Only vacant houses in relatively good condition will be selected, Presby said. Repairs will be provided by the city free of charge to developers, she said.
The Recycle a Neighborhood plan was first proposed to the City Council in April, 1990, after several residents of Auckland Avenue in North Hollywood complained of drug dealers and vagrants in a row of vacant houses on adjacent Cahuenga Boulevard. At least four houses on Auckland Avenue were burglarized, said Joe Fleishman, one of the neighbors who alerted Ferraro’s office to the problem.
“If it is a family, no matter how low the income, they will be more respectful of the property than if it was just boarded up,” said Fleishman. “I think they would make good neighbors--certainly better than what we had.”
The area targeted for the project is bounded by Victory Boulevard on the north, Ventura Boulevard on the south, the city of Burbank on the east and Tujunga Avenue on the west. The area has seen intensive redevelopment in recent years, resulting in a large number of houses that sit vacant until developers secure financing and obtain city building and demolition permits.
Developers chiefly worry about the costs of evicting tenants if they refuse to leave after the six months are up. They said eviction proceedings typically cost about $600 each and take at least three months--costing developers thousands of dollars in lost revenue and interest earnings.
Officials plan to set aside $5,000 in redevelopment funds to pay for potential eviction proceedings, but even that is not nearly enough to compensate for lost revenues, according to Johnson of Bloomfield Development.
Though some neighbors on Bloomfield Street condemned the idea, others said it was necessary to help the homeless, even if it means heightened safety concerns.
“It is a bit of a concern, but I know that a need is there,” said David Sisam, who lives across the street from the vacant houses. “I wouldn’t stop a thing like that from happening, but I’ll probably watch my house more carefully.”
