Watts Residents Go Public on Privatization : Housing: Some Nickerson Gardens residents push for ownership. Others say buying part of a housing project is not <i> their </i> American dream.
Imagine the Nickerson Gardens Cooperative--a sprawling assortment of well-kept units in Watts for sale at bargain prices, with modern appliances, skylights and great freeway access.
That’s what a group of residents is proposing for Los Angeles’ largest public housing project, a place better known today for its late-night gunfire, poverty and roaches.
Elected tenant leaders at Nickerson Gardens have applied for $111 million from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to modernize the sprawling, post-World War II-era development, promote economic growth in the surrounding neighborhood and turn the drab two-story rental units into resident-owned cooperatives.
But critics see HUD’s Homeownership and Opportunity for People Everywhere program--a plan called HOPE that is one of the cornerstones of President Bush’s urban renewal efforts--as a condescending quick fix that overlooks the social problems that keep people in public housing.
Those who are pushing the privatization effort say it will boost the self-esteem of Nickerson Garden’s 5,000 residents, create a sense of neighborhood in a place now mired by fear and provide a piece of the American dream to families that have given up hope.
“Why not own it?” asked Mary Sansom, a 54-year-old grandmother who was forced into the project four years ago by economics and tough luck. “Right now my rent is just going down the drain,” she said, pointing out the ceiling fan, carpeting and garbage disposal that she installed in her unit. “I’ve made improvements, and I don’t even own the place.”
But some of Sansom’s neighbors say that if they had the money to buy a unit, the first thing they would do is move. Most residents, they claim, are not truly behind the privatization effort but instead are being manipulated by a few of the project’s elected leaders. And they suspect that the government is trying to wash its hands of public housing by turning over the troubled properties to the poor.
“My American dream is not to own a unit in public housing--come on,” said Pam Griffin, who works as a job counselor in the projects and has participated in protests against the plan. “I want a white fence and a Jacuzzi. A housing project is not the American dream. It’s not even the African-American dream.”
Griffin, a former teen-age mother whose daughter is now a teen-age mother herself, has spent all her 35 years in Nickerson Gardens.
Her four children and her mother live in the blue-and-purple project, as do her brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews--so many relatives and in-laws, she said, that they are too plentiful to count. Nickerson Gardens has become a family tradition, Griffin said, one she desperately wants to end.
“This is rat and roach infested,” Griffin said. “There’s no privacy. The pipes don’t work. I want my own back yard to lay on the grass with a book or something. I have relatives who have homes. And when I visit them, I don’t want to come back here.”
The push for home ownership in the projects is representative of conservative social policy, which stresses self-reliance for those most in need and questions the entitlement programs of the past. Critics, however, call the efforts simplistic, questioning whether they address deep-seated social ills that keep poor families in the projects.
Nickerson Gardens, built in 1955 at Imperial Highway and Compton Avenue, is one of several local projects moving toward privatization.
The Los Angeles Housing Authority will review a plan later this month under which a developer would renovate the 50-year-old Normont Terrace complex in Harbor City, with the eventual goal of selling it to the residents.
And seven other Los Angeles housing projects have received a total of $1.7 million in planning money from HUD, geared toward training residents to set up resident management councils and begin planning for homeownership.
Nickerson Gardens residents, confident that they already have the structures for self-government in place, have applied directly for money to convert to home ownership.
In its application, the Nickerson Gardens resident group cited the more than $2 million in grants it has received since 1990--without help from the Housing Authority--to install a computer room, purchase office equipment, begin security guard training classes and run a transportation program within the complex.
By September, they will learn which of 27 housing projects nationwide has won the federal funds. Several smaller housing projects in Baltimore, Nashville and Washington already have become resident-owned through HUD programs.
“We want to own our homes for the same reason anybody else does,” said Nora King, who as president of Nickerson Garden’s resident group has been pushing the privatization plan aggressively.
King met privately with Mayor Tom Bradley earlier this month to sell him on the idea. Before that, she talked HUD officials into extending the application deadline. She speaks of HOPE as the key to the future of Nickerson Gardens.
“We want to do things for ourselves for a change,” King said. “We’re talking about empowerment, no longer relying on the Housing Authority. I’ve been here almost 19 years, and residents are finally ready to run this place.”
But her campaign is controversial.
When HUD Secretary Jack Kemp appeared at Nickerson Gardens last month to promote his home-ownership campaign, he drew 20 to 30 pickets who shouted down speakers and waved placards that criticized “Bush, Quayle and Kemp” for neglecting the inner city. Many of the protesters derided the idea of privatization, with one man yelling, “Why would I want to own this dump?”
Indeed, the plan has sparked bitter feuding inside Nickerson, where some residents have accused leaders of the resident group--especially King--of not properly involving the community in deliberations. Critics also complain that King and other leaders of the project’s resident management corporation have not followed through on programs started with the $2 million in grants.
“I think a lot of residents feel like they have been excluded rather than included,” said Jim Smith, who manages the community services center at Nickerson for the city’s Community Development Department. Both inside and outside Nickerson, he said, the perception among many is that the resident management corporation has turned into a “Nora King Production.”
King angrily denies that she is steering the residents anywhere. “Before I come to this office I pray for the Lord to guide my footsteps and bridle my tongue,” she said, sitting in a rental unit that has been converted into an office for the residents’ group. “When I come here, I don’t come for myself.”
King said that she was elected by the residents and continues to maintain their support. Residents have been kept informed about the home-ownership plan by regular meetings, flyers passed out throughout the project and a special public hearing held earlier this year, King contends.
Most of those who protested Kemp’s visit were from Jordan Downs, a nearby project--not Nickerson Gardens, she said.
“We’re a grass-roots group that is trying to make things better for ourselves,” King said. “This is discouraging when you want to build something and people cut you down.”
According to King, when the management corporation distributed a survey to gauge resident interest, 78% of the 521 residents contacted said they supported privatization.
But those results have been questioned by critics who say residents were not given proper background information when the surveys were distributed.
Citing his support for resident independence, Joseph Shuldiner, executive director of the Housing Authority, said the city agency has stayed out of the internal squabbling at Nickerson. But because of the infighting, he added, the city likely will complete its own survey of resident interest before throwing its support behind the ownership plan.
Bertha Gilkey, a prominent St. Louis tenant advocate who has been hailed by Kemp for her leadership, said such internal conflicts have been a part of every effort to involve residents that she knows about.
“Groups disagreeing does not upset me,” said Gilkey, who is widely regarded as a leader in resident self-management. “It surprises me when it doesn’t happen. It’s extremely painful for me to see groups go through conflict, but it’s necessary. In-house disagreements are part of the growing pains.”
Too much dissension, however, may indicate that Nickerson Gardens is rushing the process and needs to spend more time with resident management before moving to resident ownership, she said.
Still, Gilkey is sold on the idea of resident management, noting that such programs typically include job training and other efforts to encourage residents to take control of their lives. Such empowerment enables residents to address the social problems that now keep them in the projects for generations, she said.
At Nickerson Gardens, some skeptical residents say they have seen political leaders come and go before and have heard about previous plans to refurbish their decaying development.
“We’re trying to survive,” said one single mother who has lived at Nickerson Gardens for a decade and hopes to move someday. “None of these politicians understand us.”
Others hold out hope that this ownership plan may finally be the one that makes a difference in their lives, though they acknowledge that they are unclear on the details.
Sansom, who said she would buy her unit, has already raised two daughters and is now child-rearing a second time around. One of her granddaughters was born last year with cocaine, marijuana, alcohol and nicotine in her blood, and Sansom has taken over the infant’s care from her daughter. The 13-month-old also suffers from tuberculosis and syphilis.
Nickerson Gardens may not be paradise, Sansom said, but it is her home, and at least she and her four granddaughters “have a roof over our heads, clothes on our backs and plenty to eat.”
Times staff writers Carla Rivera and Timothy Williams contributed to this story.
