Rusty Water, Sagging Doors, Broken Glass, Stench: It’s Home to the Elderly : Public Housing: Thousands of the nation’s oldest, poorest and frailest live in unsightly or unsafe units.

Standing in the bathroom of his apartment at an elderly housing project, Joe Britto voices a frustration that is becoming common around the country.

“I have plaster falling down; I have plaster in my house falling down,” said Britto, pointing to water-soaked plaster on the wall of his apartment in the Margaret Collins elderly housing project in the city’s Jamaica Plain neighborhood.

Britto has been waiting fruitlessly for the Boston Housing Authority to repair the bubbling plaster in his bathroom and the poorly spackled plaster in his bedroom in the BHA-run apartment.

“When people get older and they work long enough and they work all their lives they should be able to sit back and live whatever part of their lives they’ve got in some kind of dignity and respect,” said Britto, whose brother also lives in the project.

He’s not the only one who’s complaining.

Thousands of the nation’s oldest, poorest and frailest people live in public housing under conditions that range from unsightly to unsavory to unsafe because of management shortcomings, lack of investment and a history of neglect.

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino recently formed a task force to deal with the problem in his city, where 34 senior developments house about 15,000 elderly and disabled people. Tenants pay 30% of their income as rent.

The task force is headed by Mark Maloney, a real estate executive, who says he feels the BHA is being upfront about the problems.

“I don’t think there was any hiding of issues by the BHA,” said Maloney. “They would like to see these issues addressed. The red carpet has been rolled out for us. Anything I’ve asked for I’ve been receiving.”

In Alice Soderberg’s bedroom in the 32-year-old Margaret Collins development, a small wooden chest conceals badly peeling paint. “Since I’ve been here I’ve been trying to attend to everything,” said Soderberg, 85.

It is a common complaint at the project where residents say they are forced to handle their own repairs.

The list of problems is daunting. Decaying gutters make a haven for squirrels; the front doors leading into the foyer of each building have no locks or security buzzers; windows leak when it rains. A stench fills the laundry room where just one washer and dryer serves the entire 44-apartment complex.

BHA administrator David Cortiella admits that much of the housing is in decay, but says the agency is committed to improving it.

The problem isn’t only in Boston. Elderly housing nationwide, much of which was built more than 30 years ago, is crumbling, housing experts and elderly advocates say.

“A lot of the housing stock simply needs to be rehabilitated,” said David Schless, the executive director of the American Seniors Housing Assn. “Fiscal constraints have really exacerbated the deterioration of the public housing stock for the elderly.”

Not everyone thinks that elderly housing is in such bad shape.

“The elderly are easier on buildings than families. They’re physically in far better shape than housing for families,” said Gordon Cavanaugh, an attorney in Washington for the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities. “Most people feel that the buildings for the elderly are indeed trouble-free.”

But Cavanaugh does concede that funding for rehabilitation in many cities has been scarce.

“For years the federal government didn’t fund the reserves for rehabilitation and they didn’t fund the capital money to improve buildings,” Cavanaugh said.

Maxine Green knows the stories first-hand. She is the head of the National Tenant Organization, which she runs with several volunteers, based in Ft. Pierce, Fla.

Through fax, phone and mail, Green has heard tales of peeling paint, lack of security and other problems from tenants in numerous cities including New York, Philadelphia, Washington, Baltimore, Detroit and San Francisco.

“If we had better maintenance in public housing, we would not have the deterioration that we do have,” she said. “It’s just a vicious, vicious cycle that you have to go through with those kinds of programs.”

In Boston, the BHA is beginning to use a performance evaluation system to measure the quality and quantity of work by its supervisors. A five-year capital improvement program that addresses some of the structural problems got under way two years ago.

The agency also issued a list of guidelines for custodians and maintenance personnel; however, residents insist they are not being followed. Frequent visits by building managers and architects are little comfort to the tenants.

Oscar Farmer, 74, is waging his own battles at the Martin Luther King Towers in the city’s Roxbury neighborhood.

Farmer, a retired postal worker who is legally blind, spends his days attending meetings with elderly and housing advocates. He also communicates regularly with the Massachusetts Senior Action Council, which has campaigned rigorously to try to improve living conditions in BHA elderly housing.

“If we get hot water, we don’t get heat sometimes. People are intimidated because they’re old and they figure they’ll get evicted if they speak out,” Farmer said.