Low income housing: it’s a real problem. How do you find affordable housing for people who earn little or no income in a period of real estate value growth? We love gentrification because it leads to higher home values and make us richer — homeowners, investors. As our property values go up, the city collects more from us in property taxes. And we spend more, feel more confident. We sit and fan ourselves cool on our back porches, sipping margaritas, feeling pretty secure knowing our house values are not just secure but rising. It’s a good feeling, like knowing you’ve got a couple thousand in the bank. Studies show that consumers spend more when they know the values of their real estate are tilting upwards — they spend less and feel poor when values plummet.
All good for the $67,000 a year plus owner, but where do we build homes for poor people earning less than that once they are shushed out? Some liberals tend to think it’s great to mix up the pot, like school busing. Last week Schutze, who I usually like because he has a great BS detector when it comes to Dallas City politics, rattled off a crazy column about fair housing rules the Obama administration announced mid-week to repair the 1968 Fair Housing Law’s “unfulfilled promise and promote the kind of racially integrated neighborhoods that have long eluded deeply segregated cities.”
Schutze took aim at The Park Cities to blonde-bash (I pay good money for my blonde, thank you) and scream about the need to get more poor children into “areas of opportunity”:
The purpose of fair housing law is not just to piss off rich white people but to put poor people, especially poor children, in “areas of opportunity” where they will be exposed to values and educational opportunities that were not available in their hemisphere of origin. More than anything, it’s about getting poor kids into good schools.
Wait a minute, I thought this was what BUSING was supposed to accomplish! Now instead of busing the kiddos to those schools in “areas of opportunity”, you want to GIVE them the homes next door? Busing sure worked for the Dallas Public Schools!
(Julian) Castro and President Obama have unveiled a brand-new, get-tough, no-more-schmoozing, no more Mr. Nice Guy policy on fair housing. They say they will use super sophisticated new high-tech techniques to sleuth out racially segregated communities and then marshal various federal resources to work to overcome those patterns.
Schutze said he didn’t think he could squeeze any low income housing into the Park Cities because they are likely not taking any federal monies, so no strings attached. BUT! He did find a corner of HPISD in Dallas where we could have public-assisted housing:
Sticking out beyond the northwest corner of University Park like a Dumbo ear, in fact, is an area of 20 city blocks — some of them big city blocks — entirely within the municipal boundaries of the City of Dallas. Spanning south from the corner of Northwest Highway and the Dallas North Tollway, this area offers rich and ample opportunities for the development of federally supported housing.
He’s talking about the corner of Northwest Highway and Preston, which we have talked about on this blog forever! That’s the area with the parking garage where Crow Companies wants to build a skybridge because they have (maybe) signed a lease with a major grocery market.
That’s where Luke Crosland wanted to build a money-making luxury apartment complex for baby boomers to retire into and still be super active.
And that’s where Methodist Family Health Center just opened a new office, spending (I’m told) almost $500 per square foot on finish out.
There are lots of restaurants in the area and a few shops, also beauty salons and jewelry stores. Yup, it would be a great place for low income housing:
Sticking out beyond the northwest corner of University Park like a Dumbo ear, in fact, is an area of 20 city blocks — some of them big city blocks — entirely within the municipal boundaries of the City of Dallas. Spanning south from the corner of Northwest Highway and the Dallas North Tollway, this area offers rich and ample opportunities for the development of federally supported housing.
That ought to be enough to get Laura Miller’s reaction. No luxury apartment complex, no skybridge, no grocery store.
But hey, how about Section 8 Housing at Preston Center?
