Washington Determined to Demolish New Orleans' Public Housing

[babylonsister]

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0609/S00170.htm

DC Demolition Of New Orleans' Public Housing
Wednesday, 13 September 2006, 1:48 pm


Washington Determined to Demolish New Orleans' Public Housing

Interview with Elizabeth Cook, housing activist, conducted by Melinda Tuhus

Listen in RealAudio:
http://www.btlonline.org/cook090106.ram

snip//

BETWEEN THE LINES: Isn’t it true that Alphonso Jackson, the Secretary of HUD, the federal Dept. of Housing and Urban Development, announced that HUD’s going to demolish many of the housing developments in New Orleans?

ELIZABETH COOK: Alphonso Jackson stated way back in October after Katrina that there would be fewer black people in New Orleans. He said it bluntly in New Orleans. Since then he’s made every effort to make sure his policies bring that about. He stated that the LaFitte Housing Development, which had between 800 and 900 families, St. Bernard Housing Development, which had about 1,300 families, and part of B.W. Cooper which was about, I’d say 900 families, would be demolished. And some of these developments were not that badly damaged by the storm, so it’s not a question of, Can they be repaired? It’s a question of the federal government lacks the will to repair them. And we believe it’s a conscious effort to keep certain people from returning – namely, public housing, working-class people.

BETWEEN THE LINES: Well, there is a philosophy that says it doesn’t make sense to warehouse poor people all together in densely populated projects, and that it’s better urban policy and better for the tenants themselves if they can have more options for where to live.

ELIZABETH COOK: Well, I guess it depends on your point of view, because if you’re a working class, low-income, working poor person, you know, a warehouse is better than no house, and that’s what a lot of people are facing in New Orleans. It’s interesting to me that the argument is always put forth that we should not have concentrations of poverty in public housing high rises or public housing developments, yet, there are concentrations of wealth in wealthy neighborhoods and apparently that’s okay. And we have corporate crime that’s certainly running rampant in this country – people profiteering off war and Katrina misery, but it’s okay for them to live in gated communities, but when it comes to the working poor that need affordable housing, we have to disperse them in order to help them, and that makes no sense to me, because dispersing poverty doesn’t solve it.

snip//

[OzarkDem]

1. Ethnic cleansing

Isn't that what they call this when it happens in other countries?

[Monkeyman]

3. Yes they do

About five families came here great people. They been told their home is gone. They want to go back but to what

[Divine Discontent]

2. "warehouse is better than no house"

then they argue about risks of drugs, disease, etc. within the warehouse... I despise right wing republicans.

[gumby]

4. Thanks for that story.

It's OK for the rich to live in densely populated gated communities (like in Florida where they escape all kinds of laws and engage in corporate crime), but it's a really bad thing for poor people to be sequestered in low rent districts.

Why don't we hear these points of view in the Main Stream Media? Never mind, rhetorical question.

[babylonsister]

5. I know, gumby. I thought this was pretty scathing and it makes me

angry.

[ninkasi]

6. This is absolutely criminal

The Bush administration will do anything, ANYTHING, to cater to the wealthy. Don't want to pay taxes? We'll keep cutting them. Don't want to see the poor anywhere in your neighborhood? No problem, we'll put up gates and keep them out. The CEO of a major corporation only made 10 mil last year, and wants more? Fine, we'll just lay off a bunch of people, and make the others do twice the work for half the pay.

If you're black, or poor, or both, then Washington will not only not extend a helping hand when you're down, it'll keep you down by stomping all over you. Black Americans helped build this country. They labored in the fields even after slavery was abolished, and were treated lower than vermin.

They put their pain to music, and created blues. They invented things, they taught, they fought for this country in all of it's wars, and they helped raise the South's children. They cooked, they cleaned, they entertained, and they shed their blood for America, and in New Orleans, they are being rewarded by being kept out of a city many have called home for generations.

Why do any of us show surprise when our country is brutal to other countries, and relentlessly participate in the misery and slaughter of innocent civilians, when the same country betrays it's own? People were abandoned to die agonizing deaths, as they drowned, starved, or succumbed to the terrible heat. Our president ate cake and played air guitar.

It is up to each of us to demand that our country fulfills the obligation it has to every citizen, to protect them, to treat them fairly, and to not turn our backs on them when they are in need. We need to leave Iraq, and start seeing to the need of our own, before this country is completely without a shred of decency, or any claim to a soul.

I have never, ever in my life despised, or held in more contempt, than the conservative ghouls who are destroying our country right now. Each and every one of us must vote in a couple of months, and we need to show up in such huge numbers that it will be impossible to use Diebold to again steal an election. If they try, we must prevent them.
We still have a chance to stop this plummet into hell, and restore an America of promise, and equality. We might not get another.