Keith Reitman wrote:
the fact that Jackie and Joe (who?) rule this City. They Don't
care that these two Council Members ruled during the period of loss of our
affordable housing, that they caused the loss and it was by their design.
Tim Bonham responded:
Wow! Jackie & Joe caused the loss of affordable housing. And
here I thought there was a nationwide crisis in affordable housing,
traceable mainly to 1991-1992 changes in tax policy under Bush Sr. (the one
that was actually elected).
But Keith tells us that just 2 city council members from our own
town caused this nationwide crisis. What incredible power! We better keep
them in office here, for sure!
David Piehl writes:
No doubt there were numerous accomplices in the ever snow-balling loss of
affordable housing in Minneapolis, including a general
shortage of housing that is metro-wide. However, the fact that so many units in
Minneapolis were destroyed with no serious
plan for replacement is what has caused us to find ourselves in the situation
that we are in. It is irresponsible to dismiss the council
president (and the mayor) from responsibility for a situation that has evolved
on their watch - regardless of the causes, it was not
sufficiently addressed by the "powers that be". Both Jackie and Sharon are very
capable in their offices, so their failure to
respond adequately to the shortage of affordable housing must have been a
choice, and they have to answer for it.
Central neighborhood has been crying foul on housing demolition for the past
seven years (that was actually one of the initial issues
that prompted my friend and neighbor Neva Walker to get more directly involved
in politics). The MCDA and Inspections are the
two tools of choice that are used to demolish housing. Inspections has a rule
that if they believe it will cost more to bring a structure
up to code than the cost of demolition (about $12K), then they demolish the
structure. This is certainly a classic example of
"functional silos" in organizational structure, i.e. it meets the goals of the
inspections dept (all structures should meet code with the least amt of public
funds),
but clearly creates an apples to oranges result in terms of housing
availability. While the cost of addressing the structure is minimized, the
results are not
comparable - a vacant lot vs a rehabbed house. The interesting thing is, the
vacant lot is then subsidized for new construction so
that the demolition and new construction subsidy level together becomes rather
obscene when often a much smaller amount
could have rehabilitated the previous structure.
These are issues that the city council and the mayor are very familiar with, if
they neglect them then it becomes an issue for
the voters.
David Piehl
8th Ward/Central
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