Thank you Vanessa Freeman for your wonderful letter this morning. Sometimes
people who were drowning in a sea of poverty hold on to the bottom rung of a
ladder that they grab and have a hard time letting go to move up a rung.
They have to be prodded to get them to take that next step, because compared
to being homeless it seems awful good. They need to be reminded that others
are also drowning and need that first rung more than they. Jason and Don
Jorovski remind us that there are a thousand desperate souls in Minneapolis
tonight, needing and waiting to grab that same bottom rung.
We also need to build a wider more comfortable ladder with more than just
bottom rungs. The key to such is "Affordable Homeownership". All the talk
of affordable housing has by and large left out the most viable method of
stabilizing families and giving them a chance to keep climbing that ladder.
Supportive homeownership is so much easier and more beneficial than
supportive rental housing. It takes much less energy to stabilize a family
in housing that they own than in transitional rental housing. Because it
takes so much less energy, (you only have to give support for a short
period, not the rest of their lives), it is much less expensive.
Some powerful non-profits, who make their money from supplying subsidized
rental property, do not like homeownership because it permanently removes
their clients as a market. Also the profits from supportive services to
stabilize a family in a home they own are far less than the seven or eight
hundred dollars a month for a mat on the floor of a shelter. Far less than
the up to $1200 to $1300 end cost they get for a supportive housing
apartment. The costs to the taxpayers for a subsidized rental apartment are
greater than the full monthly cost of a middle class home.
My choice is to give the family the down payment, the support and a
declining monthly subsidy for the first seven years. Then the family is on
its own with not only a stabilized family, but also with seven years of
equity in a house. That equity translates into small business loans and
college educations for children as well as a family that is integrated into
society and who can help others grab the ladder.
Sharon Sales Belton had a plan to subsidize housing costs on three or four
hundred thousand dollar town houses in order to, in her words, "attract the
middle class back into Minneapolis". She was on the right tract that
housing was the key to having more middle class in Minneapolis, she just did
not understand that the home grown kind are better than imported ones. She
just did not understand that "affordable homeownership" is the key to
taking poor people and making them "Middle Class".
A few Non-profit housing developers and providers are beginning to
understand, and caring more for people than profits are starting programs
for affordable homeownership. They understand that this process takes
supportive services and training for the individuals, but that it is a
long-term solution. NOT a quick fix that has to be re-fixed on an ongoing
basis forever. The difference is empowerment and giving someone freedom
from the temporary vagaries that afflict us all, but impact the poor in
devastating ways. American Indian Housing Corporation is a good example of
a Non-profit that is willing to construct such housing and create such a
training program. They are looking at building such housing and supplying
such support to create homeownership in the community.
I think Marx meant this when he talked about "Control of Capital Goods". We
should empower people, not keep them in economic slavery. The old adage is
true, we should teach people to fish rather than giving them temporary
handouts that aren't temporary but lifelong. It costs no more to help
someone to permanently OWN a house than it does to help someone to always be
at the mercy of others for housing. It just takes a little more commitment
and a little more care.
People should call their Council Member and the Mayor and tell them to start
talking about "affordable homeownership" of housing, not just
institutionalized poverty in large affordable rental projects. People
drowning in poverty are glad to grab even the "Institutionalizes" ladder,
but we need to put in a couple of additional rungs. Homeownership is a
ladder that leads up and out of the muddy riverbank of poverty, not just out
of the cold water and drowning.
Jim Graham,
Ventura Village - someone who swam a few years in that cold river.
>>"We can only be what we give ourselves the power to be" - A Cherokee Feast
of Days
(Remind someone of this)
_______________________________________
Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy
Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
