WPCNR THE HOUSING NEWS. By John F. Bailey. July 4, 2009: It is unclear how new public housing replacement projectsopened in the last ten years benefitted residents of public housing – at least in Detroit.
Rehousing residents of decaying housing and where they go after they are moved out due to demolition of their projects and where they are today is somewhat hard to tell.
In Detroit, an article by The Michigan Messenger (A Center for Independent Media website) in December, 2007, came to the conclusion that Woodbridge Estates (a collection of town houses and a renovated residential tower) at Wayne State University in Detroit the figures are not clear on how many of 600 displaced persons now live in the new Woodbridge townhouses and single family homes. http://michiganmessenger.com/611
Woodbridge Estates is one of the developments presented as a model for what White Plains Housing Authority this week for what the WPHA hopes to accomplish with the help of the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The sales manager of Woodbridge could not the news reporter tell how many displaced residents from Jeffries –West Homes (the project Woodbridge replaced have moved into it.
Woodbridge consists of townhouses and single-family homes priced from $179,000 to $339,000 in 2007 before the real estate debacle of 2008.
Todd Craft, Michigan Messenger reports, identified by community sales manager for Woodbridge said that of the 600-plus Jeffries Projects residents “relocated” in 1998, “300 were located where opportunities became available again for purchasing units for rentals. Of them, none of them purchased and some went to the rental side.”
Messenger reports “Craft could not supply the exact number for how many former residents now live in the rental side (of Woodbridge Estates).”
Craft, Messenger reports, did say that 38 of 40 of Woodbridge rental residents come from the city of Detroit.
Craft confirmed though that when the Jeffries project was raised to build Woodbridge, residents were not forced to live “on-site” next to the Woodbridge construction. They were moved to “nearby apartments” in Research Park and Freedom Place.
How did that work out?
Reporter Brandon Q. White quotes Corey Sammons, the site manager at Research Park reported only 10 to 15% of that project residents came from the Jeffries displaced residents. Research Park has 98 low-income units of 245.
Significantly, Sammons reported to White, that Research Park now has the same problems of the Jeffries Projects, drugs and crime.
Getting back to Woodbridge Estates, Messenger reports that site manager Craft as saying that of the rental units, 60% had some subsidy and 40% were market rate. Through the HUD Hope 6 home ownership program HUD, subsidized purchases of the homes.
In Woodbridge Sales side, the project has 60% at market rate, and 40% “receive a subsidy in the form of a grant or a second mortgage and that a second mortgage is forgiven if the resident stays for seven years.”
Craft said that when the units became available for purchase, 300 of the 600 persons displaced from Jeffries, were found and offered the Woodbrige homes for purchase.
None bought.
Though the White Plains Winbrook project up for its critical "clear the track" zoning approval Monday evening, despite County Planning Department objection to the procedure, would construct new units while present residents are living on the site, no project that the White Plains Housing Authority cited as an example have not made residents stay on site while the new projects were built.
