Burning Issues, Part II

Published March 13, 2009 @ 12:00PM PT

(Part I is here.)

The trailer that burned down was caused by an electrical fire.

I stopped in at Sandra’s congressman’s office to ask who could contact HUD to rectify this obvious problem. The staffer asked for more info and pictures and promised to get back to me when he got more info.

Another friend of mine in the area is on the housing authority board. I asked how to get HUD to move on this safety issue. Perhaps because 50% of his county’s housing is manufactured, aka trailers (some well-made/kept, some shambles), he didn’t offer any quick possibilities: the tenant should write a letter to the landlord, copy HUD. I didn’t share my worry about “trouble-making” tenants who get kicked out for less than filing a complaint with HUD.

Seems to me that HUD may have grown a little negligent over the years, at least in rural areas. From the condition of trailers I’ve seen in my travels, I’d say we have either a major housing problem on our hands, or an opportunity to turn millions of substandard, unsafe hunks of tin and plastic into decent housing.

My skeptical inner-self is screaming.

Will they hear our cries in DC?

(All photos by author.)

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Comments (4)

It's not just rural areas. I've seen it in suburban areas and urban areas too. A good part of it is rooted in "'trouble-making' tenants who get kicked out for less than filing a complaint". My experience as a non-HUD renter with many of these landlords and the experience of friends as HUD or other subsidized renters with these landlords is that many of them - not all, but enough and it's hard to predict which - are the cheap and vindictive sort that really will find ways to evict tenants very soon after a complaint - even a good complaint (like the ones you mentioned) - for no particular reason. Often, when they do this, they don't take in another HUD or subsidized renter and they raise the rent.

I've seen electrical violations, water leaks, plumbing violations, bad windows (broken, missing or like mine that falls out if you try to open or close it), rodent and/or insect infestations, rotten walls (interior and exterior), rotten floors, rampant crime (not in the neighborhood but in the complex or building, usually revolving around drug sales and/or prostitution), security problems, non-working required appliances, etc. Yet when someone DOES brave making a complaint and nobody gets vindictive, the general response is usually somewhere around "you should be happy to have housing of any sort at your income" as if something a half step from condemnation yet trying for median rent and never maintained properly really deserves the suggested happiness. We may be poor, we may have myriad reasons for being so and it may take a lot of roads to get us out of poverty - if we don't have barriers that totally prevent stuff like working - but we DO still deserve things like up to basic code housing maintained by someone who gives the southbound end of a rat flying back to the north for the summer.

Posted by Danetta Amschler on 03/14/2009 @ 06:49AM PT
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Danetta, you've just pointed to the path to homelessness for so many households.

"Homelessness creation" would be something to examine, and to figure out how to reduce.

For example, the mom in the trailer told me they'd be evicted if the utilities get shut off, which is iminent. I inquired with HUD as to this policy, and here's the response, "If the utilities are not on, under housing quality standards (HQS), the unit is in a failed status...get the utilities back on in a timely manner, or the unit will no longer be able to receive housing assistance payments because it does not meet HQS." Thus eviction, and homelessness.

So, you have a good family that has lost their income and cannot pay the skyrocketing utility bills, and we evict them and make them homeless? That makes NO sense. But it is reality.

HUD, are you listening???

Posted by HEAR US on 03/14/2009 @ 10:48AM PT
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Exactly. Same for if they (or in my case we) complain about any of the other code violations. Speaking of infestations, I had one friend who had to keep her lights on at all times. If she did, the roaches were bad. If she didn't, the moment they came back on it was like ever surface was moving - especially in the kitchen. I was lucky that I had gotten a job and was able to move one time because sure enough, my landlord more or less admitted he would have found a way to evict me for reporting him to the Housing Authority about the rotting floor in the bathroom.

Whether it's utilities or other problems, if landlords let the properties reach the point of legal inhabilitability, how is that the tenant's fault? So why is it the TENANT who has to do the suffering? Seems like it ought to be the LANDLORD and whomever at the Housing Authority and HUD aren't doing their proper jobs.

Posted by Danetta Amschler on 03/14/2009 @ 12:08PM PT
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Hey Diane,
Sobering piece! You wrote: "So, you have a good family that has lost their income and cannot pay the skyrocketing utility bills, and we evict them and make them homeless? That makes NO sense. But it is reality." Seems to me HUD is actually requiring this family to choose between what is seemingly a fire hazard and a (flammable) roof over one's head. Even if such utilities were affordable, HUD's policy should be waived here.

Posted by Jared Stein on 03/16/2009 @ 07:37AM PT
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Author

Diane Nilan, founder and president of HEAR US Inc., has over 23 years experience working impoverished and homeless families. Since 2005, Nilan’s cross-country journey to non-urban communities has focused on poverty and homelessness, particularly as it affects invisible families and teens. She filmed the award-winning series of documentaries, My Own Four Walls, children and youth sharing how homelessness affects their lives and their education. Her reader-friendly book, “Crossing the Line: Taking Steps to End Homelessness,” gives unique insights into homelessness. Her latest production, “REACH” empowers incarcerated parents to advocate for their homeless children’s educational rights.