Atlanta to Raze Most of its Public Housing Complexes
Atlanta is gearing up to raze nearly all of its remaining stock of aging, dilapidated multifamily complexes and two senior residences within the next several years.
The move will affect more than 3,000 units and 9,600 residents at a dozen properties as far flung as Leila Valley in far southeast Atlanta to Bankhead Courts near the Cobb County border. The demolition is expected to cost an estimated $15 million.
Residents will be offered a variety of relocation options and long-term coaching and counseling assistance that include federal rent-assistance vouchers good anywhere in the country.
Roosevelt House and Palmer House, two of the Atlanta Housing Authority's high rises that are near Georgia Tech and serve the elderly and disabled, also are scheduled for demolition under the AHA's Quality of Life Initiative. Both buildings are at least 34 years old.
Plan details AHA officials shared with resident leaders Wednesday drew a mix of support and concern. Diane Wright, who leads an AHA-wide committee of resident leaders, expressed disappointment that they weren't consulted.
Other information sessions are planned at affected developments.
"I'm all for getting out of public housing," said Wright, who is also president of the residents association at the Hollywood Courts apartment complex scheduled for demolition.
"I don't think any of us are against moving. I think the problem is we don't fully understand what's going on because they didn't include us."
The AHA's board of directors, which includes resident representatives, approved the program.
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has been briefed on the effort and must OK certain elements of the demolition or requests for additional housing vouchers, according to AHA Executive Director Renee Glover.
Since 1995, the AHA has revitalized or converted 11 of its original inventory of 42 public housing properties into mixed-income, mixed-use apartment complexes, such as the successful Centennial Place, under the federal HOPE VI public housing revitalization program.
But HOPE VI redevelopment, agency officials say, has been slow, leaving about 5,000 families still living in substandard conditions at complexes and high rises that are too costly to renovate, maintain or operate.
AHA is taking advantage of relaxed federal rules good through 2010 to raze those blighted communities and give residents the opportunity to live in better housing elsewhere.
Razed complexes on a total of 237 acres will be sold or redeveloped in ways that are compatible with plans for the larger communities in which they are located.
Demolition aside, Glover sees the agency's Quality of Life Initiative as a "win-win" opportunity to reverse the socioeconomic harm of poverty.
"It's about providing the families we serve with substantially better housing opportunities and healthier communities," she said Wednesday. "It's not a relocation program or a demolition program."
Jasmaine Griffin, 21, has lived in a number of AHA communities, Jonesboro North being her most recent stop.
But she'd gladly move again if she could live in a house in either Gwinnett or Clayton counties using a housing voucher.
"That's fantastic," Griffin, a mother of two, said earlier this week of the demolition plan and voucher opportunity. "I've generally stayed in a lot of projects down here because that's all I could afford."
The AHA will later look to rid itself of its remaining senior high rises that aren't currently up for demolition. No specific timetable has been set.
Senior high rises John O'Chiles, Antoine Graves and its annex, and Martin Luther King Towers plus University Homes, a family development in the Atlanta University Center area, are scheduled for revitalization under HOPE VI.
Two other multifamily communities --- Martin Street Plaza near Turner Field, and Westminster near Piedmont Park --- will be spared demolition because of their small size.
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