The debate is raging again over affordable housing in Mecklenburg County.Commissioner Bill James wants to make sure the county doesn't
get in the affordable housing business. N.C. legislators gave the county authority to build housing for low- and moderate-income families.
James raised the issue during debate about a proposed $200
million bond referendum which would allow Mecklenburg to buy land for public purposes.
James doesn't want any money to be used to build affordable
housing "throughout the county," read by some to mean suburbs.
"That issue is again nothing but racism," said James' commission
colleague Darrel Williams, an African American. "Commissioner James is trying to use that issue as a scare tactic for the community. He is trying to dilute this issue of land banking.
"I don't want this land banking bond to become an affordable housing issue," Williams said. "It is much bigger than that."
He said that if the county excluded affordable housing from the land banking bond, it might inspire some people to oppose, just as James says white suburbanites would oppose it if affordable housing is included.
"Part of the problem is that when folks think about affordable housing, they perceive it to be public housing and when they think of public housing, they think of black folks," Williams said.
"James is trying to scare people who don't want to be around black folks. It is the same as with the neighborhood schools issues."
Williams said future county commissioners may decide to help meet the demand for affordable housing and that the public could comment at that time.
"It is conceivable for the county to get involved," he said. "We have been talking about the need for affordable housing in all areas of the community. It is obvious the private sector is not
going to do it. Government needs to find ways to get it done. We have got to make it happen more aggressively than it is happening now, particularly with this new school issue. We may
not be busing anymore. We have got to integrate our schools one way or another."
That there's a severe shortage of housing is evident in the fact that no less than four groups
one sponsored by the Charlotte Chamber are conducting studies on how to build affordable homes.
"There is no question ...there is a need for affordable housing," said Harrison Shannon,
executive director of the Charlotte Housing Authority.
But Shannon said the problem is many people think affordable housing means public housing, when it does not.
"How you define affordable housing?" he asked.
Shannon said some definitions say housing is affordable by families who earn 80 percent of the median income of about $42,500 per year in Charlotte.
"We serve people who make between 30 percent and 50 percent of the median," Shannon said. "We have more than 4,000-plus (families) on our waiting list, but you can't just look at
our waiting list. There are others out there not on our waiting list. There is a great need for affordable housing in the area of rental and home ownership...single-family home ownership and townhomes, etc.
"If we keep going in the direction we are going we are going to have a significant problem. We are going to have a lot of employers with needs for employees. There's going to be a lot more 'Help Wanted' signs."
Charlotte City Council member Malachi Greene and other black elected officials agree.
Greene said businesses have avoided cities where their employees can't afford to buy homes.
"Affordable housing is one of the linchpins of economic development and continued economic viability," he said. "If you don't have housing people can afford, businesses will go elsewhere,
as other communities have found out."
But Greene said James and others are making a racial issue out of it.
"When people hear affordable housing they think about black folks and poor folks," Greene
said. "We are producing jobs at an amazing clip in Charlotte and it's driving the price of housing up. Businesses are wondering if their people can afford to come here and buy a
house. It is incumbent upon government to try to do something about it."
Shannon said the housing authority has built nearly a dozen scattered housing developments of 50 or less units across Charlotte.
"If the will is there to do so, it can be done successfully," he said. "We are not talking about building 500 or 600 hundred units. We are talking about integrating, doing it in mixed-income
communities. Most of our units are scattered-site. We have people coming in asking for vacancies and we have to tell them 'this is not private, this is assisted housing.' ""Scattered site
housing has no appreciable affect on property values ...in a negative way," Shannon said.
The problem, he said, is that not enough private developers are building affordable housing, particularly in the suburbs.
One of the authority's biggest projects is the conversion of the huge Earle Village housing project into a mixed use development. Though the downtown project has been maligned for
its impact on the former residents of Earle Village, the so-called First Ward redevelopment is rising as a social experiment in mixed-use housing, with condos and townhouses, for sale and rent.
More may be built soon.
The city council is set to vote next week on how to sell city-owned land at Seventh and McDowell streets across from Little Rock AME Zion Church.
African American Bobby Drakeford and uptown land owner Danny Levine have told council they want to build affordable housing on the site. Council must decide whether to sell it to the
highest bidder or arrange a private sale.
Patrick Cannon is among five council members who favor a private sale, which would give the
city more control over the land's use. Other private sale supporters are Greene, Nasif Majeed, Lynn Wheeler and Rod Autrey. Swing votes on the issue could be Sara Spencer
and David Irwin, who was appointed last month to replace Al Rousso.
Council member Tim Sellers raised some eyebrows when he used to term "tar baby" during a
discussion of how to dispose of a city-owned tract at 7th and McDowell streets. Sellers said he used the term to mean it was a "sticky issue," not as a negative reference to black people.
