JS Article on Taskforce

A fair Journal-Sentinel article on the shift in emphasis by the Affordable Housing Taskforce. Naturally the first comment is breath-takingly wrong, and while I don't like to target people because of some random comment they leave, it does expose some of the misunderstandings.

First, let's look at this:

Just another un-elected governmental body trying desperately to keep their
existence.

The Affordable Housing Taskforce is comprised of members from non-profit organizations and faith-based groups, etc. that are very concerned about how increasingly difficult it is to find housing in Waukesha County. The Taskforce is not an unelected government body. This never occured to anyone involved, but in response to concern (apparently justified) that people might think this is a Waukesha County government taskforce, the Taskforce earlier this month changed its name so that "Waukesha County" appears at the end rather than the start. Hence we are now "Affordable Housing Taskforce in Waukesha County" although some of the older materials might still reflect the old name until they're updated.

Now let's look at the next part:

If you want affordable housing in Waukesha County,
GET A JOB!
Then you
TOO! can “AFFORD” TO LIVE IN WAUKESHA COUNTY.

Well...that's kind of the point, ya know? Too many people cannot afford to live in Waukesha County because of the high housing costs and other barriers specifically designed to exclude people who don't make enough money.

I don't know about you, but I call that social engineering, and anybody who thinks that the way things are in Waukesha County is due to market force or the "invisible hand of capitalism" is truly off-base. Market force is not restricting multi-family construction in many communities in an attempt to limit renters. "Invisible hand of capitalism" is not requiring very large minimum lot sizes in some communities which makes housing much more costly.

Maybe the commenter also think that people with disabilities (a group that has a very high unemployment rate) should not live in Waukesha County. Or maybe the thinking is that seniors should work until they quite literally drop?

UPDATE: Link fixed. Again. and Again. Deleted & redone. Working now.

Renters, Owners, & Schools

A while ago, I discusses a zoning meeting that I attended in which some residents objected to a proposed rental development allegedly over fears of how it would impact the school district.

For your reading pleasure, I present the Census data for Waukesha County which shows that 35.5% of owners have children under the age of 18 (school age) while only 26.9% of the renters do. Of course, to be fair, those were 3 & 4-bedroom townhomes proposed which would've considerably raised the odds that many of those housheolds would have children of school age. But this data goes toward disputing the general perception (which never made sense to me) that rentals automatically mean overloading the school district with kids.

It didn't help the protestors' case that a statement was read in which the school district welcomed any and all kids that would enroll in the district.

HOME Dashboard Report

Available on HUD's website are reports on various HOME programs across the nation including a visual summary called the Dashboard Report. For the Waukesha County HOME Consortium which also includes Ozaukee, Washington, and Jefferson Counties, $14,344,122 was awarded to the Consortium in 2009. About 93% has been disbursed with another 3% committed as of December, which seems pretty effective to me, although slightly under the state average.

The Dashboard Report show a heavy emphasis on homeownership with 97% of the funds being committed to Homebuyer(72%) or Homeowner Rehab(25%) programs.

What I find striking is the demographics on pages two and three. The vast majority of people served were white (87.7% for rental, 88.5% for homebuyer, 96.1% for homeowner). Perhaps not surprising given the demographics of the counties involved.

For rentals, approximately half of the households served are the most needy, those that have Extremely Low Income, or under 30% of Area Median Income. By contrast, approximately 10% of the homeowners fall under this category and just about none of the homebuyers. The vast majority of the homebuyers are those earning 61%-80%. Remember that 72% of funds go to the homebuyer category. In other words, the vast majority of the HOME funds received by Waukesha Consortium aren't going to those who need assistance the most.

Regarding family size, about 60% of renters are single-person households (which may have more to do with the housing options available) while homebuyers and homeowners are more evenly distributed across family sizes.

About 20% of homeowner rehab assistance and 30% of rental assistance go to the elderly, but very little or none of the homebuyer assistance benefits the elderly.

There's another snapshot with numbers although I'm not positive this is the basis for the graphs in the Dashboard Report-it seems to be. In this snapshot, Waukesha is red-flagged for being in the bottom 20% (of all state public jurisdictions) for not having enough renters who with income of 50% or less than the Area Median Income. Overall, the Waukesha Home Consortium is ranked 7th out of the ten public jurisdictions in the state. I believe the Consortium's heavy emphasis on homeownership hurts the ranking because it does not effectively serve those who need assistance the most.

Computer Recycling Drive

Not a housing item, but a allow me to make a post about IndependenceFirst's computer recycling drive.

When: Saturday, April 17th 10 a.m. - 2 p.m.

Where: IndependenceFirst Parking Lot at 540 S. 1st St. in Milwaukee, WI 53204

Why: The Computer Recycling Program at IndependenceFirst accepts donated computers and refurbishes them, making them available to people with disabilities who otherwise couldn't afford to purchase one. We're in short supply so please direct your spring cleaning efforts to making a donation to our program with an old computer, monitor, keyboard, mouse, etc. (We prefer minimum requirements: Pentium III, 256 or 512 MB, 800 MHz, 17 inch monitors for reuse potential).

How It Works: Usable computers will be refurbished and reused in the program. Hard drives can be cleaned out by you or us (according to strict protocol to avoid sharing of your content/personal identity). If you'd prefer, you can remove your hard drive prior to donation or we can remove and replace it as an alternative. This is a safe recycling program that has existed without issues for over 8 years. Computers that are unusable will be put directly onto a truck from a local certified computer recycler. Its a win-win-win! You get rid of something you don't need and get a tax deduction, people with disabilities get a computer and the landfills are spared of waste.

Questions? pcdonations@independencefirst.org 414-226-8101 V/Relay

More on program benefits/story: Click Here For Video

Water War

Interesting Journal-Sentinel article on the latest volley in the water war between the cities of Waukesha and Milwaukee. Comments are always fun to read.

But despite the hot air, the anger, it really won't make that big a difference according to the socio-economic study being conducted by UWM's Center for Economic Development. Development will continue to happen, it'll just be more expensive.

Generally, planners and utility managers did not view the source of supply acting as a potential constraint on development. Rather than the source of supply, it is the costs associated with providing water infrastructure that generally have an impact on the development process. Planners and utility managers need to weigh the costs of providing new infrastructure against the gains of development, to ensure that the existing population is not negatively impacted by the costs.

Why the fuss, then? Partially because there's the perception that allowing Waukesha access to much more water than it needs will allow it to siphon more industry & businesses away from Milwaukee. Then there's also anger at Waukesha's chutzpah at asking for regional cooperation in access to water when it has consistently worked against regional cooperation on other issues. Because of exclusionary policies enacted by many communities,

A review of past trends indicates that a significant increase in the number and percent of low-income or families living at or below the poverty level has occurred over the past 40 years in the cities of Kenosha, Milwaukee, and Racine while it has declined in many of the selected suburban communities. It is unlikely that a change in water source, from groundwater to Lake Michigan water, would have any impact on these trends within existing service areas.

This is why the City of Milwaukee is insisting on more than just money for water. Milwaukee understands that they are having an increasing number of very low-income people in the population base because the people cannot move to or travel to the suburbs closer to the growth of many jobs.

Update: Typos corrected.

Those with blinders on...

Another piece NY Times, an opinion piece discussing the housing bubble and criticizing those who claims that "nobody could've predicted the housing collapse." Heck, I, with what, one semester of college economics, was warning about this years ago in the Housing For All Yahoo Group. I knew what we as Americans were doing was not sustainable, so it's very hard for me to believe that former Fed Chairman AlanGreenspan didn't either. Groups like the National Community Reinvestment Coalition was warning about the Adjustable Rate Mortgages (ARMS) for years ago, and Greenspan actually claimed that ARMs were a good idea. It's not that nobody was warning about the collapse, it's that they chose to not listen.

Yet another example of grassroots community activitists being right in face of denial by policy makers.

NY Times on Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac

A good article in the NY Times on the status of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the quasi-government agencies that backed the mortgages of many homes. The National Affordable Housing Trust Fund was initially supposed to be funded through a part of their profits.

I should note that those two agencies have been unfairly blamed for the crash of the housing market, by people who confuse cause & effect.