Readers, bear with me. The following appeared in the comments of a previous posting entitled, “City Hall's rental property program test balloon, as viewed by NAC's readership.”
To respect certain wishes, I’ve had to edit the exchange, and of course you may return to the original using the above link to see if I’ve done it competently. The point to me is that the issues raised here are worthy of discussion, and many of you will have lost sight of the thread once it began sinking down the page.
The gist will become clear fairly quickly. Please join the conversation, subject to this blog’s usual disclosure policy.
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knighttrain said...
So what is the deal with the property at 703 Main? It was for sale for months and the sign is gone now. Did it sell? I looked at it and it did not look that bad to me. Nothing a little yard work could not cure.
11:55 AM
G.Coyle said...
knightrain: Are you a slumlord wannabe? I bought Bill Baize's other property at 619 E Main a year ago. I'm now watching as all his slumlordly cover-ups fall off and the full extent of 30 years of neglect shows thru. I will spend $100,000 before I’m done to undo the damage caused to this beautiful historic house. I also looked at 703 E Main and it's the same stuff. Your comment is most perplexing...unless you're a slumlord.
8:35 PM
knighttrain said...
No Coyle. I used to own a slum on Main Street for 30 years, but sold it for 12 times what I paid. I notice that there is a lot of property up for sale in the area and I cannot figure it. Speculation I guess. BTW--My slum was inspected many times by the city over the years and always passed. A couple of times I had to make some changes as the code changed. I meant that I looked at the outside of the 703 and it did not look as bad as what I was hearing. I did not know who owned it. 10:39 AM
The New Albanian said...
Congratulations, Knighttrain. You've excelled at capitalism. Hard to figure why other won't do the same ... but wait ... slumlording is a form of capitalism, isn't it? Doesn't make 'em Kulaks, though, hard as we may wish it to be so.
12:08 PM
knighttrain said...
Yes, it is and I may dabble again soon. But the truth is there are many in the downtown area who have a vision that is not very realistic, or they just are not very tolerant of others outside of what they perceive to be their social class. People should realize that New Albany is a very poor community with a generally poorly educated population and poor people need roofs they can afford. NOT THAT I AM IN FAVOR OF CREATING SLUMS!!! But the fact remains that there is an economic niche to be filled. There have been many urban areas where they have scattered the public housing into many areas of the city rather than have the "projects". Perhaps we could expand these into the Klerner Lane area and the Main Street area and we can all feel better about ourselves.
7:18 PM
The New Albanian said...
"But the truth is there are many in the downtown area who have a vision that is not very realistic, or they just are not very tolerant of others outside of what they perceive to be their social class."
Pleasant thoughts from someone who previously bragged about turning a big profit on a slum, but I digress.
Please, expand upon this thought, Mr. K. This is looking increasingly like a topic that needs to be elevated to the marquee. If you agree, then I'll do so -- and the remainder of the unrealistic crowd can have a chance to join the discussion.
7:36 PM
(Note: Knighttrain now replies to a comment that subsequently was deleted, and in turn, I have removed his references to it)
knighttrain said...
I simply implied that there are different visions and the reality in New Albany is not one that many like to accept.
There are many properties that are up to the legal codes that many on these blogs would turn up their noses at as well as the people who live in them. Families move in and out of rental housing all of the time, why? Because they are in bad financial situations. Go ask the local school principals how many children move in and out of each school in New Albany on a weekly basis---I think you would be surprised.
AS for New Albany--41% live in rental housing--12% in public housing--the median income is far below state standards and---grab this---25% of the people in New Albany over 25 did not graduate from high school----so lets build some nice upscale places for them to live? They are trying to get by. They do not need affordable housing by your standards---they need cheap housing by their standards. But there are many that need just the bare minimum to get by and as long as it meets the code it is the consumer that sets the standard---not bloggers.
8:22 PM
knighttrain said...
New Albanian--I was joking about it being a slum--but it was in the downtown area and an older building. It met all codes and as I said was inspected many times.
8:25 PM
The New Albanian said...
KT, duly noted, and of course I've been sassy with you, too.
knighttrain said...
BTW--I did not say I dabbled in being a slumlord---I have rented property---and have dabbled in making money----and not at the expense of poor people.As long as I am on the subject though I have rented for years before I could afford my own home and I lived in some places where the cockroaches crawling on me in the morning woke me up every day--so don't lecture to me about the poor. There is a stigma attached to renting. Everyone in the neighborhood knows you are renting and thinks a little less of you. I saw where on of the mayoral candidates said something about this situation and he referred to absentee landlords and renters in the same sentence as if the city needed to be rid of them as well. It is unfortunate that poverty is alive and well in New Albany--but the economics are not changing, it is getting worse not better I see it every day.
8:42 PM
And that’s where we pick it up again. Readers?
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16 comments:
Now back to my jazz and reading evening. I'll leave this one up until Tuesday afternoon.
Glumly, I agree with your assessment that there are a disproportionate number of downwardly mobile persons living in
The inner NA area. They’ve been sucked in here by the vacuum created by greedy vision-less government the last, oh, 50 or so years. And let’s not forget a few generations of “pillars of the society” gorging at the tax abatement trough while simultaneously giving nothing back. But the good news is:
Things change.
NA’s ace in the pocket is our collective emerging desire for New Urbanism and guess what? NA already has most of what it will take to once again be a vibrant desirable community according to its tenets. Those slums you speak of were once fine homes, built to standards and with craftsmanship that surpass most construction in the last century. That’s value.
In 10 years the “ghetto” will be that suburban nightmare called Clarksville, and a ring just inside I-265 where most sprawl has taken place in the last 20 years. Don’t worry; when all the crap housing that “developers” have built in the last 20 years starts failing, there will be plenty of substandard housing available for those folks who just “need to get by”.
I think there is more to this house (703 e. main) than meets the eye.
I drove by just to check it out. I quick stop shows me the outward appearance of a home. It does not provide me with any history of it's activities or it's tenants.
Is it perfect? no, but to the naive eye, it doesn't look bad. Is it a crack house? I couldn't tell. It looked pretty decent compared to some i've seen.
I'd love to meet someone down there that has the history on this house so I can see if from their perspective, and not the roads.
Speaking of roads, I'm beginning to feel that new albany is at a crossroads. It's almost a race. The property investors are trying to snatch up as many bargains as they can, versus enterprising home owners that see the potential in these old homes and want to restore them.
I know of a few neighborhoods in louisville that have gone completely downhill because of rentals. Nice homes in nice neighborhoods that have become nothing but income generators to pay for the owners new home. They were $70,000 bargains 10 years ago, and now they're $800 a month rentals.
All that to say this:
If something is not done NOW to put some teeth in existing enforcement to sway slumlords away from this area, it will most likely be taken over by them. Similar to areas in Louisville, the good folks who love their neighborhood and their homes will eventually give up and move out, knowing the rental problem will only get worse.
Could this comment by GC be anymore elitist? While it is certainly nice that you are able to spend your $100K to upgrade your property, you are far from the norm here in New Albany. The same holds true, I am guessing, for the "our" with the collective emerging desire for New Urbanism. I think you will find that a much larger portion of the population is far more concerned with day-to-day living, with being able to afford what they already have, with not falling behind in the struggle against higher energy costs, higher "fair market value" property taxes, fixed or even falling retirement incomes, medical bills, higher education costs and the like.
Don't get me wrong. I want to see this city improve, flourish and grow in many of the same ways that most, if not all, of the writers to this and other blogs do. New Albany will be my home for as far as I can see into the future.
I've spent an hour trying to put thoughts to words and am far from happy with the results, but I am also convinced that extreme attitudes such as those expressed by GC will get us nowhere fast. Knighttrain speaks of different visions. Even more important are the differing realities for residents across the landscape of this city. What might be wrong for you may be the American Dream for someone else. And what might be substandard living for one might well be economic necessity for another.
There are wrongs that need correcting, but let's not disparage others just because they don't fit into "our" vision.
I would like to make one thing perfectly clear. My postings are not to present an elitist attitude, after all, I am a mid 30's year old social worker, its not like I have much to be elite about.
My problem is not with the homes that may be up to MY standards, my problem is with the structures that are not up to the city's and the states minimum standards.
Rich, poor, middle income, welfare, millionaire, there is no class distinction that neccessitates living in filth. Owner occupied, rental tenancy, no distiction there either when it comes to keeping the outside of your place clean, free from debris, rubbish, weeds, and the likes.
Also there is nothing at all stopping a landlord from ensuring that his/her property is up to code, and doing the work that dictates to make sure it stays that way. If the land lord can not do it, then a designated agent of the land lord can, do a drive by once a month, is the outside of the property clean, if not, tell the tenants to clean it, if they are disabled, show some pride in your property, and the community you are making money off of and help them clean it.
My point is this, there are those who turn this conversation into "rich vs. poor" , "owners vs. tenants", the fiber of this topic is not about that, it is about the cleanliness and safety of our community, and those who violate those laws should pay, whether it is the tenants, the land lords, or an owner who occupies the home, regardless of their income level, education. Across the board equal enforcement of the ordinances that are in place to create a clean healthly, safe community is what that is about.
I have to laugh every time one of the apologists for anti-social behavior writes we bloggers are elitist, or we just don't like poor people. LIke csd619 points out - it's not about rich vs poor. Anyone who is currently living next to a crack-house or derelict rental house or has those unsavory "downwardly mobile" neighbors next door will understand from whence I speak. sorry I use big words, I know it freaks some people out here - a place reveling in anti-intellectualism. By the way, for what it's worth - I've worked and saved for 20 years to be able to afford my first home. I'm a lower middle-class single disabled mother trying to make are lives better with what little we have. What about my life is so elitist?
Had the community not at some point in time deemed it fitting and proper to provide a regulatory regime for its housing stock, there would be no codes on the city’s books, and yet there are. Evidently the community is in agreement on this point.
These codes amount to commonly agreed upon standards, and as standards, they are a cost of doing business for those seeking to rent living space to others.
However, as in the case of New Albany, if the city’s responsibility to enforce these standards is abdicated – and it definitely has been abandoned over a period of decades – what such negligence amounts to in reality is an indirect subsidy, one that reduces the costs of doing business as incurred by a rental property’s owner.
Whether such a situation increases the owner’s profit margin is a scenario that readers may contemplate on their own time.
Just about every person, and on all sides of this issue, agree that while renting living space always will be a fact of life, and that many remain perfectly respectable, the community is better off as a whole when people own their own living spaces.
Rather than the indirect subsidy given rental property owners when standards are not enforced, which we can reasonably infer does much to enable the less savory aspects of neighborhoods filled with rental properties, as opposed to owner-occupied properties, doesn’t it make more sense to enable home ownership through any measure, including direct subsidies, available to the community?
The "market forces" referred to by Knighttrain currently aren't "free market" at all, any more than exurban sprawl. Don't we have both a right and an obligation to examine the way that direct and indirect subsidies provide for both exploitation of the underprivileged by unregulated slumlords, and greater individual expense to prop up public services in ever expanding areas?
Aren’t we all better off in the end? In this election season, there will be many – my 3rd district Uncouncilman almost certainly prime among them – who will shamelessly seek to transform this issue of basic community standards into have-nots vs. haves, us vs. them, and little people vs. elitists.
It's simply not true. It isn't elitist to seek economic development that makes the pie bigger for all. It isn't elitist to suggest that we directly subsidize home ownership rather than indirectly subsidize exploitation. It isn't elitist to invest in the future of the community.
Thoughts?
I think the two biggest hurdles for something to be done regarding this issue, is suprisingly not community support for the measures, BUT #1 the isatiable love of procrastitory bureaucracy and #2 once something is done and a tough ordinance is enacted to require rental unit inspections and permits, I can guarantee that some local attorney/landlord will take up the battle and file an injuction and/or civil suit on the grounds of the 4th ammendment (unlawful search and seizure).
It wont take long for some one to claim that the inspection process is the city government using the issuance or revokation of a rental permit as a means of coercion to force the tenant/landlord to allow a search of publicly inaccessable areas of a private property with out a warrant obtained by due process.
This is an issue that anyone working on a future ordinance, or current plan should take strong consideration of (hint hint nudge nudge current administration).
If consideration is not given in this matter proactively, any work done related to cleaning up our city in this way will effectively be put in a holding pattern until all legal avenues (injunctions, appeals, etc.)
The only precidence I can find for such a situation is Stewart vs. Red Wing, MN. And that suit is evidently still in its infancy.
So there has to be a built in mechanism to counter this issue before we get slapped by it.
After all, if I can manage to come up with the idea to look into it, I am quite sure that some one with more legal savviness will find more obstructionistic avenues to pursue.
Just food for thought.
Some of the true slumlords rent "weekly". "Weekly" in the Housing Code ordinances needs to be better defined (or spelled out) and made to conform to current or better City Building Codes.
We were always told while fighting another nightmare on "Main" Street there was "nothing" they could do because this slumlord rented "weekly".
It didn't matter there were windows missing; it didn't matter as to the amount of debris and lack of fire escapes, etc. It didn't matter we had a child in there with lead paint poisoning. It simply didn't matter.
The "renters" in that slum at one time felt "we" on Main St were being elitist and were against renters, in general. Now, after years of knowing one in particular over there -- they admit we were only trying to bring that house up to code to "better" their living conditions.
There is one house in New Albany where the tenants are very low income and were afraid to go to anyone about anything because they have no money to move immediately...if you know what I mean. So, I took their issue to the City and the City suggested these tenants call the Health Department. I told them these tenants aren't going to call anyone; they're afraid and they don't have any money to move within 30 days after the complaint would be filed. Then I asked, "what, is it who owns the property that makes them exempt from being on sewers"? It finally dawned on them to ask me who owned the house I was talking about, and then all of a sudden the City decided to send "legal" notice.
It's a tough world out there; been there and done it...but ignorance is no excuse...I also do not want to condone people choosing bad lifestyles and support the slumlords who rent to them. It's not like they don't know what they are doing...trust me, they do.
It is simply a matter of will, exposing them, taking it before all officials -- even up to the State Building Commissioner or the State Fire Marshall (like we had to), before you can get something done.
Keep your faith; every once in a while we do have a miracle that we've been able to accomplish as a "group"; united.
Of course, with election time here this would be the time to see who might know a qualified Building Commissioner!
As usual, these are only my opinions from the trenches that I feel I have been in since practically arriving in New Albany.
KT,
You are fishing for arguments in a forum in which you will not win.
"revolving door", rental property, uncelan property equals illegal activity, 99% of the time with out fail.
No one has EVER stated on here that every landlord is a slumlord, or that every tenant is a problem. You only read what you want to read and only take from that what you can take to use as grounds for an argumentative posting.
Please take the time to read and comprehend the complete message being conveyed here, and you will come out with a better understanding that no one on here is an elitist, in fact, several are landlords themselves.
every single person who are regular visitors and posters on Roger blog care deeply about this community, and what it means to each and every one of us.
Try not to be as judgemental, and read the messages for what they truly are, not what you can find between the lines. Keep your mind open.
True. Not often.
If I did not think that Knighttrain had raised a valuable point about perceptions of elitism, I would not have elevated this thread to the marquee and attempted to nurture it.
I'm a bit disappointed that KT has yet to comment on my interjection of "indirect subsidy by neglect," but then again, I'm becoming accustomed to being ignored (see "three-way council race dooms anti-Price hopes).
I'll be posting something else now, and as always, thanks to all for reading -- including cuddly anonymous troglodytes.
I have stayed out of this discussion mainly because I do not live downtown and was interested in how this thread developed. Now, I have an opinion from my "gray" point of view.
I think that many here did not respond well to KT. Not that I agree with everything that he wrote. I think that if many of us are really honest with ourselves, and think hard about it, there is some elitism. Maybe not consciously, but still there. I know that I was a little uncomfortable when KT and sbavanti brought it up.
One more thing. KT kind of brought it on himself with his "joke" of previously owning slum property. However, I thought that he cleared that up pretty quickly but many seemed to not be to able drop it.
Although the comments in this thread were well written and with some reasoning behind them, I did find myself comparing it to some postings on the late, lamented SOLNA. It seemed both sides were digging in their heals and not even trying to understand what the other side was saying.
Not a healthy state of affairs, in my opinion.
Iamhoosier...I do believe that if you were terrorized daily by criminal neighbors and slumlords, you're statement would be different.
Gina,
I could not agree with you more. That is why I stayed out of it until now.
I would follow that up with, is it not just possible, that you're vision is little clouded by being too close to the situation? That is my point about TRYING to understand each side(s).
I don't know who KT is. I already commented on his "slum" ownership. What else was so horrible about what he wrote and tried to follow up with? I found nothing that says he thinks prostitution, drugs, criminal activity is okay.
Someone may bring up the revolving door comment. My guess is, that KT took "RD" to mean multiple renters over a period of time. That is how I took it the first time. I now believe the usage was in reference to multiple people coming and going in day's time. I can't speak for KT but do some of you now see how it could have been interpreted?
Agreed, Iam.
The whole thing started when KT asked a legitimate question. That question, along with the New Albanian's very pertinent question about indirect subsidy, went completely unanswered in the ensuing argument.
Bluegill,
We are ignoring NA, hadn't you noticed?(smile)
Of course, you are correct. I think the indirect subsidy got lost in the "anger" and, probably more so, that there is little disagreement about it among this blog community.
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