Greenville Magazine - June 2008 - (Page 45)

ometimes, in our efforts to help, we actually hurt people,” said Reverend Beth Templeton in a recent sermon. She was referring to efforts to revitalize Greenville’s blighted neighborhoods. The City of Greenville is working hard with many partners to address a housing crisis much different from the one we hear about each night on the national news. Through their leadership, neighborhoods are rebuilding and re-energizing, and people who have never owned a home are saying yes to home ownership. But what Beth Templeton and others have been saying for a while now, is that even projects built on the best intentions sometimes hurt the very people they are meant to help. Home ownership has long been touted as a part of the American dream. While it is a lofty goal, there are countless families in Greenville and elsewhere for whom home ownership will never be a reality. Low wages and increasingly high rental prices keep many families so far below the poverty line that even affording a decent rental property is next to impossible. Add to that the fact that most of the landlords who bought into the Section 8 program 20 years ago are now opting out as their properties come up for renewal. They can charge market rate rent for those same properties now, so they are leaving Section 8 behind and understandably looking towards greater profits in an increasingly uncertain economy. These factors and others leave Greenville’s poorest with few options, none of which are good. According to Templeton, “Woodland and Pierce were two housing complexes owned by the Greenville Housing Authority. Combined, they had 350 rental units charging rents of 30 percent of tenants’ household incomes. People who had no income could live there, as well as those who could easily pay $400 or more per month.” Templeton admits the conditions there were horrible, but for those who could only afford that level, Woodland and Pierce were still home. She continues, “The Greenville Housing Authority received a HOPE VI grant which allowed them to tear down all the apartments. Residents were assisted in moving elsewhere. Today the former Woodland-Pierce site is known as Arcadia Hills. There are gorgeous and precious brand new homes for people to purchase. The subsidies for purchase keep the prices to around $100,000. The people who are lucky enough to purchase a home there are truly blessed. I am thrilled for them to live in an award-winning neighborhood and have the opportunities that homeownership provides for them.” What could be the downside to such renovation? Now only 35 rental units exist there, leaving 315 fewer possible places for our lowest income families to live.The City, in cooperation with First Baptist Church of Greenville, the Urban League of the Upstate and the Randolph Group, replaced 138 sub-standard mostly rental units in the Viola Street community with 86 beautiful new homes for ownership and eight rental units. According to information supplied by Ginny Stroud with the City, the neighborhood also boasts a 2100 square foot building, which serves as the clubhouse and office space for the neighborhood association. All streets in the neighborhood are state-of-the-art with sidewalks, curbs and gutters. Green space was also an important element in the neighborhood and the Viola community includes two parks and several green spaces at the entrances to the neighborhood. Another City project, this one in cooperation with the Allen Temple Community Economic Development Corporation, added eight new affordable rental units to the Sterling and Green Avenue “S “When we plan a new thing, will we be mindful of the downsides of our plan and try to reduce the pain to those most deeply affected by the old?” neighborhoods. Both projects show a great cooperation between the City and other parties interested in rebuilding Greenville’s poverty-stricken neighborhoods. No one can deny that the work being done is an enormous help to many families looking for a way to better their living situations. The only down side to these and other similar projects is Greenville’s overall lack of balance between home ownership and rental opportunities. Admittedly, no one has an obvious solution to helping our poorest citizens have a necessary voice in the revitalization process, but people like Beth Templeton are trying to start a conversation about what needs to be done, in hopes that the need might become a bigger consideration in future projects. Her organization, Our Eyes Were Opened, an outreach of United Ministries, helps educate people about the realities of poverty in our area. She concluded her recent her sermon with these thoughts, “We must be mindful of balancing the scale when we are proposing a solution for a problem in our community. When we want to tear down horrid apartments, will we address the need that those dwellings were fulfilling the need for very inexpensive housing? When we tear down crime-infested motels which function as single room rental units, will we address that need? When we plan a new thing, will we be mindful of the downsides of our plan and try to reduce the pain to those most deeply affected by the old?” GM may/june 2008 | Greenville maGazine 45

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Greenville Magazine - June 2008

Greenville Magazine - June 2008 Contents From the Publisher My Greenville Everyday Heroes Tackling Diversity Greenville’s Gone Global In The Lead From the Pros Anderson Suburban Sprawl Wellness The REAL State of Real Estate Something to Bark About Minority-owned Business A Look Back 1-Tank Trips Private School Resource Guide After Hours The Bulletin Around Town Viewpoints

Greenville Magazine - June 2008

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