Is Rahm Emanuel Planning to Privatize Chicago’s Public Housing?

[marmar]

(In These Times) Chicago, long a pioneer of privatization, is poised to embark on a sweeping experiment with the city’s public-housing stock. The Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) plans to court private investment in as much as half of its public-housing units through the Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD), a new federal program billed as a way to “revitalize” housing for the poor and address a $26 billion backlog in needed repairs.

But housing advocates around the country worry that RAD is just a prelude to privatization. RAD, approved by Congress in 2011, gives local housing authorities broad latitude to raise funds, including the ability to mortgage or sell public-housing buildings. Critics believes that if public housing is opened up to the vagaries of the mortgage market and the whims of private developers, large swaths of low-income housing could wind up in foreclosure, or become luxury condos once RAD’s affordability requirements expire.

Steven Knight, supervising attorney at the National Housing Law Project, says that the program’s “stated goals are very laudable” but “the devil is in the details–local housing authorities have to get these transactions right, and if they don’t, the consequences may be severe and long-lasting.”

So, will Chicago get it right? RAD arrives in the city as the CHA is already under fire for failing to spend millions of dollars earmarked for affordable housing while amassing at least $440 million in cash reserves, even as more than 280,000 people sit on its housing waitlist. These financial shenanigans were enabled in large part by the CHA’s deregulation in 2000 under now-Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s, who pushed to remove federal oversight of the housing authority’s budget as vice chairman of its board. ..................(more)

http://inthesetimes.com/article/17793/is-rahm-emanuel-planning-to-privatize-chicagos-public-housing

[marym625]

1. Oh dear dog!

This can't happen!

Good thing is, he is now behind in the polls

[mucifer]

2. Chuy's numbers are dropping like a stone in the polls :(

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. Privatization is a giveaway of things that WE taxpayers paid for!

Roads, utilities, etc.
And it is going on here, and in Canada, and in Britain, probably other counties.

[rhett o rick]

4. k & r. Thanks for posting. nm