2200 block of St. Albans, shot of 2221 St. Albans shoddy maintenance and trash

This is a quick view of the 2200 block of St. Alban's, Philadelphia, PA, 19146 that shows how well-kept the houses are, and then shows a shot of the run down, beaten up PHA house that the Scattered Site program claims it "renovated." You can see the three pieces of indoor-grade wood slapped on to the outside, left uncaulked and unpainted, and finally, the trash left in front of the house and the tenants just leave it out there. The trash pickup is on Monday. This was taken on Thursday. Scattered Site doesn't enforce their tenants putting out the trash correctly. Complaints to PHA's Scattered Site program appear to have little effect on the tenants or the management. PHA's Scattered Site program is slated to get Recovery Act funding, but cannot maintain what they have now with the staff, I.T., PHA police, and management that they have.

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• Philadelphia
• Public
• Housing
• Scattered
• Site
• Program
• 2200
• block
• St
• albans
• Saint
• Alban's
• St.
• 2221
• trash
• blight
• Recovery
• Act
• funding

[burgesspeanut]

Look how nice this street is, now look at how bad the PHA property is, and the drug dealers all cleared off before this was taken. This is PHA's idea of lease enforcement. There is no formal mechanism for neighbors to weigh in on how PHA is doing, and this will mean the end of PHA in Philly if this is allowed to continue.

[burgesspeanut]

Still, a HUD OIG audit in July, 2010 found that as much as over half of all Section 8/HCV housing was "materially unsafe." Although the housing in the video is all Scattered Site, a similar, if not worse, rate of lack of safety and maintenance is obvious.

[burgesspeanut]

Good news! The tenants occupying the upstairs apartments have been evicted. These tenants were observed by dozens of neighbors dealing and using drugs. Numerous complaints and police response have resulted in a successful eviction by PHA. But it should not be harder in public housing to evict bad tenants than it is for a private landlord. Otherwise, drug dealers will obvious gravitate toward exploiting public housing, coercing and abusing tenants, to get a foothold.

[burgesspeanut]

This house is still a drug house. The CSN$ crew runs out of it. PHA's front line employees are hampered in that they don't get the resources, police, investigation, and money they need, because Greene and the PHA Board use that money to investigate each other.

[burgesspeanut]

There are still illegal tenants in the top floor apartment, even as neighbors have complained. They are from out of state, with a car with out of state plates. This is not the purpose of public housing. Only tenants on the lease have permission to be in there.

[burgesspeanut]

Their housing program is literally one of the worst run government programs I have ever seen. It is criminal negligence that PHA inflicts upon their tenants and neighbors and the press is afraid to cover the real story of how this housing money plays out in practice. This is not addressing homelessness. These houses are preventing good tenants from finding livable housing. Good tenants request out of these properties or stay on the wait list for PHA. Why are Philly Democrats allowing this?

[mrurbanblight]

I've called PHA many times regarding this property and PPD has responded to countless 911 calls regarding the tenants and their drug activity. Eventually, I was told to call PHA's police dept. Now that I know Carl Greene used the PHA police to "investigate" employees who disagreed with his "style" of doing business, It only makes sense that 2221 continues to exist in its present condition as one of the most known drug houses in SWCC.

[mrurbanblight]

This house is a notorious drug haven. Throughout the day and night there often are several obvious illegal activities--several dealers going in and out of the house (within minutes) sitting on neighboring stoops smoking their purchases and attempting to intimate anyone who walks by or comments. Why does PHA allow this activity to continue?

PHA has to be accountable for its neglect and its continued lack of control and management of its scattered sites program.

[burgesspeanut]

Look how tidy the side of the street is when the video starts, then look at the board on the house at 2221 St. Albans St. that PHA's Scattered Site Housing program owns and operates. They literally just told a South of South St. Neighborhood Association Zoning meeting that they had just "been through there doing renovations to the exterior." That board on the sill is the "renovation!" This group wants stimulus funding so they can build more of this.