[StBernard] Time Runs Out for St. Bernard Parish

[Westley Annis]

We all need to respond to this letter.  Since when are mixed income for
African Americans only ?  There aren't any white low incomw people who might
take advantage of these units ?  And the African Americans from N.O. didn't
suffer the worst from the flood...St. Bernard Parish did.  Out-of-Towners
need to keep their noses out of our business, especially when they don't
know what they are talking about !
 
Syl 




-----Original Message-----
Time Runs Out for St. Bernard Parish
Published: March 29, 2011
New York Times Editorial

It has taken far too long, but the Department of Housing and Urban
Development has finally intervened in an outrageous case of housing
discrimination by the government of St. Bernard Parish, an overwhelmingly
white district adjacent to New Orleans.

Since 2006, in defiance of the Fair Housing Act and several federal court
orders, the local government has restricted construction of affordable
housing developments with the clear intent of keeping African-American
residents out of the district. HUD has now threatened to strip the parish of
$91 million in federal aid unless it repeals discriminatory ordinances and
complies with the law.

The restrictive ordinances were only the latest in a series of creative
exclusionary strategies. Shortly after Hurricane Katrina, for instance, the
parish approved an ordinance prohibiting property owners from renting to
people who were not family members or related by blood. Since 93 percent of
the homeowners are white, the provision was clearly aimed at residents in
the adjacent, mainly African-American parts of New Orleans that suffered
some of the worst damage from the flood.

A lawsuit from the Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center forced the
parish to repeal the "blood relative" ordinance, but other measures swiftly
followed, all designed to keep the district as white as possible. In 2007,
the parish council barred property owners from leasing or even lending
single-family properties in large sections of the district to anyone. In
2008, the parish imposed a one-year moratorium on multifamily units,
essentially stopping construction.

After a federal court declared the moratorium illegal, officials passed a
nearly identical measure requiring a public vote on multifamily dwellings of
more than six units. Repeated maneuvers like this one seem finally to have
exhausted the federal government's patience.

The parish has promised to repeal its discriminatory ordinances at a meeting
scheduled for April 5. Federal officials should stand ready to revoke
financing at the first sign of backsliding.