What are We Going to Do? - by Cathy Burton

.....
click here to return to March index

The opinions expressed in these articles and features are those of their author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of McANA or the opinion of its Directors or Officers.

What are We Going to Do?
by Cathy Burton
[President of McANA]

Predatory lending... foreclosure... bankruptcy... homelessness... vacant buildings. Words that can devastate individuals, families, neighborhoods, entire communities. Words that we all hope will never touch our lives, but which have become a looming reality of frightening proportions in Indianapolis. These are no longer (if they ever were) problems confined to the “inner-city” or to those who fit society's comforting definition of the chronically poor and the undereducated. These are not problems which we can continue to dismiss as normal fallout from urban flight. Our City is facing a crisis - perhaps one of the most serious with which we have ever had to deal.

Every winter, and often in the extreme heat of summer, shelters for the homeless are overflowing. While the majority of the shelters seem to be filled with men, there is an increasing number children and women in this City who have nowhere to go. Homelessness does not confine itself to age, gender, family status, or level of education. It is happening in our suburban neighbors as well as in our center city neighborhoods. It is not just displaced veterans who have no permanent place to stay. It is not just runaway teenagers. It is mothers and fathers and grandparents - single adults - whole families - parents struggling to keep their children with them. It is people who had a job one day and nothing the next. It is abused spouses and senior citizens without the means to keep their homes.

We need to make a concentrated, comprehensive effort to ensure that every man, woman and child in this City has a safe, secure place to live. Rehabilitating vacant, already existing houses helps to meet this goal and also eliminates the blight, crime, and decay that empty buildings deliver to our neighborhoods. Rehabilitation efforts can energize a neighborhood and revitalize our history.

Rethinking our approach to “subsidized housing” is certainly another front which we must attack. Eliminating the “projects” model of housing reminiscent of the 1960’s and 70’s which isolated low-income families from the rest of the community is a critical component in battling homelessness. We need to find ways to leverage housing assistance dollars so that families can have a choice about where to live, and at the same time recycle some of our existing housing stock rather than letting it sit empty and degrade.

We should also recognize that some people choose not to own homes, but would prefer to rent or lease and that the rental market is a big part of our local economy. Renters need to know they have rights to decent, affordable housing. We need to set and enforce minimum standards for rental properties and make sure that landlords and renters live up to meeting those standards and take pride in their properties. We need to remove the stigma that the term “rental property” brings with it by making sure that renters are welcomed as part of our neighborhoods and not always considered as transients.

But these steps are far from providing a comprehensive answer to the destructive cycle of people being forced from their homes. We need to implement clear and forceful policies which prohibit predatory lending and misleading sales tactics that victimize first-time homebuyers, senior citizens, and people of modest means. We need to develop and deliver a comprehensive education program that will give people the information and tools they need to plan for the financial and maintenance responsibilities that come with owning a home. We need to have ongoing budget counseling available to help homeowners evaluate and stay on track with their financial means. We need to have resources in place to assist families maintain reasonable housing during unexpected short-term financial crises before they lose their homes. We need help homeowners understand mortgage options, property taxes, and adequate insurance. We should build a training program that will help homeowners learn to do some simple home maintenance and repairs on their own and be able to choose competent contractors who charge fairly to handle bigger tasks. I n short, people need to know that there is more to owning a home than just picking up a set of door keys.

We need to foster a renewed sense of caring and commitment among families and neighborhoods to encourage more private support to those who struggle to make ends meet. And we need to recognize that sometimes, even when armed with good planning, people hit hard times when they need some help to hang on to their homes. We can either figure out how to help them, and in turn stabilize our neighborhoods, or we can watch the statistics for homelessness and mortgage foreclosures continue to skyrocket.

In any given night, there is an average of 3500 people who are homeless in Indianapolis. Last year, more than 6000 people in Marion County lost their homes to foreclosures - an increase of more than 500% in the last decade. Every year, more than $22 million is spent by local agencies to assist the homeless. These numbers do not even begin to account for the loss of human dignity and resources attributed to losing or never having a permanent home.

So what are we going to do about it?

Cathy Burton