“All the paperwork we have to do is not cleaning a single apartment. It’s not providing the social services we desperately want to provide for our residents. We’re bogged down in ‘process’ and in paper, with 30 people working full-time, plus a dozen temps, taking up an entire floor doing nothing but certifying and recertifying our residents to comply with HUD’s extraordinarily detailed requirements, and doing so every year. That’s got to change. We’re shifting and refocusing so we can respond to people’s needs, but it takes time.”
Executive Director Jimmy Miller of the Housing Authority of New Haven (HANH) was responding to the passionate inquiries by alders, such as Alfreda Edwards and Robert Lee (pictured below), at Tuesday’s meeting of the Ad Hoc Committee on Housing Authority Review. The review covered pressing quality of life issues of the 2,000 New Haveners, among the city’s most vulnerable elderly and disabled, who live in public housing developments, and the 3,000 others who rent apartments with public “Section 8” vouchers.
Lee chairs the committee, which was formed in the mid-1990s to oversee a housing authority in chaos and on the verge of a federal takeover. Although without powers, because it is not a standing aldermanic committee, it has remained a kind of ombudsman making sure the needs of public housing residents are heard and acted on.
“The people in my district, especially at 904 Howard St., are scared,” said Alderwoman Jackie James (pictured below). “I’m a social worker for DCF, and, believe me, I can’t keep being a social worker on my own time to these people. Conditions there are just crying out. Many people have very serious health issues, plus they’re so isolated.
“I take them when I can on little trips, but, my God, there has to be much more going in this building. There’s dementia among some people, and I don’t see who’s managing these cases. In most cases, no one is. I mean people don’t appear for three or four days and we hear about this, and they are dead in their beds. How are you addressing this?”
Miller said that HANH, under his leadership, is refocusing the whole staff to think of the needs of places like 904 and to understand that for many residents HANH is the only family they might have, a kind of last resort. HANH has just hired a head of social services, he said. There are four case managers working in three of HANH’s nine developments with individuals with serious mental or physical disabilities. Cornerstone and Continuum Health Services do intensive social work with the residents most in need at Charles McQueeney, Ruopolo, and the 49 Union St. developments. They are trying to expand such services, Miller said, but it’s extremely costly, with one case manager for every ten or so residents requiring attention.
James & Miller, Verbatim
Here’s more of the exchange:
James: But you’ve got to be more creative.
Miller: Well, we are, but we’re on a learning curve. You have to remember that we have been conceived, up to now, as a property management organization. This represents a big shift for us, and we’re doing it. We don’t yet have an MSW on staff, but we’re going to hire one. That means that we are doing our assessments more or less on our own up to now. These individuals and families have different levels of need, and some profound. Some need help with a G.E.D., yes, but many, and a growing number need to manage their medication, need help filling out forms. We’ve also got a van that seats sixteen, and we’re going to be able to pick people up, have a program of recreational activities. We’ve assessed about 300 families this year so far, and will do 300 more in each year to come.”
James: I can’t tell you how many calls I get from people about their rent, afraid they’re going to be evicted. Do you evict the elderly and disabled from HANH?
Miller: If my grandmother didn’t pay her rent, she’s out on the street. No, I’m joking, of course. It’s extraordinarily difficult to evict people. That’s never our aim. The process needs to be explained to people, and all the processes, and we are going to do a “how to” manual. But I must say I’ve worked at several housing authorities, and the elderly usually pay promptly. In New Haven, that’s been a problem.
Protections In Place
Even in the case of people with known criminal records, added John Prokop (pictured with Miller at the top of this article), head of security for HANH, an eviction proceeding is highly unlikely. Housing judges know, Miller added, that even for a person awaiting trial, perhaps on drug charges, if he lives in public housing project, there he usually stays, much to the fear and consternation of the other residents.
“We’re often constrained,” said Miller. “We have been able to do better background checks, and we have several known sex offenders living in HANH, yet that is part of our population. We go around the building, we let people know that we know they’re there, and this is the case with people with substance abuse problems. But to remove people, that is extremely difficult. Even for non-payment of rent, it takes 13 months or so for something definitive to happen, the protections are so great. A housing judge knows that the street is often the next stop for our people, even somebody who the whole building saw in handcuffs for a drug offense in the morning. So he comes back while proceedings are pending. So you have these different populations mixing, and it’s not always easy.”
Prokop and Miller were at pains to point out that priority number one for them has been making the buildings clean and secure. In the last quarter they have spent $2 million on painting, restorations, and a new security service that is working with the tenant councils. And a visual intercom system, to be provided to high rise residents free by Comcast, is in the works and may eliminate strangers wandering the building, a perennial cause of concern, and crime in public housing. Placing more social workers in the high rises that house the elderly and disabled — this means physical disabilities, many people with Alzheimer’s, dementia, and other conditions that make interactions with other tenants often problematical — is a major goal HANH is working toward, Miller said, which is a main reason to simplify the paperwork. “Then we can retool some of our staff for these basic human needs.”
Other alders, such as Aldermen Michael Smart, were concerned about programs that help public housing residents gain enough self sufficiency ultimately to buy their own homes. Miller pointed out they since about 2000, perhaps 12 residents have moved into their own homes, which, all agreed, was not an impressive number. “No, we’re not going to jettison that program,” said Miller, “but our focus has to be on this elderly and disabled population and giving them what they need. These problems, I promise you, are only going to grow. We are dealing with very poor people whose lives are complicated by developmental and psychological conditions that are lifelong, that are not going to go away.People don’t grow less old or less frail. Most of our people are not going to buy houses.”
Under an initiative called “Moving to Work Sufficiency Program,” HANH is beginning a process to simplify its procedures in a manner that will be acceptable to HUD. They are working with the developments’ tenant councils. But none were in attendance at the committee meeting. Alderwoman James said, “We obviously have to bring the meetings to them.”
“And you know what else they need?” asked Miller at the conclusion of the meeting. “They often just want attention. You do that and they’ll give you the shirt off their back and ham to take home to your kids.”