Braving Atlanta Housing
Shemeka Clayton and Larry Cook discuss HOPWA
Galvanized by a new ordinance that severely limits zoning for supportive housing, people living with HIV/AIDS in Atlanta are mobilizing to fight substandard housing provided by Housing Opportunities for People with AIDS (HOPWA) funding.
At a meeting last Friday hosted by SisterLove and the Campaign to End AIDS, 22 Atlanta activists drafted a strategy that would allow consumers with HIV/AIDS to understand and influence HOPWA in order to demand “safe, affordable, and appropriate housing for people living with HIV and AIDS.” Some steps include plans to review tenant and landlord laws, create an inspection committee consisting of consumers and to request an HIV/AIDS housing needs assessment.
Although people have criticized HOPWA housing in Atlanta for a while, the community mobilization began when the Atlanta City Council passed an ordinance rezoning supportive housing out of the Atlanta city limits in June. Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin vetoed, saying the bill “mimics the unfair actions from our country’s sad past that promoted the despicable laws of segregation and Jim Crow.” The Council overrode the veto.
Advocates argue that the ordinance forces poor people with AIDS further away from public transportation, as well as their doctors and support systems.
“People are living where there are no bus lines, far from the bus stops. They are living on a fixed income and it’s hard for them to get to appointments,” said Shemeka Clayton, who works at SisterLove, Inc. and is co-chair of the new Atlanta HIV and AIDS Housing Strategy Workgroup.
HOPWA headaches
“We don’t have anyone to go to for help,” said Rev. Kendal Richardson, who lived in transitional HOPWA housing last year. “We have to understand the HOPWA process, and what our rights are.” Richardson, with Clayton, is co-chair of the new workgroup.
Richardson now rents a room that he pays for using SSI, but after a heinous experience in HOPWA’s temporary housing in 2006, he has made it his mission to improve the Atlanta Metropolitan area’s HOPWA program. The entire 28-county Atlanta eligible metropolitan area receives $7 million in funding and has 2.5 staffers to provide housing subsidy assistance, supportive services, and housing placement assistance to about 3,000 households.
HOPWA doesn’t require rooms for short-term assistance to meet Housing Quality Standards (HQS). Richardson said he couldn’t live in a shelter after a surgery, but the HOPWA housing he was put in had no heat, and no refrigerator to put food in. Richardson was suffering from anal warts. “When I go to the bathroom I bleed. It wouldn’t be nice to be in a public place like a shelter,” Richardson said.
Atlanta responds
Richard Willis who manages the HOPWA funding in the City of Atlanta wouldn’t comment on this individual case, but said. “There is an expectation that if this short term assistance goes on for more than a few weeks that the unit should meet HQS standards.”
Willis said that most of the Atlanta metro-area’s residents live outside the city-proper, and that the City is working with Jerusalem House to create 76 more units of permanent HIV/AIDS housing.
Willis also said the city is working with for the new five year Comprehensive (HUD) Plan of HUD funds up for review, Atlanta is looking to facilitate more community input in the HOPWA process.
Posted on November 6, 2008 at 10:40 pm
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