Off the Cuff Rant About HHA Actions
I’m glad I didn’t go to the Huntsville Housing Authority (HHA) meeting, yesterday. I am all for open discourse, especially in Government, but my temper has never been fit for level headed debate. When I have emotional involvement with an issue, I need to write my arguments. That way I can set it to the side for a bit and come back and edit and tweak until I think I’m actually saying what I mean to say in a fair minded manner that makes sense.
I’m not sure I even care to try for that balance on this issue. What in the world is the HHA thinking of, to buy properties in high tax bracket areas to give to people that don’t pay taxes, that live off tax dollars themselves? How does the HHA think the Government is going to get the funding (read taxes) that support the HHA if they take up real estate that pays the big bucks and give it to people that can’t or won’t contribute?
And that doesn’t even address the HHA residents that like to say that their children deserve to live in the area with the best schools. How do they think those high property tax areas got those nice schools? Could it possibly be because people actually pay the property taxes in those areas? Is it really that unreasonable to feel that, if, as a parent, you feel your child deserves to go to a nicer school; then, as a parent, you need to earn the money it takes to put your child in that better school?
I realize some things don’t feel “fair,” and that some folks get a huge head start on obtaining the nicer commodities in life. Life isn’t fair for anyone. Most people actually have to work most of their lives for the things they want. I personally don’t think it’s fair that my money, that I worked my butt off for, and that I’d like to use to buy a nicer house for myself, is being taken from me to go buy one for someone else! (I don’t live in South Huntsville.)
The only thing I can figure is that the HHA must think that Government money is meant to be squandered. After all, even if everyone in Huntsville gets smart, quits their jobs, stops paying their rent and their mortgage and then lets the city know that they now owe them housing in the area of their choosing, the city of Huntsville can just go in debt and buy everyone’s house right? The Huntsville bailout. It’s the American way; at least until whoever is holding all the markers comes to cash in.
Yes, this was a totally one sided rant. If I’m missing something in understanding this situation of HHA purchasing apartment units in South Huntsville for use as low-income housing, feel free to fill me in by submitting a comment (if you’re in the mood to rant, also, that’s fine, but name calling isn’t allowed.)
Huntsville Times: Huntsville Housing Authority hears emotional debate over public housing
Well spoken and intense discussion of the free housing issue. Hardly qualifies as a “rant”, since it is so coherent and indisputable.
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Joani Reply:
October 31st, 2009 at 11:02 am
Thanks for the response :) The only feedback? This page has gotten a decent viewing since being posted.
If everyone agrees with me, how is this deal going through? Or was the HHA right when someone commented that the people that live in S HSV don’t own it? I found that comment mind boggling, myself.
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Extremely well done; My favorite quote from Adrian Rogers, 1931 relates well (It’s only 5 sentences):
“You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.”
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Joani Reply:
January 7th, 2010 at 5:22 pm
Love the quote. Thank you very much for taking the time to share it :)
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Do you feel that the property values are greater than human life itself? There is often a misconception that lower income people don’t pay taxes at all. All they want to do is live off of the government. Maybe one of these days all the ignorant stereotypes will play out. As far as the people who live in S.Huntsville owning it they don’t. There is no puzzle to solve there. I was born and raised in S.Huntsville lived down there for almost 30 years and never once did I think that I owned it. Never once did I have the ignorance or arrogance to tell someone that they can’t live amongst the people down there because they didn’t have as much money as me or the next person. They were always met with open arms. Everyone is going on stereotypes because they think that if you live in the projects, or you are on Sec.8 then you are lazy, a thug, or dealing dope. You know nothing of the people that will soon become part of S.Huntsville. Don’t judge someone you know nothing about. Here is my big question that no one can seem to answer: Where are they supposed to live?
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Joani Reply:
January 14th, 2010 at 9:26 am
My protest has nothing to do with who lives in my neighborhood. My neighborhood isn’t even in question, since I don’t live in S. Huntsville. I live about a mile from a large unit of subsidized rent apartments. It looks a heck of a lot nicer now than it did before, too. I appreciate that and have no problem with my new neighbors or the fact that the Government used my money to help turn around a complex headed for decay into a well maintained and populated housing area.
Unless someone was making a mess of my neighborhood (read “mess” as literal “mess”, as in trashing property) or making me feel unsafe in my neighborhood (trespassing, threatening), I don’t ever see me telling anyone I don’t want them in my neighborhood. I can’t vouch for the open arms thing, as the only people I actually recognize in my neighborhood are my immediate neighbors and the daily walkers I that greet on a regular basis, but I don’t care how much someone makes or what they do for a living. I’ve never even thought about it.
My only problem with the recent purchase of high property value real estate for the purpose of subsidized public housing by the HHA is purely economical. The reason I feel that I have a right to have a problem with it is that they are using my money to purchase property that is more expensive than other property areas available, property that normally would be expected to bring more money to the Government than less expensive real estate in the form of higher property tax. I would think that return flow is lost in subsidized housing, so it’s not just extra funds gone now, but into the future, as well.
Tax money should be for the basic protection, transportation and education of the people. Shelter is protection, and when someone can’t manage to acquire it on their own, and their families and churches can’t or won’t help, then it falls to me and you to take care of them from that tax money the Government believes that it can spend so much more wisely than you or I. When their definition of wisely is to provide things that the beneficiaries would “like” to have instead of “need” or their definition of wisely is to engage in some sort of sociological experimentation that is beyond their assigned function, I protest.
I realize that most areas of Government are wasteful and squander our money like it’s magic dollars appearing from thin air instead of a quarter of someone’s paycheck who might have been able to take a vacation sometime, or maybe even retire some day if they could have kept it. I realize this issue may be a small drop in the bucket compared to some others. However, this is the issue that has been raised at this moment in time, and I am happy to add my voice in the hopes that someone somewhere in Government might take note and, if they have more money than they need to provide the basics, they might someday (impossible dream, I know) give it back to the people who earned it so they could spend it like they would like. Maybe even use it to help out someone who would otherwise wind up in the system.
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