Dear Editor

...Can it be that the problem is bigger than all the builders, brick-layers cement finishers, carpenters housing administrators, bankers, and politicians of these United States...

...It was not until I joined the board of the Citizens' Housing and Planning Council of New York City—alas, at the same time Starr was leaving it as Executive Director—that I learned a very interesting thing There are other intelligent, articulate sincere, honest people on that board who are as interested in housing as I am but don't always think the "Red Sea should be parted" just to make way for a budding Starr, who worked with the organization for many years, has an admirable ability to enumerate (if not necessarily advocate) many opposing points of view His knowledge of housing is immense and one marvels at the research he has packed into those 32 pages But what does the bottom line show...

...Surely you can speak from personal experience" Though I once could speak glibly at the PTA about what should be done at our children's school, when it comes to housing today T am often at a loss for a capsule answer Thus I could only hold my breath m admiration as I read Roger Starr's deep and provoking study of American housing, for he demonstrates a brilliant understanding of so many facets of this complicated subject As a builder, I must confess I am sometimes inclined to feel that I should have the "Red Sea parted" for me when I encounter government delays or community opposition After all aren't we the ones who lay the brick, pour the concrete and saw the wood...

...Dear Editor Housing Challenge Roger Starr's analysis of "America's Housing Challenge" (NL, September 30) is cogent and perceptive He successfully fills in the pertinent historical background and describes in intelligible language (no mean achievement) the essential elements involved m producing and maintaining government-subsidized or assisted housing His discussion of the central problems is not only accurate but conveys his compassion for the ill-housed and those who suffer social or racial discrimination I do not believe our housing problems can be solved without deep commitment and creative leadership on the part of organizations and individuals in both the public and private sectors Furthermore, to reverse the disastrous course followed by Washington over the past three years, we need—as Starr points out—a consistent social policy on housing from Congress And, I would add from state and local legislators as well Unfortunately, socially oriented housing policy and programs suffer from a lack of aggressive advocacy and the absence of a vocal, grass-roots constituency To nurture these, we need more discussion and a deeper understanding of this critical subject I want to commend you for devoting a special issue of The New Leader to housing New York City Clara Fox Executive Director, Settlement Housing Fund, Inc Years ago when we moved to a little house in the suburbs and became interested in the problems of our children's school, we and our neighbors did not lack opinions and advice for the politicians, administrators and teachers "Everyone is an expert and has ideas on education," we used to say, "because everyone has been to school and knows what it is all about" Well, nearly everyone lives in a house or apartment (soldiers, sailors, prisoners, college students, and hotel residents possibly excepted), so why shouldn't everyone be an expert on the problems of housing...

...My friends and relatives, knowing that I am involved in the development, construction, and ownership of housing, often ask me, "What is wrong with our housing policies...

...Starr's conclusions, summarized under the heading "The Problem of Policy," are that the 1974 Housing and Community Development Act has some good points but is mostly wanting, and that the courts are less of a help than a hindrance He offers an intelligent general guideline "Congress must design Us subsidy procedures realistically, it must encourage the emergence and survival of a housing industry, it must appropriate ample funds to meet the goals and regulations it adopts At the same time, legislative devices must contain the expression of a policya sense of what is good and right " Not bad, yet what specifically should I tell my friends and neighbors when they ask me what is wrong with the housing industry...

...I wonder Scarsdale, N Y Robert F Borg President, Kreisler Borg Florman Construction Company Roger Starr's "America's Housing Challenge" reveals both an excellent factual knowledge of the whole complicated subject and an acute understanding of present political, economic and social forces Despite his brilliant exposition, however, Starr fails to give practical recommendations for changing the conditions he criticizes At one point, for example, he states that the demolition of existing housing is "clearly wasteful not only of physical assets but of human and community relationships," yet he then goes on to conclude that the "nation's older urban buildings remain an ambiguous source for improved housing" In the light of current market conditions (high interest rates and construction costs) one would expect Starr to look upon possible refurbishing of the stock on hand as a definite source for improved housing continued on next page Dear Editor Among those familiar with housing, it is axiomatic that political rent controls and government enchantment with new construction has produced the situation we face today Therefore it would seem reasonable to propose that a moratorium on new construction, termination of rent controls, and increased housing or family assistance payments could bring about a renaissance of our housing stock at about half the inflated cost of new construction The last paragraphs of the concluding section "The Problem of Policy," leaves the reader confused I would agree that the social problems of the broken and disruptive tenant family cannot be magically cured by building new apartments But more is needed than the author's urging that Congress adopt a policy that "is good and right" There are some practical solutions 1 The establishment of more rigid hud or legislative requirements for the selection of tenants in subsidized housing to make acceptance a privilege and not a right 2 An increase in the public special services provided by HEW to problem communities 3. The improvement of court procedures and penal systems to encourage greater respect for law and order 4 A family assistance income program along the lines first recommended by Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and now being reviewed by HEW New York City Duncan Elder President, Citizens Housing and Planning Council of New York, Inc Roger Starr's acerbic commentary on housing policy is more than an analysis of mixed success and failure It is a description of the "Catch-22" elements, with all their inconsistencies and irrationalities, of a policy that is public in substance and private in form It is also an affirmation of the need for a greater commitment of resources, human as well as fiscal, to meet the housing needs of our urban backwaters Starr's analysis, however, is deeply affected by the fact that he is ? New Yorker Although what he has to say is relevant to urban areas generally, he neglects the relationship of economic and social development in the hinterland to population migration and thus to urban problems His gestalt reflects long and painful experience with the impact of the unmanageable family upon high-density living patterns He has no illusions that housing is a cure for societal ills, or a substitute for social services and what he calls the dignifying gift of productive and amply paid work " My major criticism of Starr's essay is that it gives insufficient attention to the politics of how to change housing policy I don't believe any solution to the housing problems of the poor is to be found in building dwellings for their exclusive use And greater at tention, I think, should be paid to the fact that changing circumstances may offer new opportunities Economic conditions, for example, have priced a substantial portion of the blue-collar and service-employe working class out of the housing market Meanwhile, the postwar baby boom has come of home-buying age at a time when the housing supply is shrinking and prices are hitting new highs And in many parts of the country public employes, including policemen, firemen and teachers, cannot afford to live where they work-yet with the cost of gasoline doubling, the close proximity of home to workplace is becoming more a necessity than a mere convenience Accordingly, the pressures for making housing assistance available to those who need it-and not only the poor-are increasing "Fannie Mae" and "Freddie Mac" programs are already subsidizing buyers of up to $42,000 homes, with no public criticism of aid for the affluent Indeed, equity calls for a housing policy that will benefit everyone who requires help to compete in the marketplace Political leadership should be able to put together a coalition of all those who need housing, and the jobs housing produces, to support a program that will give the poor a percentage of the units produced An illustrative case is the Mass Housing Finance Agency (MHFA), which finances projects designed to meet the market As a condition of accepting MHFA assistance, developers must agree to allocate 25 per cent of their units for people at the public-housing income levels, either by accepting Federal or state subsidies or by skewing rents This mix assures housing of good design and quality management because the focus is on the competitive market and not on the poor We need more public intervention in housing and community development, not less The Federal role should be to provide funds, but wherever possible the underwriting process ought to be handled by a state or local entity Local authorities should also be responsible for the other elements of housing, what Starr calls the utility and social packages The 1974 Housing and Community Development Act points us in the proper direction, what is now required is the political leadership-local, state and Federal?coupled with an understanding of urban needs and human concerns to get us moving down the right path Washington, DC H Ralph Taylor Roger Starr has written one of the best descriptions I have seen to date of "America's Housing Challenge" There is much I can agree with Yet there are also several points and opinions that seem to have been influenced by information Starr must have gathered second and third hand 1 would like to address myself to two of these Blaming the demise of the FHA 236 program on bad management is a cliche widely used by enemies of Federal involvement in solving our housing problems-including some members of the current Administration Severe constraints of local land use patterns may be a more valid reason, but only in selected locations From first-hand experience I can testify that greedy np-off artists, incompetent suede-shoed promoters, carelessly selected sponsors (who, while perhaps well-meaning, do not know what they are doing), insensible hud rules and regulations and mind-boggling red tape must take most of the blame for the mess the 236s find themselves in And the problems we can expect to have in the future with housing produced under 236 and 235 will make our troubles so far look minute in comparison As happens all too often, a basically imaginative and far-sighted approach-an this case interest subsidy-has been perverted for the sake of making a fast buck and sheltering unconscionable profits by individuals and organizations who could not care less whether low-income families are well-housed or not Moreover, cash-flow difficulties, caused by m-feasible rent structures that stem from the developer's need under hud regulations to demonstrate a net income sufficient to service a loan, large enough to cover the project's costs, have been found to be a major contributor to defaults under the program Other defaults axe due to such factors as unrealistic hud cost limits in some areas or a contractor's need to take shortcuts, resulting in senous construction defects Even the most creative and competent management is hard put to overcome these obstacles Section 235 nas proven less than successful, as is generally known, because no provisions were made to help poor people meet the responsibility of home ownership This need was recognized in Section 221 (h), where sponsors were technically obligated to give guidance to occupants of housing rehabilitated through their own efforts, but it was seldom enforced and was not included in 235 Despite this oversight, the Federally subsidized housing program was fundamentally a sound idea, one that Congress can be proud of It is the implementation of the legislation that has failed Though economic integration was clearly intended to be a central part of this substitute for public housing, local land-use patterns and other barriers erected by local administrators have generally kept the poor (a high percentage of whom belong to minorities) from mixing with the more affluent In only relatively few instances has 236 and 235 housing been constructed in "better" neighborhoods, and on the whole these are the projects that have been successfully integrated, economically and ethnically, while remaining financially strong The other major point made by Starr that I take issue with comes in his last two paragraphs Producing housing that deprived citizens can afford without at the same time trying to solve some of the social problems of the day is counterproductive and inexcusably wasteful New low-income projects placed in the decaying sections of our cities, or saddled with segregating occupancy restrictions, result-at best-in ghettos more pleasing to the eye than the old ones The essential reason why people like myself are promoting the concept of cooperative home ownership is the opportunity we see to develop not just housing but communities that rely on mutual action to attain their goals Like any other endeavor, of course, it takes competent leadership to make this approach work Unfortunately, we do not have enough Jerry Voorhises (National Association of Housing Cooperatives, Inc ), Harold Ostroffs (United Housing Foundation, New York), and Fred Thorn-thwaites (Co-op Services, Detroit) It is also unfortunate that we were never permitted to test a proposal made by the Mutual Ownership Development Foundation of California (mod), for which I work Notwithstanding Starr's low opinion of incentive "bribes" designed to persuade affluent families to tolerate neighbors who are less well off, mod believes that ?key to solving housing problems is the dispersion of low-income people among those of higher income so that they may mingle on a day-to-day basis without tearing down the neighborhood From our limited experience, we are quite confident that a shallow subsidy for housing admitting no more than 10 per cent of those eligible for former Section 23 (now Section 8) would induce a wide range of affluent families to live in a neighborhood with lower-income people To assure success, however, we believe such housing must be owned and operated cooperatively, be located away from heavy concentrations of the poor and minority groups, and be without income restrictions for recipients of the shallow subsidy Millbrae, Calif Paul Golz National Field Representative, National Association of Cooperatives, Inc Roger Starr knows as much about housing as anyone in the country His essay is informative lucid and sophisticated, as one would anticipate, and also "realistic," since he does not greatly raise our hopes or expectations Yet his discussion of current housing policies appears not to distinguish between goals and the methods employed in pursuing them in recent years The fact is that the primary goal of housing policy has been either to stimulate or to continued on next page Dear Editor restrain the economy, and secondly to create jobs in the construction industry Providing a. "decent home" has ranked behind these, while bringing about social change by economic and environmental means has been even lower on the list of priorities That such a policy has not succeeded in achieving these last two objectives is not due to an excessive commitment to social action, but rather to a lack of commitment Starr himself notes that some of the shortcomings of U S housing policy have stemmed indirectly from the economic arrangements incorporated in the legislation Tax breaks have encouraged new construction, yet there has been no financial incentive to provide sound maintenance and management once the buildings are finished Furthermore though many well-staffed and well-funded organizations have supported programs to accomplish the first two goals mentioned, and to a lesser degree decent housing, there has been no comparable lobby for social action This leads one to conclude that few businessmen or politicians believe their long-term self-interest coincides with the self-interest of the lower tenth of the American population Housing, however, is second only to food on every family's agenda As for future policy, Starr correctly asserts that revenue sharing offers the Federal government an exit from its "responsibility for prescribing local goals in community development activities" He implies, moreover, that this exit will be a welcome change for local governments No longer will they be pressured to include social programs as part of their housing strategy "The national policy," he states, "must somehow be framed to assert the importance of housing the poor without promising that this achievement will solve all the other social problems of the day" The prescription is right, but the em phasis is wrong, in our opinion A withdrawal from the social aspect of housing by local governments would be unwarranted and unfortunate Although the moral implications of such a retreat are self-evident, the economic implications cannot be taken for granted In fact a more socially oriented local housing policy might prove more successful in economic as well as moral terms The usual rationale for not becoming involved in such programs is lack of funds, and it is true, as Starr notes that effective housing policy must conform to economic reality Nonetheless, a social program need not be costly, particularly in comparison to new construction, and in the end it would command both wider popularity and greater financial support Starr writes off as "romantic' so-called "sweat equity projects" in which the tenant makes an investment through labor as opposed to cash He suggests that it is unreasonable for either local governments or philanthropic foundations to supply capital for such endeavors because of the low probability of repayment Given that Starr's opinions influence the imaginative foundations, this judgment comes close to being a self-fulfilling prophecy It also overlooks two salient considerations First, if socially oriented projects always made repayment there would be no need for any government policy, since the private sector could provide the service on its own Secondly, the justification for the existence of philanthropic foundations, and the numerous tax advantages they enjoy, is precisely to finance new and un-proven but socially beneficial programs In addition, many factors indicate that sweat-equity projects can be economical, particularly in comparison to new construction The buildings are already there, so rehabilitating them saves the government the cost of tearing them down The labor, especially when the workers involved would be unemployed were it not for the project, costs society nothing If the program is connected with on-the-job training and half-way programs, the participants can often learn skills such as plumbing or electrical wiring that will make them usefully employable in the economy afterward Anyone who has been involved with sites-and-services housing programs in the developing world knows that sweat-equity is the only means those countries have discovered for dealing with low-tor no-) income housing Of course, sweat-equity and similar projects will not solve all our social problems, and Starr is obviously too intelligent to believe in panaceas Still, to follow the Federal government's lead and withdraw from all social responsibility regarding housing is costly in every sense These efforts are relatively inexpensive, and given the chance they might well prove what some of us suspect that far from being a detriment to housing policy, socially oriented programs may be a prerequisite to its success In short, writing them off as "romantic" may be a mistake, and local withdrawal from them might serve to defeat our desire to provide housing for the more than 10 per cent of Americans who want to earn their way out of poverty, to better themselves while contributing more to their country New York City Marietta Tree Shelia Rauch Llewelyn-Davies Associates Rogei Stan lephes An unexpected but certainly a very great source of satisfaction to me alter having set down for The New Leader my view of the American housing challenge has been the flow of comment suggestion, idea, and cor-lection from so many readers whom I along with other students in the field hold in the highest respect The commentary The New Leader has generously printed should be read along with the original, which I am sure benefits from the addenda and clarifi cations As a writer I should be quick to note with respect to criticisms I find generally acceptable that a careful reading of my text will recall all of the suggestions implied if not actually stated but then which of us under pressure cannot find at least some evidence that be has said what he now wishes he might have said...

...One point that has appealed in several letters is that I have been remiss in not proposing a specific program for housing in the future The trouble with asserting a specific program is that one becomes subject immediately to questions concerning its political practicability this problematical area is one in which I have as little talent as in handicapping trofters and I frankly avoided it Nevertheless I thought my article suggested at least in general terms the majority of the programs I consider necessary weaponry in what physicians would call the armamentarium of the housing practitioner They include 1 A fully funded, highly subsidized program-realistically related to escalating operating costs-of publicly owned houses for persons of low income 2 A vigorous, practical subsidization-cum-mortgage-insurance plan for one to-four unit housing 3 A developer-oriented multi-family housing program adaptable to both cooperative and for-profit rental housing, where the subsidy would be used to encourage entrepreneurial activity (the energizing of a housing industry) but where reasonable profits would be offered on the basis of a return on equity commensurate with other types of investment instead of through the murky channel of income tax offsets 4 A coherent national plan for capital formation and for encouraging a flow of savings into the mortgage institutions 5 A program of restudying housing specifications with an eye to reducing the in equality in housing by enacting a maximum limit on the mortgage interest and real property tax deductibility I consider some such measure essential if the individual housing unit is not to place an intolerable burden on the nation's capital 6 A national or regional instrument for reviewing local land use laws, and for overruling local zoning patterns on a substantive rather than a procedural basis when these patterns conflict with leasonable and humane social goals 7. The continued expansion ot the horizons of social policy in bousing in a spirit that will manage to keep the policy a step ahead of practice, but no more than a bridgeable step Some of these programs are legislative others are constitutional still others fall into the uncertain sphere of national sensibility I think they by no means sum up all of the approaches that might be gleaned from the original article if anyone (myself included) had the patience to read it again Specifically I should like to respond to Paul Golz by exposing my bewilderment at his denial that FHA 236 was damaged by shortcomings of management (my words) and his insistence that the damage rather came from admin's rative failnies It seems to me that we ai e both talking .(bout the same thing Pursuing the subject further with him I must reiteiate my unhappy conclusion that the cooperative housing movement has not worked out as we hoped it would Mam of us remember the communal courage displayed by the residents ot Amalgam ited Housing dining the Depress'on-rallied no doubt, by the leadership cf Abraham Kazan We can only watch in dismay as the resi dents of Rochdale Village and Co op City refuse to respond reahstically to the equally stalwart leadership of Kazan's successor Harold Ostroff I suggested that the present residents of these and similar developments do not consider themselves cooperators in quite the same way as their predecessors they more likely think of themselves as tenants and of their state or municipal mortgagee as their landlord Some of the difficulty i think springs from a New York program that goes far beyond Golz' suggestion of 10 per cem low-income, specially subsidized cooperators I am not sure that such programs can be effectively blended with the attenuated cultural status of the cooperative movement which may be an inevitable effect of the years of affluence To my friends Marietta Tree and Shell"i Rauch I must say with regret that I wish I agreed with them about "sweat equity" A number of these projects are under way in New York City today with my blessing and support, but I find it difficult to believe that, even should future projects overcome their technical and organizational inexperience they will be able to grew significantly by offering low-paid competition with the present trade union organization of the construction industry And I continue to wonder if the nurturing of such an underclass of building workers will solve the problem of the American poor Further comments on 'America's Housing Challenge will appeal in future issues-Ed...