Housing Crisis My A@#

Forgive the provocative title. It's all about the headline right?

I have been asking myself this ever since the word foreclosure became the most commonly used word in the national media.

What's the big deal?

The housing crisis has been in full swing for decades in my neighborhood. Of the 50 grand homes that used to sit on my block, 18 are still standing. That's 64% of the housing gone. Not in foreclosure or sitting vacant... GONE! That means that 64% of the houses on my block have already been through foreclosure and sat vacant for many years and fallen apart and been torn or burned down. Another 10% sit vacant today. This is just one block out of the hundreds like it in Buffalo and hundreds of thousands like it throughout the nations urban communities. Where is the outcry? Where are the billions of dollars of federal money to bail out these communities? Welfare right?


Welfare in the form of federally funded highways that make wealthy suburbs possible?

Welfare in the form of mortgage interest tax deductions that make middle and upper class homeownership possible?

Without these, the largest welfare programs in the history of humanity, everyone would be stuck in the 'hood. But, if everyone was stuck in the 'hood then the 'hood wouldn't exist. Instead, the 'hood would be a stable, viable community. Not perfect, but stable. Not without problems, but with solutions. Almost like it was before this mad scientist experiment called suburbanization began.

How do we move forward from here? We have moved to one of the abandoned places and are building a community here. With our neighbors we are trying to cross racial lines, socio-economic lines and spiritual lines. We are sharing the joys of new babies and the pain of mothers having to leave those babies to go to war. We are loving our neighbors but more importantly, our neighbors are loving us. "Move to the 'hood and minister" is the call but the surprise is that the 'hood has much more to give than we do.

Grace and peace to all.

P.S. Here is the news item that started this little rant: Empty neighborhoods fill Rust Belt
Also, 6 of NY State's 10 most abandoned neighborhoods are on Buffalo's East Side - our neighborhood.
The picture above is the view from our front window.