A shocking example of local government waste was briefly mentioned in today’s Baltimore Sun article about the HABC’s recent troubles:
“Those tagged range from a Bobcat to a 2011 Ford F-550 truck to the 2007 take-home Jeep Cherokee used by the unit’s chief, Claude “Buzz” Wolfe.”
Why does an HABC employee get to have a take-home vehicle? The agency is supposed to house people, not give cars out to “unit chiefs”. How many more “take-home vehicles” lurk in Baltimore’s bloated bureaucracy?
The Housing Authority of Baltimore City (HABC) is the agency that controls the bricked up buildings you see all over Baltimore. The HABC says it has a 99.7% occupancy rate in this press release! If you have ever walked around the city and seen the numerous HABC controlled properties then this statistic probably seems very odd. In this video I show an HABC bricked up house and talk about some of the issues people have with the HABC.
I wonder if the press release is talking about the livable units the HABC controls? It is possible that 99.7% of the livable HABC units are occupied. I wonder how many HABC controlled units are livable though? Quite a few HABC properties have clearly been uninhabitable and empty since at least the 1990′s.
Last Sunday there was a controversial article about the Johnston Square neighborhood in the Baltimore Sun. I am not going to cover the controversy here. You can read the article or one of the letters to the editor about the article. I want to comment on a quote from Housing Commissioner Paul Graziano on page two of the article:
“Asked if he can point to any comparable undertakings in Baltimore, Graziano said the city has successfully conveyed numerous Reservoir Hill houses to developers who then revamped them.”
I hope Mr. Graziano is not talking about SCOPE. You can read my thoughts (from 2008) about SCOPE and Reservoir Hill here.
In theory he could be talking about Pennrose. Pennrose improved some HABC houses, but there have been management issues with Pennrose and some of the houses are filled with unofficial residents who cause many problems in the neighborhood.
15 houses on the 2200 and 2300 blocks of Callow were supposed to be redeveloped by a developer that the city selected in 2004. It never happened. You can watch a 2009 video I made about Reservoir Hill here. From the 2:08 mark to the 5:50 mark of the video I am walking on the 2200 and 2300 blocks of Callow. I would not use the word “success” to describe these blocks.
Last Tuesday Housing Commissioner Paul Graziano spoke at a Reservoir Hill Improvement Council meeting. The commissioner had some pretty depressing news about the Madison-Park North housing project. I have posted notes from that meeting (that can be found on the Reservoir Hill Google group) that were taken by citizen of Reservoir Hill below this post.
The commissioner is basically going back on everything he said at the August Madison-Park North multifamily dwelling license revocation news conference. The commissioner will be unhappy to know that everything he said at the news conference can be viewed here.
Back in August Graziano opened up his speech by saying how horrible things were at Madison-Park North and everything that the city has tried over the years to fix the problem. He called the situation “Intolerable” and twice said “looks can be deceiving” when talking about how things might look OK to the naked eye, but in reality the situation at Madison-Park North is intolerable.
Looks can be deceiving- knocking down one building, planting some new trees, and getting a new slumlord owner may look nice, but Madison-Park North will still be as intolerable as ever. If the commissioner and mayor give in and do not proceed with the multifamily license revocation then we are going to be stuck with a mildly spruced up version of Madison-Park North for at least another generation! In August Graziano went on and on about how horrible Madison-Park North is, but now it appears everything that he said has been conveniently forgotten. I am so happy that his original thoughts can still be viewed here.
Why does Paul Graziano still have a job?
At the original news conference the mayor said we will not tolerate this type of criminal activity in Baltimore. I am glad she thought this. We are now facing a situation where if we allow a new slumlord to take over and make minor changes that we will be tolerating “this type of criminal activity in Baltimore”.
So did the commissioner really have a plan back in August or was he trying to show off in front of the cameras? Does the mayor have a long term plan for Madison-Park North and the housing department?
On March 15th mayoral candidate Otis Rolley is coming to Reservoir Hill to answer questions about his vision for Baltimore. I plan to personally ask Mr. Rolley if he plans to fire Paul Graziano and what he wants to happen to Madison-Park North.
The summary of Paul Graziano’s appearance at the Reservoir Hill Improvement Council meeting can be found below:
Have a safe New Year’s Eve. Remember that December 31st is not a city holiday so meter maids will be ticketing the uninformed. I hope this coming decade is one of true change and rebirth for Baltimore.
A few Sundays ago I traveled to the Harlem Park neighborhood of Baltimore with Park Advocate Chris Delaporte and Bmoresmart member Robert Wray. Chris and Robert loved my other Baltimore videos and they wanted to be a part of my next video series. Robert did the filming with his incredible camera. I hope you like the difference in video quality.
This series is all about the neighborhood of Harlem Park in West Baltimore. Harlem Park is filled with empty lots and empty houses. There is an odd sense of emptiness on many of its streets. The neighborhood has a lot of green space. Glorious Lafayette Square park is located in the Northeast part the neighborhood. The neighborhood is filled with empty HABC houses and I talk about this issue in many of the segments. The “Highway to Nowhere” is the southern boundary of Harlem Park and I share my thoughts about it in a few of the videos.
Not many people get to visit Harlem Park and even fewer are brave enough to travel through some of the alleys that we walked through. I hope you learn something about this potential-filled neighborhood from these videos. Here are two of them, keep checking back for more:
Filmed by Robert Wray the founder of mp3Car and ITC.
Adam is the most recognizable face of the recent resurgence in Reservoir Hill. He has appeared on many national and local radio shows, in several news publications, and at numerous events discussing his innovative urban redevelopment ideas and his unique lifestyle. Adam is a successful entrepreneur, community activist, and a local political guru who ran for city council in 2007. He is the founder and director of the TechBalt.com Buy a Block Project and BaltimoreHourly.com. His fearless local political commentary has rocked the local blog scene for most of this decade and he plans to take it to the next level in the next decade here on Charm City Current.
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