ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, February 6, 1996 TAG: 9602060042
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SAMANTHA MAJOR
THE JAN. 6 article (``Plan calls for overhaul of area'') spotlighting the ``idea'' to raze and redevelop a specific portion of the Old Southwest historical district came as no surprise to residents. For years, many long-time residents of Old Southwest have suspected that their areas were being ignored purposely by Roanoke city to accommodate a hidden agenda. The notion cannot be too farfetched when one considers just what quality of life exists in the areas of Day and Marshall avenues.
Honest taxpaying citizens have been subjected to the most deplorable conditions imaginable. Senior citizens are virtual prisoners in their own homes, which, I might add, are generally paid for and provide a base for tax revenue. Children live in fear of known, convicted child molesters while dodging bullets from random gunfire. Residents have had their homes shot into by disgruntled drug dealers. Arson has been seen at an epidemic proportion. Gang activity is escalating unchecked. Why?
Roanoke city officials, as any resident will tell you, have terminally ignored the area of Day and Marshall avenues. They have all but vocally encouraged the increase of slum housing. Unscrupulous property owners (a.k.a. ``slumlords'') seem sanctioned in their contemptible practices by city officials, in spite of the efforts of underpaid and understaffed building inspectors to nail them to the wall for their wonts.
One despised slumlord and shrewd entrepreneur was contacted concerning his tenants' behavior and conditions of his properties. His response: ``If it's that bad, then why don't you all move out of the neighborhood or purchase the [rental] property yourselves?''
Virginia has laws that provide for the forfeiture and seizure of any rental property that is deemed a ``public nuisance.'' This is to include unacceptable behavior by tenants and housing conditions. City officials have bemoaned the living conditions of Day and Marshall avenues, presumably to indicate that they understand the residents' fury. However, not one slumlord has had property seized, nor has one been forced to adhere to the written law. Thus, living conditions are intolerable and getting worse.
The chatter among many residents is that Roanoke city has allowed the quality of life to deteriorate. If (hypothetically, of course) a specific area of any community is allowed to fall into decay, property values will decrease (although real-estate valuation in Old Southwest has increased at an average cost of $2,000 annually for the past eight years). Hence, a resident who might attempt to sell out and leave human living conditions similar to those found in Southern Detroit cannot, for all practical purposes, give the property away.
This commonly seen tactic in larger cities allows for a city's planning-and-redevelopment folks and speculators to waltz into a depressed area, snap up properties at one-fifth of the ``assessed value,'' and raze block after block to make way for their projects. Portsmouth is a prime example. Waterfront properties, once owned by the ``gentry,'' were snapped up and razed by developers and sold at $110,000 to $120,000 per unit. The crime that drove homeowners out of their neighborhoods was never checked, and those expensive condos cannot be sold for $80,000 eight years later.
However, one wishes to rationalize the deplorable conditions on Day and Marshall avenues, one thing remains clear. City officials saw fit to commandeer $7 million in taxpayer dollars to erect an eyesore of a walkway to keep the toes of the elite dry in inclement weather. Those funds would have been better spent paying city policemen their worth, razing condemned and abandoned dwellings, assisting homeowners in renovation and purchase of properties, hiring more building inspectors, prosecuting and seizing properties from detested slumlords, and a host of other sensible objectives.
Regardless of the futile attempt to generate a huge base for tax revenue, the ``idea'' to raze and redevelop a specific portion of the Old Southwest Historical District will do nothing whatsoever to help improve the quality of life on a long-term basis for current and future residents of the potential ``Charlestonian'' area.
It appears that an underhanded attempt to regenerate the economy in Roanoke city is much more important than those residents and homeowners who have remained loyal to their neighborhoods and the city. Condos? Office buildings? Aren't there enough vacant spaces in the downtown area to redevelop or renovate without continuing to allow the ruination of the lives of hard-working taxpayers to accommodate the city's agenda?
Are human beings and their quality of life less important than another multimillion-dollar project designed to entice dollars of the elite and generate enormous kickbacks? In Roanoke city, this would seem to be fact rather than fancy.
Samantha Major of Roanoke is a former teacher of social development and economics at Tidewater Community College.
LENGTH: Medium: 86 linesby CNB