Sorry Hurricane Katrina Survivors, You’re Not Worthy of Nice Housing

Boy, this is a real WTF moment. You’d think that Katrina survivors have been through enough. They managed to make it through one of the worst natural disasters in our nation’s history, though many of them lost friends and family members as well as their homes, businesses and communities.

We all know about the embarrassing debacle that was the aftermath, what with FEMA’s brilliant ‘assistance’. Then, these poor schleps were housed in toxic trailers full of mold and formaldehyde. In an effort to quickly move families out of the trailers and into safer housing, FEMA has developed colorful ‘Mississippi Cottages’, which are being touted as a cheap, efficient solution - and for the most part, people are thrilled.

Local municipalities, however, have an objection: they’re ‘too nice’.

From the New York Times:

They fear people who get cottages will simply live in them and not rebuild their houses, said Mike Womack, executive director of the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.

“They’re too nice,” he said. “I’ve heard this over and over again.”

Too bad for you, Katrina victims - you’re just not good enough for these little $32,000 cottages. Back to the toxic death boxes you go!

Link [New York Times] via [Treehugger]

Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons & Lori Waselchuk for The New York Times

The Suburbs Are Turning Into Crime Ridden, Cookie Cutter Hellish Barrens

Remember the scene in Back to the Future II when Marty stumbles around his alternatively universed crime ridden suburban neighborhood, which is filled with empty houses and gang warfare? That is quickly becoming the reality in a many suburbs as the subprime mortgage crisis ripples out. There are neighborhoods today were 61% of the houses are empty and in foreclosure.

Formally middle and upper class homes are being rented out to shady (poor) people and are falling apart thanks to the cheap-as-possible construction methods of most conventional home builders. Neighborhoods with homes that used to sell for upwards of half a million dollars are turning into run down crime hives.

The Atlantic has a great piece titled “The Next Slum“ that explores this growing problem and the urban flight from from the suburbs. Here’s a snip:

Arthur C. Nelson, director of the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech, has looked carefully at trends in American demographics, construction, house prices, and consumer preferences. In 2006, using recent consumer research, housing supply data, and population growth rates, he modeled future demand for various types of housing. The results were bracing: Nelson forecasts a likely surplus of 22 million large-lot homes (houses built on a sixth of an acre or more) by 2025—that’s roughly 40 percent of the large-lot homes in existence today.

For 60 years, Americans have pushed steadily into the suburbs, transforming the landscape and (until recently) leaving cities behind. But today the pendulum is swinging back toward urban living, and there are many reasons to believe this swing will continue. As it does, many low-density suburbs and McMansion subdivisions, including some that are lovely and affluent today, may become what inner cities became in the 1960s and ’70s—slums characterized by poverty, crime, and decay.

Link [The Atlantic]

Photo credit: Flickr user tlindenbaum, faux tilt shift added with Photoshop