Little Rock housing seekers swamp agency
Desperate people camp at fairgrounds to get names on Section 8 list
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
April 29, 2004
by Andy Davis
They began lining up outside the gates
of the State Fairgrounds early Wednesday morning, hoping for
a spot in a federal program that would help pay the rent.
Officials in Little Rock weren’t accepting the
applications for the Section 8 subsidized housing vouchers
until noon, but by 6 a.m. more than 200 people had showed up.
By late Wednesday morning the line, which had swelled to more
than 500 people, crushed against the gate and extended more
than 50 feet up the driveway to Roosevelt Road.
"I need this," said Frankie Woods, 37, a single
mother who slept in her Jeep Grand Cherokee in the
fairgrounds parking lot to secure her place at the front of
the line. "I’m five months pregnant, and I really
need this."
Moments later the Little Rock Housing Authority canceled the
event out of a fear that opening the gate would create a
stampede. Police were called to disperse the crowd.
So ended the second day of the Housing Authority’s
effort to fill the Section 8 waiting list, which had been
closed for three years. The authority had planned to accept
250 applicants for the list Tuesday and 250 Wednesday.
On Tuesday police were called to break up a fight. On
Wednesday an ambulance took away a woman who passed out after
being squeezed in the crowd.
Hundreds of people, mostly single mothers, waited for hours
on both days only to be turned away Wednesday. They blamed
the Housing Authority for the chaos.
"Why wouldn’t you have a plan?" said Erica
Camp, who had been in line since 5 a.m. "Why
wouldn’t you implement something if you know what you
have now is ineffective."
Hattie Daniels, the chairman of the ACORN (Arkansas Community
Organizations for Reform Now), called the event
"deplorable." Some of the women who were turned
away planned to meet at ACORN’s Little Rock headquarters
on Wednesday evening to consider a response to the occasion,
she said.
What happened also demonstrated the lack of affordable
housing in the city and the increasing desperation of its
working poor, some activists said.
Joan Adcock, a city director who runs a welfare-to-work
program, said she planned to take some of her clients to be
signed up but changed her mind when she saw the crowd.
"That is such a sad, sad sight," she said. "To
a lot of these people, that was one of the last chances they
had to survive. I wish there was some orderly way we could do
it, but I know that’s difficult."
The Housing Authority administers about 2,000 of the
vouchers. Those who get vouchers pay a third of their income
as rent to live in private apartments, and the Housing
Authority covers the rest.
The last time the Housing Authority opened its waiting list
came in June 2001, said Shelly Ehenger, the authority’s
deputy director. At that time the Housing Authority accepted
3,000 applications at Neighborhood Alert Centers and social
service agencies without any problems.
The Housing Authority is reviewing whether it should have
used a better method to select applicants, she said.
"Crowd control is always an issue, and I’m not
going to say that the issue can’t be revisited,"
Ehenger said. The individuals in the crowd were ultimately at
fault, she said.
"People have to take individual responsibility for their
actions," she said.
The North Little Rock Housing Authority, the state’s
secondlargest public housing agency behind Little
Rock’s, administers about 1,000 Section 8 vouchers and
has a waiting list of about 407 names, said Pat Judd, the
program’s manager.
The authority opens its waiting list about once a year and
hasn’t had any problems with crowd control, she said.
Women who stood in line at the fairgrounds said they signed a
waiting list for Tuesday and Wednesday.
The lists were supposed to ensure that those who showed up
early would be the first inside.
The women said those lists were honored Tuesday. On
Wednesday, they said, they were told the list was invalid and
whoever was in the front of the line would be the first
inside.
Ehenger said the Housing Authority didn’t authorize
either list.
At 11:19 a.m. Wednesday, the crowd pressed against the gate
as Ehenger announced that she would begin accepting
applicants. Ehenger stood on a planter inside the gate and
used a bullhorn to call for order.
"We will stop the process," she warned.
A few minutes later a woman in the crowd collapsed, and
onlookers pulled her away, set her on the grass and fanned
her. The crowd briefly took up a chant: "Use the list.
Use the list."
Moments later it was over.
"We will not be accepting any applications for the
Section 8 program today. I’m sorry," Ehenger said.
After most of the crowd had left, 33-year-old Deionca Clark,
a single mother of three, sat outside the gate weighing her
options.
She lost her job at a bakery in March and couldn’t pay
her rent in April. Her landlord has allowed her to stay while
she looks for work and cheaper housing, but she doesn’t
know how long his generosity will last.
She expects to get $247 a month in welfare payments after
signing up last month. Her rent is $500.
"I don’t know what I’m going to do now,"
she said. If she loses her apartment, she said,
"I’d have to go to a shelter, and that’s real
scary."
With no car, Clark wasn’t even sure how she’d get
home. "I’m sitting out here trying to think what my
next move’s going to be."