Low Income

Though 2010 is around the corner I wanted to share. If you are a single person and in 2009 and you are making $44,800, you my friend, according to HUD are low income. Funny thing, I know a guy who makes a smidge, as in I rounded up, above low income. I’m sure he considers himself middle class. Middle class by $200. If you’re single making $35,950 you are “very low income,” and if you are single making $21,550 you are obviously working at a non-profit for chicken feed (USPRIG?).
A GS-5 step 1 position, which is what I started off as in DC, and the starting salary of a UDC staff asssitant is less than very low income.

“No one wants to live near poor people”

…isn’t exactly a correct comment, but I have seen it a couple of times on the web regarding mixed income housing and gentrification. I’m mean we’re living in Shaw not Woodly Park or Chevy Chase. I have a hard time imagining that people who bought housing, oh east of 9th Street, were caught completely off guard by the subsidized housing that dots the neighborhood. Than again, maybe some were.
I think of Shaw as economically diverse. You have neighbors in longtime poverty and short term (young, just starting out, etc) poverty, the elderly and disabled on fixed incomes, and others whose incomes wax and wane depending on clients, contracts, sales, rentals, or what have you. But I don’t think it is so much a neighbor’s poverty is as it is their dysfunction. Grad students are broke, but hardly anyone is up in arms about graduate family housing. Plain college students can be broke also (depending on their sources of support) but neighbors do tend to oppose their housing as that population can be a bit too rambunctious and loud, not because they may or may not have money (see Catholic U area for examples of such conflicts).
Shaw’s diversity, economic, racial, etc., is a strength and a challenge. Crime is a huge challenge, so are the blocks of concentrated poverty. In mixed income areas we learn from each other. The more middle class residents learn about the various programs for neighbors in need, the more they can train themselves to be supportive of programs that work and harshly critical of ones that fail and are nothing but fronts for poverty pimps. The more I learn about Bread for the City (CFC# 61733), and N Street Village (CFC# 90946) the more I am impressed by their work and efforts.
But let’s wander back to the question of mixed income housing and if it is possible, would non-poor people be willing to live next to poor people. Well in Shaw, we already do, in townhomes. I have a hard time telling, as it is from causal observation over the years, but the Washington Apartments, along 7th and 6th Avenues, appears to be slowly becoming more racially diverse. As far as I know they aren’t subsidized housing, but I do get the sense that those apartments are economically diverse. Feel free to correct me if I’m totally off base.

Affordable rental housing

What: (Housing Search Clinic) ARE YOU LOOKING FOR AFFORDABLE RENTAL HOUSING?

When: Every Thursday 4:00 pm – 6:00 pm No appointment needed

Where: HCS Training Center 2410 17th street, N.W. Adams Alley, Suite 100 Washington, D.C. 20009

Additional Info: please bring documents that pertain to your personal situation and might help in your housing search. These include all documents related to your income (such as recent pay stubs, TANF, unemployment, disability, child support, pension benefits, alimony, or social security statements) and expenses (such as recent phone, credit card , or utility bills, student and car loan statements) . Please bring information about your current housing (such as a copy or your current lease.)

Learn about recourses to assist you in your housing search
Learn how to best present yourself to a landlord
Learn about other housing options to consider
Learn about affordable housing waiting lists
Get help determining how much you can afford in rent
Meet with a counselor for a housing assessment

HSC is located in Adams Alley. Walk down the alley on 17th street between Euclid and Kalorama Streets. Using the intercom, press # and 100 to be admitted