ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, January 13, 1997 TAG: 9701130068
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
MEMO: ***CORRECTION***
Published correction ran on January 15, 1997.
To our readers
Headlines in Monday's paper incorrectly suggested that Habitat for
Humanity of Roanoke Valley was trying to force a 76-year-old man off his
property.
Habitat offered Henry Casey $15,000 for his house, which is assessed
at $10,800, in order to build a large community of single-family homes
in Southwest Roanoke. Casey accepted the offer, but, at closing, asked
for more money. Habitat has said it would help Pasey fins a new
place, and that it would consider increasing its offer because the
assessment on the property had risen since the offer was first made.
However, in a letter to Casey before he signed the contract to sell,
Habitat told him that the sale was voluntary and that it would not
acquire the property if he did not agree to sell.
A 76-YEAR-OLD MAN with a meager income is being pushed off his land by an unlikely source - Habitat for Humanity.
All around Henry Casey's home on Jackson Avenue in Southwest Roanoke are weedy lots where dozens of old shotgun-style houses once stood.
The area overlooks a rail yard, crowded with rows of cars - coal hoppers, tankers, boxcars. There is the faint click-clack of trains rolling over tracks.
Vagrants frequent the area at night, finding shelter under the nearby 10th Street overpass or in the few remaining vacant, crumbling homes.
The area is a once-thriving pocket of inner-city Roanoke that has gone to pot.
Casey, 76, is its lone resident. Odds are, he won't be there much longer.
He lives where Habitat for Humanity of Roanoke Valley plans to build its largest community of affordable single-family homes for working low-income families.
For three years, Habitat has been working to acquire and clear 31 lots - including Casey's - for its plan to build 25 homes between 10th and 11th streets and Norfolk and Jackson avenues. Habitat has all but four of the lots it needs, plus land donated by the Norfolk Southern Corp.
Casey's house - and the 32-by-50-foot lot it sits on - is property in flux. Habitat was ready to close on the sale of Casey's property when he asked if the organization could increase its $15,000 offer. He was concerned that the offer wouldn't give him enough money to buy another home.
And if he couldn't find another home, couldn't move, what would Habitat do, Casey asked. Build around him? Force him out?
Most likely, Casey will have to move. And Habitat is in the uncomfortable position of asking an aging man who lives in near poverty to move to make way for housing designed to help people who live in substandard conditions because they can't afford decent homes.
"We don't want to fix poverty housing by putting someone out of their home," said David Camper, president of Habitat's board of directors. "We're not out to displace anyone."
Renovating Casey's house isn't feasible because it is in such poor shape, Camper said. Habitat discussed with Casey the possibility of his moving into one of the new Habitat homes. But it was unclear whether he would meet all eligibility criteria, which include a willingness to put hours of sweat equity into home construction and making monthly mortgage payments - on average, $250, Camper said.
Habitat offered Casey $15,000 for his property, which the city had assessed at $9,800. But Casey said he would need more to buy another house. He found one not far away, on the corner of Salem Avenue and 11th Street. The owner wanted $25,000, he said.
"I guess I'll have to take what Habitat gives me," Casey said. "I want my own place."
Casey's four-room house is a small wooden structure, covered with a thick coat of chocolate brown paint. Several three-door cinder-block sheds, built by Casey and painted the same brown, are out back.
The home is heated by a wood-and coal-burning stove in the corner of the kitchen. Last week, when temperatures dropped from the balmy 70s dropped into the 40s, the smell of burning coal filled the house.
The house is dark, the walls as brown inside as outside. A bit of late morning sunshine filtered through the Venetian blinds that covered a kitchen window.
"Flip that switch," Casey told a visitor. A bare bulb hanging from the kitchen ceiling flickered on.
Casey shrugged when asked how old the house was. "Old," he said. "Old."
The houses that once surrounded Casey's were built at the turn of the century for railroad track gangs. They were called "shotgun" houses, presumably because you could shoot a gun from the front door and the shot would go straight through the house and out the back door.
Casey and his wife, Luvenia, who died of cancer a year ago, bought the home 13 years ago. At the time, they'd been married for 10 years.
A retired furniture company employee, Casey lives on a monthly $504 Social Security check. He collects and sells aluminum cans and mows lawns for extra money - $10 here, $30 there.
Casey said he may rent a house if he can't find one he can afford to buy. His income won't go far, he said. He would have to rely on some of the money he makes from the sale of his property to cover the rent, he said.
Casey won't have to move immediately. Habitat construction is scheduled to begin this spring, but on Norfolk Avenue. Construction won't begin on Jackson Avenue, where Casey lives, until 1998, Camper said.
Habitat is willing to work with Casey, possibly by increasing its offer and helping him find a new place to live, Camper said. Upping the offer would be appropriate because the real estate assessment on the property has risen to $10,800 since the offer was first made, he said.
"This is so unusual," Camper said. "If there were a way to build around him, we would. But my gut feeling is he'd be a whole lot better off not living in that house. I don't think that's decent housing for him now. I don't think it's safe for him there now."
LENGTH: Long : 111 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: JANEL RHODA\Staff. Henry Casey owns the last piece ofby CNBland on Jackson Avenue that Habitat for Humanity wants in order to
build a new community. color.