THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, March 22, 1995 TAG: 9503220266
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MIKE KNEPLER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 54 lines
The city's long-awaited task force on the future of public housing will meet for the first time Thursday.
Meanwhile, its research efforts are being jump-started with a $10,000 grant from the Celia M. Stern estate, supervised by Peter G. Decker Jr., a well-known Norfolk lawyer and a former chairman of the State Board of Corrections.
The task force, with about three dozen members, was formally established by the City Council Tuesday. It is headed by City Councilmen Herbert M. Collins Sr. and Dr. Mason C. Andrews.
The panel is to study Norfolk's public housing, including the social conditions of residents, educational and job opportunities and the effects of crime.
The City Council decided to form the task force last fall after the Planning Commission suggested improvements to public housing, especially near downtown economic development sites.
The commissioners said they were raising the issue for two main reasons: to protect investment in projects such as the $270 million MacArthur Center shopping mall and to make sure that public-housing residents benefit from downtown revitalization.
Collins also encouraged creation of the task force. He added that Norfolk needed to explore more ways to blend public-housing residents into the city's general population.
Decker said he wanted to support Collins' task force because he believes ``public housing has been an experiment that failed.''
In recent years, Decker has contended several times that public housing needed to be eliminated because the neighborhoods are breeding grounds for crime.
But Collins and Decker also have said that their goal of eliminating public housing must be tempered by the housing needs of poor people.
``Don't let anybody think I am trying to get the poor people in the projects taken out of their houses,'' Decker said. ``When I said the projects should be bulldozed, what I meant was by attrition to reduce public housing to normal housing, where you don't have to have people compacted into a small area.''
Both Decker and Collins said that the $10,000 donation will not pre-determine the recommendations of the public-housing task force.
``I am not dictating a result,'' Decker said. ``But will I accept the status quo? I will not.''
The task force will meet at 3 p.m. Thursday in the parish hall of the Basilica of St. Mary of the Immaculate Conception. The public is invited. by CNB