MANY RESIDENTS BANNED FROM PUBLIC HOUSING

ASHEVILLE - In August 1997, 14-year-old Jason Robbs was charged with
disorderly conduct by Asheville police and was subsequently banned from
every public housing development in the city.

Asheville Housing Authority officials told his mother Dianna Robbs that she
had to choose between living in Pisgah View Apartments and living with her son.

But the single mother of two couldn't afford to live anywhere else. Her son
was to be banned for a mandatory minimum of three years.

So Dianna Robbs sent Jason to live with his grandmother in Woodcroft
Apartments, a low-income development not affiliated with the authority. He
eventually ran away, and his mother hasn't seen him in years.

"He did get into trouble, but he was only 14," said Robbs, who still lives
in public housing. "I was his main caregiver, and he was going to be
arrested if he ever came around here. Wherever he is, he's 19 now and I
done stopped trying to fight it."

As part of an ongoing effort to rid public housing developments of drugs
and crime, the Asheville Housing Authority has since 1995 systematically
banned people from its properties who break the law.

A 13-page "banned list" available at the authority's central office shows
that nearly 1,100 people remain barred from the 14 developments - 10 of
which are public housing - owned or managed by the authority.

Most were barred for incidents involving the possession of illegal drugs,
but individuals can be banned without having been charged with or convicted
of a crime.

The authority is subject only to the federal guidelines set by the
Department of Housing and Urban Development. Asheville City Council has no
direct oversight of the agency or its $7.2 million budget, but the mayor
does appoint all five members of its board.

On Aug. 13, that board is slated to vote on an official ban policy, the
first the agency has ever developed.

"We had a procedure, but it came to us that we had to adopt a policy,"
Resident Services Director Alberta Williams said. "A lot of people were
calling and trying to get their name off the ban list, and we knew we
couldn't continue to operate that way."

The authority has no "purging" system for the ban list. After three years
pass, people may request to be taken off the list. If they have a clean
police record, according to Deputy Director Michael Godwin, the ban could
be lifted. Otherwise, like hundreds of individuals, they can stay on the
list for seven years or more.

Up to now, Williams said the authority has modeled its current procedure on
ban policies from housing authorities in Winston-Salem and Charlotte.
Officials at both agencies said they initiate bans on people who break the
law on housing property.

HUD regulations grant local authorities the power to ban people from their
properties. Deborah Holsten of HUD Greensboro's public information office
said that such a practice is viewed as part of the lease agreement.

"And if people break the law on the property, the housing authority can
prohibit them from being on the property," she said. That policy would
apply to both residents and nonresidents, according to Holsten.

However, residents would be evicted before being banned.

A few transgressions

The bans are about safety, Godwin said. "The main reason most of the people
are on the banned list is for using drugs or selling drugs on our property.
They aren't seeking housing, but are on our property causing trouble."

Yet, records show that dozens of people were barred for transgressions such as:

- - Driving the wrong way on a one-way street.

- - Parking in front of a Dumpster and blocking access to it.

- - Getting into a water fight and "(throwing) water out the upstairs window
on someone outside."

- - Impeding traffic flow.

- - Exceeding safe speed.

- - Gambling.

- - Using "loud and profane" language.

- - Littering and illegal consumption of alcohol.

- - Being cited for playing loud music.

- - Driving through a stop sign.

- - Breaking the plastic cover on a "No Smoking" sign in an elevator and
damaging a light fixture.

- - Being a passenger in a vehicle that "egged" a police car. The person was
also "seen on a video buying eggs" beforehand.

That's why many of the current 1,300 public housing residents say the bans
are too aggressive; that they hurt poor families and increase homelessness
in a city with the highest housing costs in the state.

"We have people about to lose their homes over nothing," said Lynnette
Maybin, a resident of Hillcrest Apartments. "Today it's somebody with a
baby. Tomorrow it's somebody with six babies. We have so many people on
that ban list, yet apartments are sitting here empty."

As of July 15, the authority's monthly occupancy report showed 40
apartments were vacant at Hillcrest, a 234-unit development. Of the
agency's 1,512 public housing units, 183 were vacant.

Most often, people are banned after they get a police citation. When any
law is broken on authority property, the police department informs
authority officials, who then issue bans.

Right now, Godwin is the only person who can authorize bans and is the only
one who can remove people from the ban list. The new procedure may involve
an appeals board.

"I would be the first one to say we may have made some mistakes," Godwin
said. "But I think we have tried to apply the ban fairly."

The high cost of safety

Local law enforcement supports the ban policy, though the police department
does not impose it.

"We can't ban folks, but the authority has the power to do it, and
certainly we will support them in their efforts," Police Chief Will
Annarino said.

"Since the bans, we've seen a tremendous drop in crime in public housing,"
he said. "In the early 1980s, we couldn't send an ambulance into Hillcrest
(Apartments) without a police escort."

City Crime Analyst Ed Eads said he's just started to compile data on crime
statistics in public housing units, but that the work will be lengthy and
complex.

"It's going to require a great deal of time to extract that amount of
data," Eads said.

Eads did provide recent data on calls for police service at Pisgah View
Apartments, a 262-unit complex in West Asheville. In 1999, police responded
to 1,600 calls; in 2000, 1,300 calls; and last year, 1,200 calls.

"It appears there is a downward trend," Eads said, "but these numbers don't
break down the severity of the calls or show their exact nature."

Safety is an expensive endeavor for public housing authorities. By 1998,
according to HUD, U.S. housing authorities were spending $500 million
annually for safety and security measures, including additional police
officers, tenant patrols, lighting and security cameras.

Annarino conceded problems still exist here. A man was stabbed to death
July 27 at the Garden View Apartments. In January, Charlene Major and her
two young daughters were killed in their Walton Street apartment.

Still, many public housing residents chafe at ban policies, even in the
name of safety. That's partly because they may already feel a loss of
autonomy by living in the developments, according to Bill Rohe, a public
housing expert at UNC-Chapel Hill.

"The biggest sore thumb for residents is that they can't decide who can
stay in their apartment, or if their boyfriend or girlfriend can move in,"
said Rohe, who teaches in the university's city and regional planning
department, and has studied low-income housing issues for more than 20 years.

"They have to register visitors, and so forth," he said. "And they're
probably subjected to more inspections than people in private housing
because there are so many federal regulations.

"But from a housing authority perspective, if (visitors) are staying (in
the apartments), they need to be on the lease and contributing to the rent.
Rents are based on income."

A flawed procedure?

Godwin said that while some of the bans may seem Draconian, the reality is
more complex.

"Like with stop sign violations," he said. "Oftentimes we've got a
situation that when the police are in the development, people who may be
there to buy drugs or sell drugs will try to speed off to avoid getting
arrested. People need to understand the reasons behind what we're doing."

But Robin Merrell, a housing attorney with Pisgah Legal Services, thinks
the authority's ban practice is flawed.

"This is a case where people's rights are being taken away from them, and
we should always care when (that happens)," she said. "I know some people
are going to see this as an issue that's never going to affect them. 'These
are poor black people, so what do I care?' But they're banning people for
the wrong reasons."

At a recent meeting between Hillcrest residents and housing authority
officials, retired Asheville Police Lt. Walter Robinson defended the ban
procedure under some harsh criticism from attendees.

Robinson is part of the authority's Community Safety Team, funded through
the federal Public Housing Drug Elimination Program. About 40 police
officers participate in the $370,000 program and work off-duty patrols in
the developments.

"The only reason that ban list is in effect is because people on the list
broke the laws," Robinson said. "Before you start knocking the ban list,
remember that these are the people you are defending. I mean, how many
former drug dealers do you know that's repented?"

Merrell isn't totally opposed to a ban policy. But she thinks no one should
be put on a ban list without a hearing first and that people should be
allowed to appeal at any time, rather than waiting three years.

"There is a place for (a ban policy) - to try to make the developments as
safe as possible," she said. "We shouldn't have people who are dealing
drugs, or people who are violent. But even they shouldn't be banned until
after they've had a fair hearing and been convicted of something. That's
one step away from a police state. I think a ban policy should be very narrow."

A housing dilemma

Oakley resident Althea Goode lived in public housing until 1995 when she
bought an Eastview Homes condominium from the authority. She worries that
the ban policy pushes low-income people from their only housing resource.

"Public housing is supposed to be for poor people," she said. "If they
can't go there, where can they go? To the shelters and the streets?"

According to HUD figures, about 1.3 million families and individuals in the
United States live in public housing units, which are managed by some 3,300
housing agencies. HUD administers federal aid to local agencies that manage
the housing for low-income residents. HUD sets the lower-income limits at
80 percent and very low-income limits at 50 percent of the median income
for the county or metropolitan area in which residents live.

Asheville's city planning staff notes the median local income for a family
of four is $47,ooo. The median home costs $138,000, which makes Asheville
the most expensive housing market in the state. Staff cited a Coldwell
Banker housing cost study that showed a $116,000 house in Greensboro would
cost $150,000 in Asheville.

Local housing costs have hit Shiloh resident LaShonda Carson hard. She was
banned from public housing in 1997 after being arrested on drug charges.

When she became pregnant, she sent her son Zahmre, now 10 months old, to
live in Hillcrest with her grandmother. But Carson, then homeless, couldn't
visit her son.

"I couldn't be there every three or four hours to feed him," she said.
Carson and her partner are now trying to keep up with a rent bill of $595 a
month. They're not having much luck.

"I guess the housing authority said, like, next year I'll be able to come
back to their projects," she said, giving a bottle to Zahmre. "But I'm
going to try not to ever have to go back there."