Public Housing

CHAMBERSBURG, Pa. - A $555,811 federal grant will be used to replace appliances and windows and to make other improvements at public housing developments run by the Franklin County Housing Authority. The money was approved last week through the Comprehensive Grant Program administered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, according to the office of U.S. Rep. Bud Shuster, R-Pa. Chris Gulotta, executive director of the Cumberland County Redevelopment Authority, is acting as a management consultant to the Franklin County Housing Authority while it searches for a new executive director.

To the editor: The latest spate of erroneous publicity regarding one of the Hagerstown Housing Authority's programs requires me once again to write a letter in an attempt to set the record straight. The publishing of a front-page headline article, several subsequent letters to the editor, and the editorial of July 27 have elicited mixed emotions. When faced with problems that have no easy solutions, we seem to strike out at vulnerable targets, which, in the past, may themselves have been the subjects of bad publicity.

It's important to listen to other people, because you just might get another point of view. It's a simple truth, but one I keep learning again and again. For instance, when several readers sent me copies of last Sunday's Washington Post story about how attractive Hagerstown's public housing has become to folks priced out of similar units in Montgomery County, my first reaction was, "That's no big news. " Last September when I interviewed Beth Stouffer, who runs the food bank at St. Mark's Lutheran Church in Hagerstown's West End, she told me that they were seeing lots of new "customers," many from out of the area.

andrear@herald-mail.com laurae@herald-mail.com HAGERSTOWN - Local officials fear that Hagerstown has developed a reputation as a housing refuge for the working poor from the Washington suburbs. In a Sunday story in The Washington Post, three Montgomery County, Md., families told of moving into public housing here after they couldn't find an affordable place to live. Hagerstown Housing Authority Executive Director Ted Shankle said Monday that statistics don't point to a trend.

scottb@herald-mail.com HAGERSTOWN - The head of the Hagerstown Housing Authority met with the Hagerstown City Council Tuesday to answer questions about public housing and rebut claims that the area has become a housing refuge for the working poor from the Washington, D.C., suburbs. A mid-November story in The Washington Post quoted three Montgomery County, Md., families as saying they chose to move into public housing here after they couldn't find an affordable place to live.

A meeting to discuss recent violence in Hagerstown's Westview Homes public housing complex will be held at 6 p.m. today at the Westview Community Room at the corner of Main and Buena Vista avenues. Hagerstown Police Chief Dale Jones and housing authority officials are scheduled to attend. The public is invited.

Sometimes progress is not kind to those who are in its path, as some residents of Hagerstown's Westview Homes have discovered. Their public-housing complex will soon be flattened to make way for a $73.5 million project called Gateway Crossing. Now it's up the housing authority and the city's non-profit agencies to make the move as painless as possible for resident. It's been a little more than two years since housing officials announced their plan to demolish Westview, a barrack-style public housing project built on the early 1950s which has become increasingly difficult to maintain.

daniels@herald-mail.com HAGERSTOWN - The Hagerstown Housing Authority is planning to build a 60-unit public housing facility for seniors to make up for a deficit of units it created when it replaced the former Westview Homes housing project with Gateway Crossing. Executive Director Ted Shankle said the authority formally requested Housing and Urban Development funding in October for the estimated $9 million project as part of HUD's replacement housing program. HUD has agreed to give the authority $350,000 a year for five years toward the cost of the project, or for the next 10 years if the authority secures additional funding from other sources.

waynesboro@herald-mail.com WAYNESBORO, Pa. - The Waynesboro Zoning Appeals Board on Thursday granted a special exception that gives the Franklin County Housing Authority permission to build a community center for Valley Townhouses, a 22-unit public housing complex the authority already is cleared to build. More than 30 residents from the Sunset Avenue area - next to where the complex will be built - attended the hearing to protest the plan. Board Chairman Ted Sottong said the vote was one of the toughest the members had to make "because it affects lives.

Recently, the Grants Allocation Committee of the Community Foundation of Washington County awarded a $5,000 grant to Easter Seals Adult Day Services to support the Project LINC program. Project LINC, or Living Independently through Neighborhood Connections, is a medical day care program that provides medical assistance, medication monitoring, health education and health care coordination for local residents living in public housing within the Hagerstown Housing Authority. The grant award was made possible in part by partnership with the Pauline Anderson Foundation.

By Anne Chovey Special to The Herald-Mail BERKELEY SPRINGS, W.Va. --Tucked up on the hill overlooking downtown Berkeley Springs is the upscale restaurant, Lot 12 Public House. Billed as "A Dining Destination," Lot 12 is located in an old turn of the century home. Diners can eat in what must have been the parlor or sitting room, or on the wrap-around porch or at the bar, tucked in the back. My companion, Pap Ricka, and I arrived on a warm summer night and decided to opt for comfort inside rather than a view outside.

HAGERSTOWN -- "If I'm not working, I'm not living," Klaus Kneeland said from inside his tent. Kneeland, who last winter said he slept during the day and worked at night, didn't want to come out of his tent, but consented to be interviewed. He said he was making $8 an hour cleaning for a local business, for which he works 40 hours a week. He found that job after spending almost a year unemployed. He received unemployment payments, but child support was being deducted, so he didn't have enough money to afford a place to live, he said.

HAGERSTOWN -- The Hagerstown Housing Authority received a $9.88 million federal grant Friday to build a public housing project for senior citizens at the site of the former H.L. Mills Station at 55 W. Baltimore St. Ted Shankle, the authority's executive director, said he received word Friday afternoon from the offices of U.S. Sens. Benjamin L. Cardin and Barbara A. Mikulski, both Maryland Democrats, that the grant had been awarded by the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

HAGERSTOWN -- The Hagerstown Housing Authority plans to build 60 apartments for senior citizens at 55 W. Baltimore St., the site of the former H.L. Mills service station. The authority submitted a site plan to the city last week. Ted Shankle, the authority's executive director, estimated the project cost at $13 million. The authority has applied for $10 million in federal stimulus money. The project would take about 18 months with the stimulus money, twice as long without the stimulus money, Shankle said.

WASHINGTON - Here's how area members of Congress voted on major roll call votes in the week ending July 24. HOUSE Pay as you go Voting 265 for and 166 against, the House on July 22 passed a bill (HR 2920) putting Congress' pay-as-you-go budget rules into permanent law and giving presidents power to sequester funds when Congress breaks those rules. The bill awaits Senate action. A yes vote was to pass the bill. Maryland Roscoe Bartlett, R-6, no Pennsylvania Bill Shuster, R-9, no West Virginia Shelley Moore Capito, R-2, no Republican alternative Voting 169 for and 259 against, the House on July 22 defeated a Republican plan to replace HR 2920 with a law setting permanent caps on annual spending and deficit levels while leaving tax cuts uncapped.

WASHINGTON COUNTY -- With waiting lists for Section 8 and public housing growing ever-longer, short-term rental assistance programs can mean the difference between a modest home and life on the streets for many Washington County residents, Community Action Council (CAC) Deputy Director Sherry L. Neil said. CAC expects to be able to extend that assistance to an additional 20 to 25 families in the coming months with the help of about $40,000 in federal stimulus funds as part of the Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing Program, Neil said.

BALTIMORE (AP) -- The owner of a Frederick-based cab company says one of his drivers was found shot to death early Monday in Baltimore. Blaine Young, owner of Yellow Cab of Frederick, says the driver was found dead around 4 a.m. after the company received a call for a local pick up and drop off in Frederick. Young tells The (Baltimore) Sun that the driver told a dispatcher shortly after midnight that he had picked up the fare and was not heard from again. The driver was found shot to death in his cab at a public housing complex along North Bond Street in Baltimore.

HAGERSTOWN - The Hagerstown Housing Authority received an early Christmas gift Friday afternoon when it learned it had been named the recipient of a national Excellence in Housing award. Announcement of the recognition was made at the Housing Authority's annual employee holiday luncheon at Elgin Station. The local agency was selected for top honors over thousands of housing authorities across the country, said Jose Rodriguez, who represented Nan McKay & Associates Inc., sponsors of the award.

HAGERSTOWN - The adults dedicated 52 Wayside Ave. with prayers and hymns; 7-year-old Alexcia Russ dedicated it with cartwheels. For Alexcia and her sisters, Aaliyah Russ, 5, and Amiya Russ, 19 months, the house, constructed by volunteers from Habitat for Humanity of Washington County, will mean the first time they've had their own backyard in which to play. Until now, they have lived with their mother, Melissha Vaughn, in public housing in Noland Village, where there's no yard, shootings are a common occurrence and a woman was murdered a few doors down, Vaughn said.