Las Vegas NowLas Vegas Public Housing to be Demolished
The end of public housing in Las Vegas is near. A new plan is underway To begin demolishing old neighborhoods and to try to integrate the impoverished families into communities around the valley.
Some of the valley's public housing was built in the 1950's and has housed generations of families.
At some point, they will all be demolished. The city is planning is to level all its public housing and re-locate 12,000 to 15,000 people.
"Its fraught with controversey because a lot of folks see us as breaking up a community," said Carl Rowe, who is the executive director of the Las Vegas Housing Authority.
This week he signed the city's five year plan for the systematic demolition of public housing and sent it to federal authorities. He says public housing is a source of blight for the areas that it's in. He said it isolates the worst elements of poverty.
He added that the original idea of public housing has failed and keeps families in a cycle of poverty.
He wants the city pay their rent at Section 8 homes throughout the community.
"In many people's eyes that makes them seem less than, but the Section 8 was to try to remove that stigma and make the housing part seem anonymous, because what we really want is for these folks to be able to blend in and become a part of the community and not have a stigma like our public housing residents have," Rowe said.
So the new approach is to ask the Department of Housing and Urban Development to issue vouchers for the Section 8 rentals.
With the housing downturn single family home owners are increasingly turning to Section 8 to get someone to pay the rent rather than lose their homes. Last year there were only 200 Section 8 landlords, now there are nearly 250.
The demolition of public housing is expected to start next year on the east side of the valley. The land will be redeveloped with housing and commercial retail space.
