Single moms often live in poverty

from The Courier Journal

Activists: Spread affordable housing

By Marcus Green

About 40 percent of Louisville households headed by single mothers are bunched largely in high poverty areas west and south of downtown, a new report shows.

Housing advocates say the study shows the need for more affordable housing throughout the city, including subsidized apartments and public housing.

And such housing should be required in every Metro Council district, according to the study released today by the Metropolitan Housing Coalition, a nonprofit agency that supports fair housing issues.

The mayor's office stopped short of endorsing mandated affordable housing, instead endorsing incentives to encourage developers to build homes of different price levels.

Experts say the importance of blending low-income residents into middle-income neighborhoods is that it offers better work and education opportunities for impoverished parents and children.

"In these high-poverty areas, there aren't a lot of jobs, a lot of viable institutions" such as parks, said Karen Christopher, a University of Louisville sociologist. "When you're raising a family, that's what you need."

Expanding affordable housing into middle-income and affluent neighborhoods won't directly pull single-mother families out of poverty, but it could influence their aspirations and behavior, Christopher said.

Homes and apartments are deemed affordable if they cost less than 30 percent of a household's income, according to the federal government.

But in Louisville, demand outpaces supply, with nearly 15,000 people on a waiting list to receive housing subsidies.

The housing coalition's analysis of U.S. Census data paints a stark portrait of households headed by women, showing that 37 percent of those led by single mothers are impoverished.

The coalition is recommending several steps.

In addition to requiring affordable housing in each of the Metro Council's 26 districts, the coalition wants public money to be consistently directed to a city trust fund that homebuyers and developers could use for that purpose.

"The ultimate goal is to have affordable housing everywhere," said Cathy Hinko, the coalition's executive director.

Mayor Jerry Abramson's office disagrees that the city should require affordable housing in all parts of Louisville.

"We have always taken an incentive approach," said Chris Poynter, an Abramson spokesman. Those include incentives that encourage the construction of homes for low- and moderate-income residents.

In an attempt to start the housing trust fund, Abramson has committed $1 million to the fund in the pending city budget and promises to add more in the future, Poynter said.

Efforts in the General Assembly to use a portion of certain state fees for affordable housing have failed.

"We agreed that there needs to be some kind of dedicated stream, but we would like to see Frankfort be partners with us," Poynter said.

Sarah Foster, a policy analyst for The Family Foundation of Kentucky, said policies that improve housing for single-mother families should be applauded.

But she said any group creating those policies "should not ignore the undeniable benefits for moms, dads and children" from a family with two parents, "nor should they create any policies that undermine the institution of marriage," Foster said. Many of the single-mother families live in unsafe areas or in shoddy housing, but they could move to stable neighborhoods if more affordable units were available, Hinko said.

Austina Merriweather, a 29-year-old single mother of two children, lived in Parkway Place housing complex, in a council district that has 1,400 households headed by single mothers.

She moved to an apartment in the Park DuValle neighborhood in 1999, a housing development with a mix of income levels, and now owns a Habitat for Humanity home there. She has no concerns about her safety, although she had worried about drug activity and people gathering on porches at Parkway Place.

"That was an environment that I could not see my son playing outside," said Merriweather, a bus monitor for Jefferson County Public Schools.

Virginia Durrance lives in Louisville's 6th District, just west of Interstate 65 in downtown. In 2000, about 32 percent of residents there lived below the poverty line -- $13,880 for a family of three, according to the 2000 Census.

Durrance, 39, hasn't worked for about two years, she said, but hopes to look for a job after she has gastric-bypass surgery next month. A federal housing voucher pays rent on the Arcade Avenue apartment she shares with her 9-year-old daughter.

But she would like to move. She said her apartment has been broken into, and she worries about the safety of nearby parks.

"In the daytime I'm OK, but at night time it's not safe," she said.

Reporter Marcus Green can be reached at (502) 582-4675.