MOM’S LETTER LEADS CITY TO RAZE DERELICT FIFTH WARD HOUSING 
Yesterday, this Komatsu finished the job that Hurricane Ike started, taking out 63 damaged units of the Houston Housing Authority’s Kelly Village Apartments at 1119 Grove St. in the Fifth Ward — and at least one of the residents is happy to see ’em go: “Lacrecha St. Jules,” who wrote a letter to the Housing Authority requesting that something be done, reports the Houston Chronicle, “spent plenty of sleepless nights worrying about her four children as drug dealers and thugs made themselves at home in [the] vacant buildings. . . . ‘It was dark, and there were rapes back there . . . It was a bunch of negatives, and I just wanted to turn it into a positive.'” North of I-10 and east of U.S. 59, the apartments, which showed up in yesterday’s Daily Demolition Report, date to 1930; the city says it plans to build an $800,000, 3-acre park in their place, with room for a jogging trail and garden. [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot] Photo: KHOU via Facebook
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Ahhh, a nice new park for drug dealing , drive bys , and prostitution, all at a mere $800,000 to taxpayers……
I wonder if the woman who wrote the letter considered that demoing an old crack complex and building a new park with jogging trail will likely attract Clinton Dr. area residents from across the freeway and future gentrifiers. Mayor Parker jumped on the chance for good PR, improving the quality of life for lower income residents and seeding tax base.
Texmex01: That was already going on; it was just hidden under a shelter. Remove the shelter and add lighting, and it gets more difficult. Or did you want to leave it all alone until it becomes the next Southwest Inn?
Dana, my guess is Ms. St. Jules was more concerned about removing the dilapidated structure across the street, with the attendant safety risks to her family, than tax bases or gentrifiers. My guess is you would too if you lived across the street from a falling-down burned out semi-structure that was home to crime and drug dealing.
Here come whitey!
Sihaya, it will continue in the light, glad the building is gone, but the park does nothing more that add a false sense of security…
Now, if with the park, the city added a dedicated HPD patrol, then you have the beginning of something!
“From heyzeus:
Dana, my guess is Ms. St. Jules was more concerned about removing the dilapidated structure across the street, with the attendant safety risks to her family, than tax bases or gentrifiers. My guess is you would too if you lived across the street from a falling-down burned out semi-structure that was home to crime and drug dealing.”
Google map the address and look around, all of the structures look like that!
Yes, hopefully there will be good lighting provided at the new park. Not sure how I feel about kids playing outside next to the freeway (cough cough), but that’s not uncommon in our town.
While the HHA structures needed to go, the sad fact is they were better than what a good share of the private homes around there are like. At least with HHA there is at least nominally some sort of managing entity – many of the private homes don’t appear managed at all, and state law makes it hard to do much about those without a great deal of legal effort and cost.
That part of the fifth ward is still 10 to 20 years from gentrification.
Let them eat cake then, eh TexMex?
Annise PArker can come up with $ 800,000 for this 5th Ward project(she’s buying votes);another $500 MILLION plus to “Acquire” land near Memorial Park to grow the Uptown/Galleria TIRZ ; another $50 million or so ,to expand the green belts / bikeways .But she WON’T float a $ 1-2 BILLION bond issue ,as if the taxpayers really care that the COH has $8 BILLION + in debt and adding a couple of billion more to REPAIR /REPLACE / RESURFACE the crappy ,deteriorating ,horrible roads/streets in Houston is going to jeopardize the COH bond rating.. We’ll have a sparkling ,new hike & bike system all over town.But the streets will continue to eat our vehicles. Maybe we’ll drive on the NEW hike & bike pathways when the roads become so cruddy we’ll have no choice. Or maybe it’s part of the hidden agenda to force people to take METRO !!!
BTW,check out Mayor Parker’s neighborhood: the Westmoreland District.Between W.Alabama,Garrott St.,Hawthorne St., and the 527 Spur. The streets are nice and paved, no pot holes, no alignment wrecking craters,etc. All nice and neat. Funny how her hood is pristine and the most of the rest of Montrose /Inner Loop is sliding into Third World status!!! And don’t believe for one minute the Westmoreland District is better maintained because of their HOA /Civic Club. It’s because the Mayor lives there !!! It’s such double standard BS!!!
Crikey, sometimes there are more crackers around here than at the Nabisco plant.
Texmex01 – Sure, crime will happen in the light, but it *likes* to happen in an empty shelter. This is one less empty shelter.
Driving by there yesterday on the way to the 5th ward civic meeting, you see an almost automatic difference in the neighborhood. Families outside playing and all the gangsters have moved a couple blocks east on market street. There are a lot of families there trying to do good for themselves. This is a definite improvement for them and the surrounding neighborhood.
Derelict buildings ought to come down where ever they are. Replacing this one with a park makes some sense as long as the 5th Ward remains generally undesirable to developers. If the lot’s going to sit vacant, you may as well do something with it.
Patrick, your neighborhood streets suck? Take a number. Bring your list of grievances when it’s called and join the club. “Buying votes” has got to be the silliest charge, really. I mean, why wouldn’t she buy yours, right? I guess 5th ward votes count more?
Patrick: I live near Mayor Parker (in Westmoreland) and our roads suck. In fact, our civic group thinks they suck because Mayor Parker doesn’t want to appear to favor our subdivision roads.
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Have you driven around in this area or did you hear that they were great from someone else?
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(PS: I don’t expect a reply as I’m reading 1 week old stories. I’ve been on vacation — trying to catch up :)