Church Street South Tenants’ Tickets Have Arrived

Church Street South families could be out looking for new places to live as early as mid-May.

That was the upshot of a meeting held Tuesday night in a boardroom on the second floor of 54 Meadows St., where more than 100 tenants met with city housing officials and representatives from Northland Investment Corp. to find out next steps in the long process of moving them into better housing.

The night marked a major step forward in that process, said New Haven Legal Assistance attorney Amy Marx, who represents many of the tenants: The tenants learned that the final needed approvals are in place for them to move into permanent new homes.

About 270 families are still waiting for permanent new homes as New Haven continues to grapple with its worst housing disaster in years: The need to clear out the Church Street South subsidized housing complex across from Union Station, which became uninhabitable after decades of neglect by a series of owners. Once everyone’s out, the complex is slated to be demolished and rebuilt as a larger mixed-use, mixed-income development.

After months of delays and missed promised deadlines from officials, the families — dozens of whom have been living temporarily in hotels or other apartments, others of whom remain in the Church Street South buildings still considered temporarily safe to inhabit — learned at Tuesday night’s meeting that the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has finally formally approved the portable Section 8 vouchers many of them will use to find new apartments.

HUD and Church Street South’s private owner, Northland, have tapped the Housing Authority of New Haven to work with the families on the relocation process. HANH Executive Director Karen DuBois-Walton told residents Tuesday evening that in the coming weeks every resident will receive a letter that will provide details on individual meetings that they are to have with staff. In the first meeting, which will take place over three days during the first week of May, they will have their eligibility for subsidized housing determined and learn about their options for securing a voucher and eventually new, permanent housing.

Tenants have two options:

• They can have Northland transfer their current Church Street South Section 8 subsidy to a new complex owned by someone else, where the rent will continue to be attached to the apartment, not to the tenant (a so-called ​“project-based” subsidy).

• Or they can obtain vouchers they can take with them to go find a landlord of their own to rent to them. Those ​“portable” vouchers will travel with them from home to home, and remain in effect only as long as the tenants qualify for subsidies. Families can leave the state and still use them.

Two hundred twenty-two families have chosen to use those vouchers to find subsidized new apartments on their own if they can under the rules of the program. Another 61, for now, have opted for the ​“project-based” HUD subsidies.

After that first meeting, residents must decide what type of voucher they want and meet with housing authority staff during the third week of May. If they choose the portable-voucher option, DuBois-Walton said, they could start looking for a new home in New Haven or anywhere else in the U.S..

Once they find a new place to live, the housing authority, with an assist from New Haven government’s anti-blight agency, the Livable City Initiative, will conduct an inspection to make sure it meets the federal housing department’s standards and make sure that the rent meets a test of being ​“reasonable and affordable.”

“The voucher is yours as long as you remain eligible for the program,” she said. 

With the 301 apartments at Church Street South under orders for demolition, finding the current residents a place to live is imperative. But DuBois-Walton said the process won’t be a quick one. Officials are anticipating that many residents of the complex will choose the portable voucher option and will seize the opportunity to move, but many of them will stay close, flooding an already tight rental market.

“We’re going to have 200 families entering the market,” DuBois-Walton said. ​“A lot of them will stay within a couple of census tracts.” Families who move to other cities in the state or even other parts of the country will still be able to use their portable vouchers, but DuBois-Walton said that they will come under the purview of the housing authority for that community when it comes to inspecting new homes and determining eligibility.

At the height of condemnations at the failing housing complex, some 70 families were ordered to be moved into hotels for their health and safety. DuBois-Walton said that number is down to 22 families. She said that the goal now is to get the rest of those families in hotels and the more than 200 left at the complex into permanent housing. She said that families would make only an interim stop at a hotel if something is wrong with their apartment and they need to be moved on an emergency basis.

Roxanne Bleau and Natalie Gonzalez are among the original group of Church Street South tenants to move out of the complex and into hotels with their families. They both attended Tuesday’s meeting to find out next steps.

Gonzalez moved to an apartment on Howard Avenue. Bleau moved back to West Haven, which is her hometown.

Gonzalez said she is unhappy at the apartment on Howard Avenue because, she said, the landlord isn’t responsive when it comes to repairs. Bleau said she’s happy in West Haven and even likes her new apartment, but she might move if she can find a place with a washer and dryer in the unit. Gonzalez said she wants to move to West Haven too.

“It’s really nice,” Bleau said.

And with the portable vouchers they will be able to move, DuBois said. Because of the tightness of the market, officials are anticipating that it might take some families a while to find a place to rent that charges low enough rent and that meets the required health and safety standards. So DuBois-Walton assured families Tuesday night that the vouchers will be renewable until they find somewhere to live.

For tenants who missed Tuesday’s meeting, another will be held on Thursday at the same location.

Previous coverage of Church Street South:
Church Street South Demolition Begins
• This Time, Harp Gets HUD Face Time
• Nightmare In 74B
• Surprise! Now HUD Flunks Church St. South
• Church St. South Tenants Get A Choice
• Home-For-Xmas? Not Happening
• Now It’s Christmas, Not Thanksgiving
• Pols Enlist In Church Street South Fight
• Raze? Preserve? Or Renew?
• Church Street South Has A Suitor
• Northland Faces Class-Action Lawsuit On Church Street South
• First Attempt To Help Tenants Shuts Down
• Few Details For Left-Behind Tenants
• HUD: Help’s Here. Details To Follow
• Mixed Signals For Church Street South Families
• Church St. South Families Displaced A 2nd Time — For Yale Family Weekend
• Church Street South Getting Cleared Out
• 200 Apartments Identified For Church Street South Families
• Northland Asks Housing Authority For Help
• Welcome Home
• Shoddy Repairs Raise Alarm — & Northland Offer
• Northland Gets Default Order — & A New Offer
• HUD, Pike Step In
• Northland Ordered To Fix Another 17 Roofs
• Church Street South Evacuees Crammed In Hotel
• Church Street South Endgame: Raze, Rebuild
• Harp Blasts Northland, HUD
• Flooding Plagues Once-Condemned Apartment
• Church Street South Hit With 30 New Orders
• Complaints Mount Against Church Street South
• City Cracks Down On Church Street South, Again
• Complex Flunks Fed Inspection, Rakes In Fed $$
• Welcome Home — To Frozen Pipes
• City Spotted Deadly Dangers; Feds Gave OK
• No One Called 911 | ​“Hero” Didn’t Hesitate
• ​“New” Church Street South Goes Nowhere Fast
• Church Street South Tenants Organize