Looked good on paper.
Over the last 16 years, the city of Charlotte has spent or committed at least $124 million to build affordable housing. Next month, city leaders will ask voters for $50 million more.
But the money hasn’t helped people like Curtis Simpson.
He’s worked full-time as a custodian for nine years at Independence High School, but on his $25,500-a-year salary, he said he can’t find a decent place to live.
Simpson said he and his longtime partner, Tameka Boone, and their four children once lived in a motel room for a year because they could not afford an apartment near good schools. Three years ago, the family moved into a duplex east of uptown. They were nearly evicted in May when medical debts piled up and they fell two months behind on rent.
Simpson said he juggles bills to pay $650 a month for a three-bedroom duplex with roaches, mold and plumbing so bad sometimes he can’t take a bath. Simpson said he wants to move because the conditions in the duplex aggravate his 16-year-old son’s asthma, but he found nothing he can afford.
“I work my butt off to pay the bills,” said Simpson, 47, a lifelong Charlotte resident. “My reward is to fix this and fix that. It makes you feel like something less than a man.”
The Charlotte City Council has countered rising housing costs by using the Housing Trust Fund to help developers finance construction of homes for people with lower incomes.
Voters provide the money by approving bonds every two years. The City Council then offers grants and low-interest loans to developers who agree to include affordable housing in their projects.
Charlotte leaders are asking voters to approve $50 million in bonds on November’s ballot, instead of the $15 million they have asked for in the past.
No one disputes the Housing Trust Fund can be a key to keeping Charlotte affordable for people with modest incomes.
But over the last decade, Charlotte’s affordable housing shortage has grown more severe despite the city’s spending.
A city report says Charlotte lacks about 34,000 affordable housing units needed to meet demand. That’s roughly double the number from a decade ago.
The city’s rapid population growth, rising land costs and resistance from neighbors opposed to affordable housing helped create the problem, but the City Council’s decisions have also played a role, an Observer investigation found.