Public Housing: Who Benefits? In The US, Even the Residents Are Betrayed

public housing development in Atlanta, Georgia
Early public housing in Atlanta, Georgia.

In America, it’s hard to imagine a bright future for public housing, notwithstanding that few if any alternatives appear to match its capacity for sheltering low and no income citizens.

Who wants to live in public housing that is so badly policed, so badly managed and so badly repaired? Nobody, not even the residents.

And so the residents, hoping for something better, join a long-suffering community cry for change.

With voices united against it, yet another social housing project is pulled down and something is built in its place. Often the change is heralded with a promise that residents will, in the fullness of time, enjoy something better.

Does better ever come?

A new PBS Documentary, East Lake Meadows: A Public Housing Story tackles the question. For a review, read more in  Mother Jones: Who Benefits When Public Housing Is Torn Down? It’s Complicated.

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