I Do Not Think That Word Means What You Think It Means

Evic­tions from pub­lic hous­ing near

Start­ing Fri­day, the Atlanta Hous­ing Author­i­ty will begin evict­ing ten­ants who are not work­ing, in school or in a work force train­ing program.…
The author­i­ty, which began noti­fy­ing res­i­dents about the new rule last fall, said it is try­ing to end con­cen­trat­ed pover­ty by encour­ag­ing pub­lic hous­ing ten­ants to become more self-sufficient.
Last Octo­ber, res­i­dents between the ages of 18 to 61 and not dis­abled who lived in the 13 tra­di­tion­al pub­lic hous­ing units and in Sec­tion 8 hous­es were informed they would face evic­tion if they were not work­ing, going to school or in a work force train­ing program.…
The new pol­i­cy is “Dra­con­ian,” said Sheila Crow­ley, pres­i­dent of the Nation­al Low Income Hous­ing Coali­tion, a Wash­ing­ton-based group ded­i­cat­ed to end­ing the afford­able hous­ing crisis.

Dra­con­ian: Exceed­ing­ly harsh; very severe.

Help me out here. These peo­ple are giv­en a free or near­ly-free place to live. They get day­care vouch­ers and Med­ic­aid and food stamps and $deity knows what else. They live in the only part of Geor­gia that can tru­ly be said to have pub­lic trans­porta­tion, which has arti­fi­cial­ly low fares due to tax subsidies.

How is it “exceed­ing­ly harsh” to be required to go to school or work?

One of the ten­ants inter­viewed is 23 and 5 months preg­nant with her third child. There was no men­tion of any part­ner in her life. She lives with her moth­er, who is only 40. Nei­ther woman works, and the daugh­ter says that by the time she could get enrolled in school she’d have to drop out to have her baby.

They were noti­fied of the pol­i­cy in Octo­ber. I’ll be char­i­ta­ble and fig­ure it was the end of Octo­ber. She was­n’t preg­nant then but chose to get preg­nant since then.

Yes, she CHOSE to get preg­nant. She’s got access to a vari­ety of agen­cies that would pro­vide her with birth con­trol, includ­ing emer­gency con­tra­cep­tion if she were a vic­tim of rape.

Why do I sus­pect there are no iden­ti­fi­able fathers in those chil­dren’s lives?

Here’s an idea: you live in pub­lic hous­ing, you get birth con­trol implants or reversible ster­il­iza­tion surgery.