Regent Park

[The Bandit]

Regent Park tenants are moving back to the area after 4 years of demolishing/construction. How long before these "new" units are trashed and run-down.
Usually when people rent or are subsidized, they don't treat it like their own.

 

[slowandeasy]

My understanding was that the subsidy was to help them purchase and own the units, so that they will take care of them.

I agree that in general renters don't treat a place as well as the owner. However, the biggest problem in subsidized housing is that the landlord and/or building manager don't manage the place properly.

Toronto Public Housing his the worst slum landlord in Canada.

 

[Never Compromised]

Regent Park is no longer "slum" housing only. The whole idea behind the redevelopment was to allow for mixed use with some market housing as well as subsidized.

I give it at least 2 months before it is trashed and the middle class fair market value people have been run out of the area.

 

[The Options Menu]

The plan itself is actually reasonably good-- Canadian cities have a better record of re-gentrification than their American counterparts. Regent Park was Canada's first (I think) attempt at public housing, and it's layout (Hard for effective police and fire access in many spots), age, and lack of space to facilitate mixed income living let it acquire a certain amount of 'ghetto synergy'.

Advantages compound and so do disadvantages.

Canadian cities like Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver have done very well by re-gentrification. Mostly because the post WWII American hype about the burbs never permeated resonated here as much. (Not to say that we lack burbs.) There are tremendous social and economic advantages to having a healthy level re-gentrification that basically start compounding from the day a person is born.

It makes a tremendous amount of sense to correct historic oversights like Regent Park. (And to finally get a subway line out to Jane and Finch, etc...) The best thing you can do from both an economic and social perspective is encourage mixed income turnover with a healthy level of re-gentrification in all neighbourhoods, and to build dense human livable neighbourhoods in the first place. Which is not to say that the area won't remain 'bad', but it will be 'lass bad', and not 'bad' in the American / Developing World sense.

It's nice to say, "Oh well, the residents will just shit it up!", but there are severe long term consequences (For Conservatives: think expensive.) if you allow a ghetto to maintain its 'synergy' over the long haul. About the only problem with re-gentrification is that it keeps property values and rents higher, but that is offset by vastly higher productivity in the formal (and taxable) economy, reduced crime, etc.

More problematic are 'the burbs' which are under-taxed, over-served, car centric, low density, and filled with far too many people who bitch about their taxes without realizing that they're the real parasites. (That's a dirty non-secret-- the numbers on that have been there forever.)

TL;DR: Policy makers must take a firm hand and encourage re-gentrification, and to discourage sprawl or things 'go to shit'.

 

[slowandeasy]

Nice post Options Menu

 

[red]

Toronto Public Housing his the worst slum landlord in Canada.

why is the city the biggest landlord in the city?

 

[Rono]

Oh please, can I buy a unit there? I have been waiting for a place where I could live along side the dirt poor. Gimme a break, only an idiot would purchase property there.

 

[joey21]

Oh please, can I buy a unit there? I have been waiting for a place where I could live along side the dirt poor. Gimme a break, only an idiot would purchase property there.

x2


if you walk around the area there is still lots of crack heads lurking around = drug dealers= crime , not a safe area at all.
if anybody disagree's send your 18 year old daughter to walk around regent park at night, then lets see.

 

[r_s426]

I'm VERY happy that people are starting to move back to Regent Park. My area suffered as the city snapped up every available rental unit they could to house the people who were dislocated by the redepvelopment.

A lot of houses that otherwise would have been sold in a hot real estate market weren't because the owners were getting guaranteed above market rents paid by the city.

Whoever thought up the idea that the middle class, or even the working class, would want to live side by side with the social turmoil in Regent Park, is an idiot. Mixed housing works in small pockets... but who wants to buy a condo unit just to live next door to Joe Crackhead?

 

[Rono]

x2


if you walk around the area there is still lots of crack heads lurking around = drug dealers= crime , not a safe area at all.
if anybody disagree's send your 18 year old daughter to walk around regent park at night, then lets see.

Yes. And what kind of a target would a middle class person be in that neighbourhood? Sure, they may not be truly middle class, probably working poor, but to the crackheads and welfare recipients, they will be considered rich.
Bad idea.

 

[james t kirk]

My understanding was that the subsidy was to help them purchase and own the units, so that they will take care of them.

I agree that in general renters don't treat a place as well as the owner. However, the biggest problem in subsidized housing is that the landlord and/or building manager don't manage the place properly.

Toronto Public Housing his the worst slum landlord in Canada.

No, the biggest problem is the scum that inhabit the free housing, not the City of Toronto.

I've been involved with the repairs to gov't housing projects. We would install new windows and a week later, they are smashed out.

Brand new walls - kicked in.

Brand new washrooms - smashed.

Not everyone who lives in there is a fuckup I will admit. But a large majority are complete losers who have no common respect.

The city spends more on Social Housing than it does on bridges, roads, and sewers put together. That's fucked up.

 

[The Options Menu]

Whoever thought up the idea that the middle class, or even the working class, would want to live side by side with the social turmoil in Regent Park, is an idiot. Mixed housing works in small pockets... but who wants to buy a condo unit just to live next door to Joe Crackhead?

That's why most places (minus some of the US) are moving away 'designated ghetto' model of public housing. A 'designated ghetto' is a black hole that sucks everything in and only gets bigger. That's why re-gentrification and income mixing is important (And not just 'condos only' urban renewal). The simple truth is that it works. Even the scariest places downtown have lots of high priced residential with families, OK public schools, decent public spaces (in the daylight), etc. You might not want to live there, but plenty of people who otherwise have the means to leave choose to stay. Close to downtown, in the city, short commutes, interesting area, etc...

As far as the previous post goes-- Getting people to invest in where they live is important. More needs to be done to make people who live in public housing 'stakeholders'. Plenty of ideas for that, little effective implementation...

edit: And for those that would say, 'let them fend for themselves' that's once again great until you start to figure out the actual costs and the opportunity cost.

 

[slowandeasy]

Oh please, can I buy a unit there? I have been waiting for a place where I could live along side the dirt poor. Gimme a break, only an idiot would purchase property there.

Dude, there are no "dirt poor" in Canada. If you want dirt poor visit some places in Africa, India, etc...

 

[slowandeasy]

No, the biggest problem is the scum that inhabit the free housing, not the City of Toronto.

I've been involved with the repairs to gov't housing projects. We would install new windows and a week later, they are smashed out.

Brand new walls - kicked in.

Brand new washrooms - smashed.

Not everyone who lives in there is a fuckup I will admit. But a large majority are complete losers who have no common respect.

The city spends more on Social Housing than it does on bridges, roads, and sewers put together. That's fucked up.

NO the biggest problem is that the City of Toronto does not kick out the scum that live in their buildings... ok.. now I am just being argumentative for no particular reason. I agree the scum are the problem. But the city does not do enough to put those people out was my point.

If I am a landlord and a guy is doing that to my building, I get rid of him, then I fix the damage and get better clients. The city has not done it's job on that front.

 

[The Options Menu]

NO the biggest problem is that the City of Toronto does not kick out the scum that live in their buildings...

Quick question. So these people magically disappear right? They just don't spark an even bigger crime problem because of increased desperation? More of their kids won't be lured into gang life? Has policing become free? Property / car insurance? The courts? Jail? Hospital care?

'Kick out' is the wrong direction, getting people to 'invest in' has more upside. Assign better units to those that take better care. Make everybody in public housing pay something, divide them int 1/4s for best, kinda good, kinda bad, and bad and make the good pay less. Get the junkies to rehab and the mentally unstable proper help. Positive competition and frank evaluation is probably better than a crime wave. YMMV.

edit: Tenants associations with some teeth and just a little bit of money couldn't hurt either.

 

[Tangwhich]

No, the biggest problem is the scum that inhabit the free housing, not the City of Toronto.

I've been involved with the repairs to gov't housing projects. We would install new windows and a week later, they are smashed out.

Brand new walls - kicked in.

Brand new washrooms - smashed.

Not everyone who lives in there is a fuckup I will admit. But a large majority are complete losers who have no common respect.

The city spends more on Social Housing than it does on bridges, roads, and sewers put together. That's fucked up.

I'm soooo with you Kirk.. I've built some Toronto Housing buildings. Most of the residents just don't give a shit and the places are already piss-laden dumps only days after people move in.

You should see the place I'm building now. All the units are massive and they are really nice.. much better than the condo I live in and will cost only a fraction of my mortgage.

 

[james t kirk]

There was an article in Toronto Life maybe 2 or 3 years ago about life in Regent Park. (Can't find it.)

Anyway, I remember they profiled this fat pig of a woman who was late 20's or early 30's. She was born and raised in Regent Park and she too was now living in Regent Park - in her own place. She had 3 or 4 different kids by 3 different men and was bitching about her apartment, etc.

Anyway, it was striking at how she was basically institutionalized not to work, to be useless, to sit and wait for her cheque to come in. She was born there, raised there, and will probably die there. During her entire life, she will not contribute in the least to society. She is basically a ward of the state.

 

[The Options Menu]

There was an article in Toronto Life maybe 2 or 3 years ago about life in Regent Park. (Can't find it.)

Anyway, I remember they profiled this fat pig of a woman who was late 20's or early 30's. She was born and raised in Regent Park and she too was now living in Regent Park - in her own place. She had 3 or 4 different kids by 3 different men and was bitching about her apartment, etc.

Anyway, it was striking at how she was basically institutionalized not to work, to be useless, to sit and wait for her cheque to come in. She was born there, raised there, and will probably die there. During her entire life, she will not contribute in the least to society. She is basically a ward of the state.

That's a problem. Agreed.

Much like getting those in public housing invest in where they live, you do need to positively encourage 'work'. You can do this by squeezing (by making her life harder) but there is only so low you can go before more expensive problems emerge (often somewhat later) down the road. To be blunt, you have to keep a bit of a squeeze on those living off the public trough-- But on the other side of that coin you need minimum wages that are living wages that show a clear improvement in living standards for getting off the public trough, and a phased transition out of public housing and other public services.

As it stands, if she has a couple of kids, her working 48hrs a week at two Timmies would actually make her life materially worse in many cases. Saying kick her out and take her kids is actually MORE expensive over her lifetime than less-- It just displaces the costs. (These things have been tried, and they always pan out about the same.)

Things are far from perfect now, but...

 

[Rono]

There was an article in Toronto Life maybe 2 or 3 years ago about life in Regent Park. (Can't find it.)

Anyway, I remember they profiled this fat pig of a woman who was late 20's or early 30's. She was born and raised in Regent Park and she too was now living in Regent Park - in her own place. She had 3 or 4 different kids by 3 different men and was bitching about her apartment, etc.

Anyway, it was striking at how she was basically institutionalized not to work, to be useless, to sit and wait for her cheque to come in. She was born there, raised there, and will probably die there. During her entire life, she will not contribute in the least to society. She is basically a ward of the state.

She got her own place? Ya got to have goals I guess. The cycle of poverty continues.

 

[Rono]

Dude, there are no "dirt poor" in Canada. If you want dirt poor visit some places in Africa, India, etc...

Then you did not grow up in my neighbourhood when I was a kid. Often went days without dinner. However, yes, I would rather be "dirt poor" in Canada then "dirt poor" in India. It is relative.