The problem of housing in cities like Philadelphia is not just one of construction or temporary shelter, but of community autonomy and gentrification. The Philadelphia Housing Authority, a federally funded city authority that acts as a landlord to many low-income residents, owns many houses that sit vacant throughout the city. Over the years, they have sold many of these properties in bundles to developers, even as over 40,000 residents have been sitting on a waiting list for public housing since 2013.[2] Protestors allege that this disparity is a result of an intentional pattern of gentrification, as the city allows its properties to decay, seizes the surrounding homes through eminent domain on grounds of blight, and sells them to developers who build university dorms. This is a story that is playing out all in cities all over the country.

The pandemic has made the experience of homelessness even harder than it was before. Paula, a homeless woman in Savannah, Georgia, remembers how, in the first few weeks of the lockdown, “it was impossible to get stuff that we need. You know, we use hand sanitizer all the time because, well, you’ve got no real way to wash your hands out here. We live by the stuff… Toilet paper! We need it too. Just the panic overall really affected us because everybody was only thinking about themselves.”[3] Frank, in New York, suddenly had no access to public bathrooms, the free meals from the church nearby, and the subway, which closed from 1AM to 5AM. Tiffany, who has a job as a necessary worker cleaning medical equipment in a hospital in Milpitas, California, could not get to a shower after her shifts ended, despite handling materials that had been used on Covid patients. If housing is a human right, then we have failed.

Notes

[1] Hurubie Meko, “Why Is the Pa. Rental Assistance Program Closing with Millions of Unspent Dollars?,” LancasterOnline, n.d., https://lancasteronline.com/news/local/why-is-the-pa-rental-assistance-program-closing-with-millions-of-unspent-dollars/article_e3874c96-0290-11eb-99e6-8bca8d943472.html.

[2] Philadelphia Housing Authority, “PHA Auction of Vacant Properties Yields $8.4 Million,” June 25, 2019, http://www.pha.phila.gov/pha-news/pha-news/2019/auction-2019.aspx.

[3] Howard Center for Investigative Journalism, “Covid’s Invisible Victims,” https://cronkitenews.azpbs.org/howardcenter/covid-homeless/audio/index.html.