Criminal pasts may leave families homeless

Friday, Dec. 21, 2007 | 7:21 a.m.

More than 140 families may soon wind up on the streets, months after they were swept up in the Las Vegas Valley's largest-ever federally ordered eviction from public housing.

The families had to leave North Las Vegas' Buena Vista Springs starting in August, after the federal Housing and Urban Development Department said the property's landlord had failed five inspections in four years.

This time, though, the issue is not substandard housing, but the criminal records of those households.

In the emergency of the moment this summer, the federal agency and the Clark County Housing Authority gave the families Section 8 vouchers, another federal subsidy, without first completing required background checks.

The problem: The initial checks on 144 families showed they have criminal pasts that may disqualify them from the federal program. Results from more in-depth, FBI fingerprint-based checks are due in the next few weeks. Those will show how many people in the households have been convicted of crimes such as murder, rape and arson, which by law would force the housing authority to take back the vouchers. The agency can consider convictions on certain drug-related crimes on a case-by-case basis. The families can appeal any decision.

Howard Wasserman, director of operations at the housing authority, called the percentage of households with criminal backgrounds - 144 of 212, or about two-thirds - unusually high. He said an estimated 25 percent or less are disqualified from the average pool of applicants to the Section 8 program because of criminal backgrounds.

"This is going to be devastating," Jennifer Ellis said. A tall woman ready with a sharp word for bureaucrats, she took on the role of activist this summer and fall after finding herself among the estimated 800 people affected by the federal government's decision to stop working with Buena Vista.

Ellis tried to ensure that a phalanx of public and private agencies kept their promises as she went to meeting after meeting.

The effort involved Clark County Social Service, the Clark County Housing Authority, HUD, and congressional and county commission representatives, plus a company hired by the federal government. The agencies offered everything from moving trucks to Section 8 vouchers. It was an effort to help the poor not seen in the Las Vegas Valley since thousands sought refuge here in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

But now, nearly five months later, there's nothing Ellis or the federal government can do to keep two-thirds of those families from winding up on the streets.

Kenneth LoBene, Las Vegas director of HUD, said he was "aware it (criminal backgrounds) would be a problem" from the start, and that he and other officials told the families as much months ago.

"Our hands are basically tied in terms of what we are allowed to do," he said. The federal official also pointed out that Buena Vista management should have done its own background checks on these households years ago, in accord with federal policy, and that the failure to do so was cited in the inspections.

LoBene and Clark County Commissioner Lawrence Weekly said they were awaiting the FBI results to schedule emergency meetings among federal, county and city agencies to come up with a solution if dozens of families lose their vouchers. That effort would include agencies that help the homeless, Weekly said. The county official organized many of the early meetings to help the households at Buena Vista.

There are not many programs that can respond to these families and their struggles with unemployment, lack of transportation and poverty, he acknowledged. "What do we do?" he said.

Ellis used the Section 8 vouchers in October to find a house for herself and her two children.

But she said many of her neighbors will have trouble rebounding from the blow their pasts may soon deal them.

In her mind, the criminal backgrounds of her neighbors are part of a malaise that grips some in the black community. She mentioned the absence of fathers in many of Buena Vista's households. "The black community lacks proper role models for youth," said Ellis, who is black. She said a vicious cycle gets set in motion when children see parents taking drugs or drinking, and then join gangs when they're older and do the same. The background checks are done on all household members 18 or older.

Ellis questions why the 144 families didn't fess up to their pasts months ago.

"If you know you're in a messed-up situation, why put your kids in another messed-up situation because you weren't honest?"

Mujahid Ramadan, a local activist who has worked in valley prisons for seven years, both as a volunteer and with federal grants, says the situation facing the Buena Vista families invites a look at how criminal background checks have become part of public housing policy since the start of the "War on Drugs" in the 1970s.

"The troubling outcome of federal policy is that you may wind up having people homeless," he said.

When this happens, social decay sets in: Children fail in school, families fall apart and poverty leads to crime. "So there is a human cost and you can tag onto that a financial cost" to society, he said. "It would only be wise to do something preventive."