Housing is that indispensable mortar that holds the bricks of our society together. -- U.S. Sen. John Heinz

All will applaud that statement by the late senator. But sometimes we forget the many people who can't afford to rent, let alone buy, available housing.

		Clarke Thomas is a Post-Gazette senior editor (clt34@pitt.edu).

That problem continues to trouble our society. The good news is that there are a number of agencies and programs -- both governmental and nongovernmental -- addressing the problem.

The approaches range all the way from public housing projects through Section 8 programs (rental assistance for families and individuals to live in privately owned houses or apartment buildings) to shelters for the homeless and transitional programs to help move the homeless to permanent housing. The programs are funded in many ways -- federal, state and local governments, and philanthropic foundations.

This continuum of services is necessary for a system where people can work up to be homeowners, says Dorothy Lengyel, new president of Pittsburgh Partnerships for Neighborhood Development. "The way to get out of poverty is asset accumulation, with home ownership a key."

The big players are the Pittsburgh Housing Authority (serving 20,000 persons, including the elderly), the Urban Redevelopment Authority of Pittsburgh and the U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD). But there are also many nonprofit agencies involved. Jon Zimmer, director of Action Housing, a 47-year-old agency, says Pittsburgh has one of the best continuums of service for low-income people in the nation.

As an example, Action Housing itself has a multiplicity of programs for homeless families, persons with mental and physical disabilities, and unemployed individuals. In the past 19 years, it has developed and/or operated 87 housing facilities throughout Allegheny County, serving more than 7,500 persons and generating more than $1.5 million in property taxes annually to local municipalities and school districts.

Zimmer pays particular tribute for Pittsburgh's success to "the heroics of people who work for small salaries in emergency shelters and transition housing open 24 hours, seven days a week."

The bad news is that there isn't enough money, with the federal government -- the major source of funding -- cutting back for the Housing Choice Voucher Program (formerly known as Section 8) by $1 billion. According to the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities, that means that across the nation at least 250,000 households, including 50,000 with people who have disabilities, will lose their Section 8 assistance.

The housing atmosphere in Pittsburgh has been roiled in recent years by the federal government's Hope VI program. Its admirable aims were (1) to thin out public housing units to make them larger and more desirable and (2) to provide supportive services for successful tenancy in a privately managed community with mixed market and subsidized housing.

But the renovation of Bedford Dwellings in the Hill became a particular sore spot. At a meeting I had with several people in the housing field, Ronelle Guy of the Housing Alliance of Pennsylvania said the program "didn't take into account the feelings of the adjoining neighborhood, which lost houses from the expansion and often had to take in people leaving the projects." A housing authority official replied, "We try to make it possible for people to stay in their own homes and not be relocated," to which George Moses of the Southwestern Pennsylvania Alliance of HUD Tenants countered, "But we had to fight for it!"

What can the reader do about all this? Support the ongoing programs, including sufficient governmental financing.

Zimmer makes a sobering reminder for those worried about the federal treasury. We forget that the housing of the well-to-do is subsidized in the sense of FHA loans and "particularly the mortgage interest deduction that benefits primarily upper middle and wealthy people. The United States provides over $100 billion in mortgage interest deduction tax writeoffs for homeowners, dwarfing the approximately $20 billion the federal government spends directly on affordable-housing programs for low-to-moderate income families and individuals."

After all, as Lengyel puts it, "We forget that subsidized housing not only meets needs but pays taxes and provides jobs. Housing is an economic engine, not just a drain on the public treasury. Paying attention to housing can result in vibrant neighborhoods which, in turn, attract investment from corporations. We talk about keeping young people in Pittsburgh. Having affordable housing stock is a key."

Housing activist Craig Stevens chimes in: "The affordable housing issue isn't just about the homeless or low-income people. It's about a broad range of people who are unable to afford -- that is, having to pay more than 30 percent of their income -- for decent housing. Affordable housing is an issue for everyone -- the newly married, empty-nesters, people with aging parents, the elderly."

Doesn't that bring us back to Sen. Heinz's observation?