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Letter: Cheating by the cheat sheet

Please explain to me why different standards exist in the Aspen Pitkin County Housing Authority policy and what is explained to you in the office via its cheat sheet.

Each year, numerous employee-housing owners are sent an affidavit to confirm that both owners are working a minimum of 1,500 hours per year in Pitkin County and reside at least nine months of the year in their residence. It’s as easy as going to the bank and having it sign the form — done! Yet when I actively call the Housing Authority to say my neighbors are completely falsifying records, it has other answers.

I explain that one is completely unemployed and the other works about three days a week waitressing. They have all the toys in the world (great new cars, snowmobiles) and spend most of their time either on vacations, getting baby sitters for dinners or traveling. Camping, concerts — you name it!



Yet when I explain this all, the housing-qualifications specialist tells me that because they have two kids, it’s OK if only one works, as the other parent needs to stay at home to watch the kids, and that’s OK according to her sheet (yet I explain that both are in school and neither of the kids is ever at home). She will not accept my complaint according to her cheat sheet.

This is crazy to me with the difficulty of actually getting into the housing in the first place. It makes a complete mockery of the system and for the rest of us who actually use it like we should. Something needs to change, because there are way too many locals who know how to scam the system and get away with it.




Stacey Collier

Aspen