Aspen housing authority’s practices are outdated

Now that the much awaited new Aspen-Pitkin County Housing Authority board with more accountability has been installed, one is eerily reminded of the old “rubber stamp” volunteer board with three of the four sitting board members reappointed.

It seems as though the county and city have kicked the APCHA can down the road again. Case in point is Friday’s article concerning the eviction of Sonya Bolerjack from housing she was selected for and scrutinized by the very organization that threw her out of low-income Category 2 housing (“Housing board kicks Aspen woman out of deed-restricted condo for non-compliance,” July 19, The Aspen Times). This illustrates the point that the APCHA guidelines formulated in the 1980s are obsolete at best, unfair at their worst. The “1,500” hour rule is vaguely codified, arbitrarily interpreted and discriminatorily enforced by an agency that has little or no oversight. The Roaring Fork Valley is one big economic engine. People no longer work in one location. We all struggle to survive here any way we can as illustrated by the recent state economic study on livability in Pitkin County.

It was stated that the housing should go to a “deserving family” instead of a young single mother. Perhaps instead of spending in excess of $300,000 per year on an enforcement officer and retained lawyer, APCHA should devote those resources toward identifying and procuring much-needed land and building contracts valley wide for all those “deserving families.”

Howard Moglewer

Aspen