The Baltimore Plan (1954)

[Music] [Music] [Music] gas lighted streets Sparkletts front steps colorful screen paintings these you say are baltimore truth but baltimore like most American cities is also block after block of incredibly bad housing I'm a worker for the Baltimore housing bureau I had a job that hot summer day to find someone in the neighborhood with whom the housing Bureau could work there were great plans to rehabilitate this area but plans have only a paper in pencil reality without a neighborhood leader someone known and liked our plans would get about as far as a painted bird on a window screen I had of course the name of someone who sounded perfect for the job but I wasn't sure the address this was more than just a routine day's work for me I believed in the plan we were working on and somehow I must have felt that all the people in the neighborhood were just waiting for me it seemed like another world deserted unpeopled but not without a life of its own it is another world I suppose to most people an urban jumble but though it may seem a jungle in its ugliness and disorder its realized is in the people who live here the only place they have to miss people with the same kind leanness and neighborliness as elsewhere but I wasn't doing too well in my search it was though I'd stepped into a strange city a city from which all people had fled besides that it was hot at this rate it'd take years to get anything done it already taken long enough to accomplish what we had but at least we done something about things like this here is the shame of our American cities here is the face of our cities we hide endless blocks of houses scarred beyond belief overcrowded fire traps tenements shacks human dwellings unfit for human beings to live in [Music] in Baltimore as in all large cities such conditions went untouched for years then a new approach a young social worker just out of school went into a blighted area to report on the work of social agencies she was shocked by the housing conditions she saw her report an indictment of Baltimore's indifference interested three people the director of public welfare the commissioner of health and a newspaper editor [Music] the newspaper hit hard to the people of Baltimore such conditions were impossible but there they were as common into the daily paper the paper kept hammering away week after week month after month and gradually the impact mounted aroused by the hard-hitting news stories groups of citizens organized the citizens Planning and Housing Association and met with city officials there were more months of delays but eventually the determined action of organized citizens brought results a new housing ordinance was drafted it was a housing ordinance with this difference it outlined minimum standards for health and decency the next step the formation of the division of housing in the City Health Department its job not to wait for complaints but to go out and investigate its authority to notify owners and landlords of violations and take legal action where necessary but investigating uncovering violations was just part of the new approach the facts had to be brought to public attention time and again the facts of the hidden costs of slums the fire casualty here was a direct appeal to the conscience of influence of Baltimore its businessmen its Liars its clergymen a rat bite case [Music] lack of fundamental sanitation a Baltimore playground the campaign of community education went on young people were given first-hand knowledge of the problems and of a newly drawn plan to concentrate housing law enforcement in one block in the best blighted area of 2000 blocks a test block for the first time an American city had selected a specific area to inspect instead of waiting for complaints to commend from tenants it was a thoroughgoing investigation of all fire building and health violations in block number 1 the next step the courts this case came before another court last month yes your honor and it was postponed two times before that by two other judges well I'm not going to postpone it I've just disposed of a case of murder I have two other crimes of violence on my docket six cases of armed robbery one of us off with intent to kill you say this landlord is guilty of violating the housing code well I'm just too busy with cases involving robbery and violence to bother with a case involving a leaky rain spout case dismissed there'll be a five minute recess are we seeing young violations were uncovered by the thousands violator is brought into the magistrates courts by the hundreds results weeks and months of postponement and delays cases shunted from court to court Civic indifference results in black number one disappointment and resignation on the part of tenants forced to live in we pay rent for slum dwellings the continuation of blight with its attendant hidden costs of human misery and deprivation a housing law enforcement program for which so many it had such high hopes seemed unworkable but then something happened once again the determined action of organized citizens brought results mister Helen I'm going over the facts involved in your case very very carefully I find that you make your living from being in the real estate business but when you rent a house you contract not only between yourself and your tenant but also with the community this is the third time that you've been before this court you've had ample time I think that the city has been more than fair in this case the houses you rent houses which you do not keep in decent livable condition are a menace not only to your tenants but to the city of Baltimore mister Helen I therefore find you guilty and the fine is $50 n costs oh yes I'll be senior a housing court the first of its kind in the country a special Magistrates Court to handle all housing cases and only housing cases here were the basic ideas of the Baltimore plan at last make minimum housing standards a legal requirement and then enforce the laws the Baltimore plan was on its way yes but now the Baltimore plan was to be tested not just with single blocks but were the neighborhood of 27 blocks this was to be the big test education social services law enforcement citizen groups all resources of the community working with the people living in a blighted neighborhood if I could find a neighborhood leader but this woman the leader I was looking for no she was not I was about ready to give up I'd never find her but just then [Music] [Music] bobby was more frightened than hurt this is Turner the woman I talked to knew right away what to do she sent the men of the neighborhood for tools to work with and then she asked me to help would I go for a policeman I surely would but before I could get two steps away she asked me to bring back something else it was just what was needed for the occasion the men of the neighborhood soon got busy and before long who was much excitement among the children of the neighborhood ice-cream cone an ice-cream cone that's what mrs. Turner had ordered and it really turned a trick almost before you could say Jack Robinson Bobby's leg was free [Applause] [Music] here was a cooperative spirit we needed for our program here was natural kindness and neighborliness and here at last in mrs. Turner I'd found the neighborhood leader we needed from that point on mrs. Turner and I had a long talk I told her the D'Allesandro and formed a Citizens Advisory Council to assist the program the Baltimore plan was now moving into high gear we brought in the facilities of the United States Public Health Service to measure housing conditions in the pilot area before the program and after out of 2000 blocks of lights 27 blocks this was the target the goal a systematic tabulation of the poor conditions in the pilot area house by house the inspectors worked carefully painstakingly feeding their reports back to the housing Bureau defective wiring fire hazards [Music] falling outside the US Public Health Service survey was completed we know now would have to be done mrs. Turner and that's where you come in people like you and respect you when you take the job a volunteer neighborhood chairman mrs. Turner looked out across the backyards and said I'll be happy to and so my work began and as I found out it was a day and night job there were committee meetings home visits conferences most of our committees made it pilot house a church group had converted to a community center the worst slum house in the neighborhood it served us both as an example of rehabilitation and as a social service referral center with the help of pilot house in the housing bureau by two chief assistants found block captain men and women who were willing to work and work hard in their own blocks we met to plan our part in a citywide effort to interest and involve all the people in the pilot program city officials school newspapers social agencies individuals everyone planned for the Blitz block this was enough drama to involve in the most indifferent it was a wholesale attack on one block with the block captain the mayor and the heads of the city department officiating it was good to know that the city officials meant business it was good to know - what could be done and soon throughout the 27 blocks the walls came a tumbling down and then after the tearing down the rebuilding the repairing [Music] our hard work began to pay off soon the houses and yard that the pilot area took out a different look but there were problems some owner-occupant simply could not afford repair cost solution I urge them to go before the hearing board which might recommend assistance from the fight blight fund a fund contributed by trade organizations and businessmen assistance rendered long-term loans without interest if necessary with repayments based on ability to repay the fight blight fund helped many owner-occupants in this way but there were other problems in my duties of neighbourhood chairman I worked with all kinds of people many who hindered many more who helped I had my share of surprises and disappointment I met with indifference at times with refusal to cooperate on the part of landlords and I met with indifference refusal to cooperate on the part of tenants but for such cases where their landlord tenant or owner occupant I knew that I had an ally a situations too difficult for me all my block captains to handle the housing Bureau could turn to the hard-hitting machinery of the housing court mr. Clark your landlord has made a lot of improvements on his property but tenants have duties and responsibilities you haven't lived up to yours I find you guilty but I'm going to make the fine very very light just two dollars and costs provided you get that yard of yours cleaned up and to help you do it here are two of your neighbors mrs. Turner got two volunteers you're a lucky man next case of Thomas Gary well mr. Gary welcome back for the third time Your Honor I stand on my rights as an American citizen mr. Gary I find nothing in the Constitution of the United States which says a landlord may keep his property in a disgraceful condition mr. Gary I could find you fifty dollars a day for every day these violations are not corrected is that what you want me to do no your honor well that's what I'm going to do you're guilty of ten days violations the fine is $500 and costs this court isn't interested in taking money away from either tenants or landlords i suspend the fine if you will put that $500 into fixing up your houses agreed yes your honor thank you [Music] and at this point even mr. Garre had to admit that punishment in Baltimore's housing court did in fact fit the crime I was a bit surprised at his rather sudden character Reformation but there's no question about it mr. Gehry is a changed man children playing in sunlit open spaces this to me is a fitting symbol of our work it played before of course but in alleys like this and now they had something better in fact throughout the neighborhood things had taken out a noodle in place of this this flighted backyard had become flower garden rat infested alleys before and after cluttered backyards before and after a neighborhood like this can become this this fan is the Baltimore Klan it cannot work miracle there are slum areas beyond recovery but for those areas were three habilitative the Baltimore planned can work and together with a program of redevelopment and new housing both public and private it can remake a city [Music]

Channel: Reelblack One

Views: 27,312

Keywords:

Id: UDzskLxdzI8

Length: 20min 13sec (1213 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 21 2018