Ted Phillips: “Thousands of people are living without lights, water or gas” [View All]

Ted Phillips, executive director of United Community Housing Coalition, is scheduled to testify this Saturday in Detroit at the Citizens Inquiry into the Dexter Avenue Fire...The United Community Housing Coalition is a nonprofit comprehensive housing organization that has serviced low-income residents in Detroit since 1973.

Phillips said that in the last few years his organization had branched out to addressing tax foreclosures, which have jumped more than 500 percent in the last seven years....

“Most people owe between $500 and $2,000, but many owe less,” Phillips said. “The majority of these houses do not have mortgages, but people have fallen behind in their taxes because of poverty.” The majority of the cases are of people who owe taxes for at least three years. “If you haven’t paid your taxes since 2007 you could lose your house.”

Phillips explained that the taxes go to the city government, but the city has an arrangement with the county government to collect the taxes once they become delinquent...

“The county government was also allowed to charge an additional 18 percent on the taxes,” he said, at a rate of 1.5 percent a month. “It’s actually worse then that,” he said, “because the amount you owe goes up each month and the additional charge is added to the increased monthly bill as it is accumulating.”

...There are large numbers of people in transition from being homeowners to tenants. “But more and more we are seeing cases where people go from being homeowners to becoming homeless,” (Phillips) added. “This is the first time I have seen this. People are now going from their homes into a shelter. The poorest layers are being hit the hardest.”

It’s a terrible thing when you have one-third of the population with utility issues. Thousands of people are living without lights, water or gas.”

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/mar2010/phil-m19.shtml