Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-06-02
FUND TO ABOLISH
ALLEYS IS ASKED
Bill for $1,000, 900 Now Be-
fore Committees of Both
Houses.
Continued From First Page.)

ity of whom are by no means characters
of the underworld, the miserable novels
have been home" Previous legislation
seems not to have given due considera-
ton to these complicating factors.
The present measure proposes grad
ual process of eliminating the alleys to
extend over 10 years, with provisions
which will avoid wholesale evictions and
radical destruction of property values.
1t has been framed with due apprecia-
ton of the mistakes of the past.
The first notable attempt to get folks
out of the alleys followed survey in
1896, which showed that the buildings
were unfit for human habitation. The
next year the Washington Sanitary I'm
provement Co. was organized for the
purpose of providing better homes for
alley residents. Leaders in this move
ment were Gen. George M. Sternberg,
formerly Surgeon-general OF the Army;
John Joy Edson and DR.. George M.
Kober.
The plan was to erect good houses
with low rentals for colored people
which, it was felt, by creating vacant
street property would automatically
move folks out Of the alleys. The back
ers assumed that families wouldn't live
in these poor shacks when they could
get better homes ION the street" for
the same or lower rent.
The new houses proved blessing for
thrifty, intelligent colored workers, who
took advantage of the low
rents. But the alley people did not
move up to take their places. Strangely
enough the situation remained unaf-
fected. 1t simply proved that folks can't
be depended on to follow the economic
line of least resistance.
Some of them were tied to the alleys
by sentimental associations. They had
been born there and lived there all
their lives. They were stranded on the
cultural level of the alleys and would
be uncomfortable anywhere else. Others,
of course, preferred to live in these con-
cealed, isolated places where they could
lead their own lives reasonably secure
from the eyes of the police, get drunk as
often as they wished, and be free from
in their family relations.
The alley was the natural home of the
dive, and the dive habitant wanted to
stay there.
Roosevelt Ordered Study.
Years later President Roosevelt ap-
pointed a commission to study the al
leys, and voluminous reports were filed.
Several laws are on the books affecting
the alleys. The inspector of buildings
is authorized to order the destruction
of unsafe structures, the Commission
ers may refuse permits to repair build
ings which have deprecated so per
cent of their original value, the health
officer can proceed against buildings
condemned as public nuiSances, and
erection of new alley dwellings was pro-
hibited by an act now superseded.
Under these acts considerable prog
reSs has been made. The worst of the
old frame shacks have been demolished,
including some originally erected hur-
riedly as barracks during the Civil War.
Sewers, water mains and street lights
have been extended into alleys. The
population has been reduced from Is, 600
to about 1000. Here it seems likelyto
remain until new legislation IS enacted.
The remaining dwellings," says re-
cent report by John Ihlder, housing ex-
pert, to the National Capital Park and
Planning Commission, ARE of fairly
substantial structure, and the demands
of business under private initiative re-
suit in only slow and irregular con-
version at any distance from the prin-
cipal business center Unless the block
interiors can be dealt with as a whole,
the conversion of inhabited alleys to
other and better uses, socially and eco
nomically, promises to be slow and
hating"
The most ambitious effort to elimi-
nate the alley dwellings to date failed
through a peculiar combination Of cir
cumstances and an adverse court de-
cision. The first Mrs. Woodrow Will
son was deeply affected by the plight
of the alley people, to whom she had
made many visits. On her deathbed
she asked for legislation which would
end these cesSpools Of immortality.
Must Start All Over.
The law, enacted in September, 1914,
provided that no alley buildings could
be used as dwellings after four years.
The first enforcement date came in
1918, when the Nation was in the midst
of the World War and Washington was
crowded to its capacity with Govern
ment workers and military personnel.
Enforcement was postponed until 1928.
This date again found Washington in
the midst Of housing shortage. There
was nowhere for the alley folk to CO.
When the Commissioners finally at
tempted to enforce the law, they were
restrained by two adverse court de-
cislons, presumably due to a defect in
the wording of the act itself. So the
alleys are still with Washington-little
the better for all the efforts made to
AhPlONC OhChl-dIlu ~ 10 HcCcoSniy W
start all over again with legislation to
do away with them.
Under the pending legislation the re-
moval of the people and utilization of
the alley property would extend over a
long period. Folks are not to be torn
up by the roots" and replanted IN a
new environment with which they are
unfamiliar. The proposed law is con-
cerned primarily with getting rid of the
alley colonies rather than with improv-
ing living conditions. This second pur-
pose, however, is definitely In the minds
of proponents of the bill and measures