The Michigan chronicle. [volume] (Detroit, Mich.) 1936-current, 1944-02-19
HOUSE HUNTING


There is popular game in Detroit which almost
every other citizen is playing these days and it's one
game in which almost nobody can win. This fancy
game is called house hunting War workers quit
work to hunt houses old residents and new residents
are going mad trying to get under new roofs. Some
of the old residents who have managed to stick 1t
ont in taxpayer shacks and coal bins would give
their eve-teeth for we'll constructed garage. House
hunting is an old game among Detroit Negroes and
as usual the Negro house hunter has very limited
area in which to play the game. Since the war; how
ever the available houses for our Negro citizens have
dwinded to the point where even an empty room can
bring small fortune to the LUCKY owner.
What has been called housing shortage is in
reality housing crisis, and do not need soclolo
ris to tell us that if additional housing is not
found for these thousands of mad, homeless people
in the near future Detroit is headed for more trouble
than Berlin. Repeatedly in our columns we have
urged the city government and the Federal Housing
Authorities to face the realities of the housing stu
alton and stop playing politics with human misery
Both white and Negro citizens in the low income
brackets need housing, and the Negro group needs
it worst of all.
It appears that our city fathers are working on
the theory that the will be over soon and some
of the thousands of workers who have been recruited
into this area will go back to the hills and plantations
the day after victory. This is dangerous assump-
ton, and on the basis of past experience with in
migrant workers. it is entirely erroneous AS fright
full as race relations may be in the city OF Detroit
we are sure that at e a st the Negroes who have
focked to Detroit in the last three years have no
intention of going back to voteess povertystrcken
Dixie.
1t seems to us that the major responsibility for
d1o IN rocfa with
the city government in the first place, and secondly
with the Detroit realty interests Some critics in
sist that there is no difference between them We
have been told that the Federal Housing Authority
is willing to spend the money and build the needed
housing in Detroit but the attitude Of the city gov
eminent and the entrenched realty interests is fay
opposed to public housing. If this is true (and who
will deny it?) the citizens of Detroit should recall
the present admin stration and clean up this housing
scandal which has already hurt the war effort
he ghtened community tensions and may well lead
to a state of anarchy.
When the true state of affairs is brought to the
attention of of the city fathers they dismiss the
facts as the views of alarmsts 1t is much better to
keep quiet, they feel, and the whole thing will blow
over. Unfortunately when human beings are forced
to live in novels without comfort or the necessary
health facilities, they develop behavior patterns
which are anti-social and menace to the public
peace This is true Of people of all races and poor
whites and poor Negroes cannot be excepted. AS VIZ
have said before, when people are forced to live like
dogs sooner later they will begin to act like dogs
and Detroit has no business being kennel.
1t is sheer stupidity for our city planning com
mission and other municipal agencies to spend valu
able time and money on fancy plans for elevated
super-highways which will run across the leaking
roofs of miles of highly congested slum dwelling:
while nothing practical is done to rehablitate these
blighted areas where the great bulk of the popula
ton lives and will continue to live. In an emergency
first things are done first and are faced with al
emergency in housing If the Federal Housing Off
Gals are ready to act Detroit should not only cooper
ate with them but urge them to act Immediately
We do not want disappointed house hunters to de
veop into head-hunters.