Public housing ‘subdivision’ feted

• By KORAN ADDO
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: May 8, 2008 - Page: 1B - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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The new housing development adjacent to the Howell Park Golf Course looks like a typical subdivision.

Each of the 25 single-family homes, sitting on well-tended yards, has a unique color scheme, roof line and façade.

But there’s a big difference between this community and the conventional tree-lined subdivision.

Brookstown Place is the new face of public housing in Baton Rouge.

At 10 a.m. today, residents and developers of Brookstown Place will celebrate what’s termed a triumph for Partners for Progress Inc., the nonprofit housing agency responsible for building the development.

The goal was to build affordable housing that doesn’t look like public housing, PFP’s chief operating officer, Morise Duffin Jr., said.

The development, on East Brookstown Drive, features only rental units.

“We wanted Brookstown to lend itself to a middle-class neighborhood,” said Richard Murray, executive director of the development’s collaborating partner, the East Baton Rouge Parish Housing Authority.

The development was financed through a $430,000 tax-credit allocation from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and administered by the Louisiana Housing and Finance Agency.

There has been a longstanding need for working-class families to have affordable public housing in safe areas, Duffin said.

And with Brookstown’s upscale look, Duffin said, “we’ve given those families an option and helped fill a need without the stigma.”

More than 300 people applied to live in Brookstown’s two- , three- and four-bedroom homes, although only 25 units were built, property manager Shandell Brown said.

Some applicants earned too much money annually to qualify, while others did not pass criminal background checks or meet the minimum salary requirements to afford the leasing agreements ranging from $607 to $798 per month, Brown said.