Advocates Challenge Conversion of Subsidized Housing into Dorms

Attorneys from the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law (Kate Walz and Tiffany Hardy), the Housing Preservation Project, and pro bono lawyers from Sachnoff & Weaver Ltd. are challenging in a class action lawsuit filed last month the Moody Bible Institute’s unlawful conversion of project-based Section 8 housing into student dormitories. Moody Bible’s action unfortunately is a national trend: universities purchase subsidized housing and attempt to use it as housing for students.

The threatened property, Morningside I, is just west of the Magnificent Mile and originally housed some 200 low-income senior and disabled residents. The suit was filed on behalf of current Morningside residents, applicants on the waiting list, and the Jane Addams Senior Caucus, a 30-year-old Chicago nonprofit organization.

Plaintiffs hope to restore Morningside as a 100 percent project-based Section 8 housing, reinstate the waiting list for eligible applicants, and provide senior and disabled residents with the same upgrades to their units as for students. The plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction will be argued on October 20.

As a project-based Section 8 property, Morningside is expressly intended for low-income applicants. In project-based programs, government subsidies stay with the building when a tenant moves; this assures the long-term availability of affordable housing in a particular area. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development allocated money in the 1970s to the Illinois Housing Development Authority to create and administer Morningside, along with several other developments throughout Illinois. Moody Bible Institute purchased Morningside in 1993.

Since the late 1990s, Moody Bible has violated these obligations by gradually converting the property into a student dormitory. Approximately 160 students reside in Morningside; they enjoy Internet access in well-maintained rooms. Moody Bible is combining units to make larger apartments, hotel rooms, and corporate housing available to alumni, donors, and students’ parents. One such corporate apartment has been reserved for Jerry Jenkins, the noted evangelical Christian novelist who helped Moody Bible pay off the mortgage on Morningside. The property has even been renamed “Jenkins Hall” in his honor.
 
Meanwhile, the disabled and elderly residents have been denied similar upgrades in their rooms and even parking spaces in the building’s lot, forcing them to walk across four-lane streets to reach their homes. Eligible applicants are no longer taken off the waiting list and instead are told that the building is no longer intended for disabled and elderly residents. Over 300 people on the waiting list have been unable to secure affordable housing at Morningside. The residents’ plight and the litigation have already been featured in the Chicago Tribune and on ABC/Channel 7 News.

The situation at Morningside helps illuminate Illinois’s affordable-housing crisis, which is especially prejudicial to elderly and disabled residents. Chicago’s Department of Housing recognized seniors’ special needs in a new five-year senior housing plan, which placed the highest priority on supporting low-income, independent-living apartments for seniors. Similarly Illinois’s comprehensive housing plan from 2006 focuses on the housing needs of “underserved populations” meriting special attention—low-income seniors and people with disabilities.

Congress recognized this conversion trend in the last year by passing a law aimed at prohibiting most students from residing in subsidized housing. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) submitted an amendment to the Housing and Urban Development 2005 appropriation bill; the law ended all assistance under Section 8 of the United States Housing Act of 1937 to certain students at institutions of higher education.

For more information, email or call Kate Walz at 312.263.3830 ext. 232.