Unwanted Apartments

Some people in north Chattanooga are not happy about the plans for a dilapidated apartment complex.

An old, run down complex that provides subsidized housing on Fairmount Avenue is the center of the controversy. It will be torn down, but the Chattanooga Housing Authority will build another subsidized housing complex in it's place that will be bigger and neighbors don't like it one bit.

CHA is getting $4.2-million from HUD to build the housing project that will go from 24 units to 36 units. There will be three, three-story buildings separated by lawns.

Ever since the future of this complex on Fairmount Avenue became a topic of discussion people who own houses next door and along Fairmount have asked CHA to do something else besides building another comlpex. Since a number of people have invested in the area and built new homes, they think a future CHA development should be either single family units or townhouses.

They say a complex just keeps the same problems they've dealt with over the years, like traffic and crime.

"And then I've seen numerous drug transactions up here, no just the people that live here but their friends will come over and their transacctions here," according to Doug Jacks.

Neighbors like Jacks say if CHA builds units that people can own, that will cut back on the problems associated with subsidized rental units.

But the concerns from the neighborhood fell on deaf ears and the Chattanooga Housing Authority board voted unanimously to go ahead with a 36-unit complex. They will first spend more than $284,000 for a local architect to design the project.