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nr I Mot t .:11IJUtn al an d CONSTITUTION SUN·DAY, FEBRUARY S, 1967 / ( ~ an a ...14 -------------------------" '\jj.,~t "JI ':2 ra/4~/4~ ~1~tlo,J9'b{ tl/£L-I,__,-"/---, ,/2~~·;, ~~d, 1)/b; ANOTHER WATTS SO·ME SAY ,_j/a2ZZL'rm143.215.248.55 ~a///$.J ~··n=,,..,~--1. · "' - . ~~ I T';143.215.248.55ts Pledg~ RerrtSt;ij;'l By D. J. R. BRUCKNER LOI Aniietes Times New1 Service ST. LOUIS, Feb. 4-Almost 2,000 tenant families of the largest public housing development here are preparing for a rent strike March 1 against the Public Housing Authority in an effort to force major improvements in living conditions. Tenant spokesmen who set the strike deadline said the alternative to over-all upgrading of the huge development is widespread rioting. Tenants r e£erred to " another Watts" and some teen-agers told a reporter, " It's corning, man , it's coming big !" Involved in the dispute are the Pruitt homes and the Igoe apartments whlch form a single housing complex about two miles from downtown St. Louis. They are operated by the housing authority for low-income tenants. Representing the tenants is the Pruitt - Igoe Neighborhood Corp., a community group organized last summer by the Urban League and the War on Poverty to upgrade the comtnunity. Housing authority officials and members of the city's board of aldermen agree that conditions at the development have deteriorated r apidly in recent years. But the housing authority is requir ed to operate entirely from rent receipts, and the officials say they do not have the money to make ne~ded repairs . tion. Today, it is the worst slum in~! : _ ~ ~- '-mITTgoe1s-43 sfmliar-looking buildings, each with 11 floors, set in a tract of 30 square blocks. The land ar is stre oken bottl p cans_ 1 es o etirl.s. Inside _Jjle builgip~ worse tfia~uiside. Each buil f lffame ~ or which stops only at the fi rst, fourth , seventh and 10th floors. A reporter went into four buildings before he found an elevator that worked. The hallway walls are gray cement stone blocks. They never have been painted. Most of the floors also are gray. The RECENTLY, they promised are commonl filled with es ~s a-nd oro"k:en ~ ass. to begin major repa_ir s in the spring, but tenant spokesmen 1"1'11'l'IWl~tni,)"'li ' FP"ovel'run 1i r ats n u s. said work must begin immediately if the strike is to be The stench in some buildings avoided. is overwhelming; many ventiWhen it was built 13 year s lating fa ns do not work. Broken ago, Pruitt - Igoe was widely windows are common, and praised as one of the best pub- many refrigerators and drain lie housing facilities in the na- pipes do not work. A number of kitchen stoves no longer work ] attention given to work orders because tenants over-used them placed by tenants which the corto heat their cold apartments . poration says have been ignored for months. BANDS OF roving youths All these things, the corporaam the elevators, break laun- tion says, must be done on a y machines and windows and crash program. ock out hallway lights. Eugene Porter, corporation About 10,000 people live it:,i president, claims his corporaPruitt-Igoe, and all but one of tion represents 1,900 of the 2,000 the 2,000 fa milies is Negro, tenant famili es and could enMore than 60 per cent of the fo rce its rent strike easily. The families have no male head of housing authority says a rent household and an equal per- strike would , in fact, cut off centage a re on public relief. even the meager operating The tenant corporation's de- funds it now has for the project. mands include adequate heat and hot water immediately, imes' P,a rties Q~ mediate repair of broken stoves , . refrigerators, windows and ele_yators, and regular police protection to replace the two guards assigned by the housing authority to the entire project. It also wants a janitor assigned to each building, contending that the present assign, ment of one for two buildi ngs is insufficient. It wants immediate �