Political Quotes

“When one drives just a short distance from my home, in a bus, goes down to the Desire Street Housing Project, built in the 1950's, now on a Superfund site, surrounded on all sides, with one way in and out over a railroad track, 1,800 units now occupied by 400 individuals, not aggregated one locale, but spread out throughout 1,8000 units, unprotected. The employees do not have two-way communication. If something happens, as it did one week before I went when a 15-year-old child was killed on the doorstep of his unit over rival drugs wars, over sales territory, I went upstairs and talked to the 80-year-old lady who lived in that building by herself and said, ``Ma'am, is there anything I can do to help you?'' She did not know who I was, nor did she care. She said, ``Come with me a minute.'' Her unit was well kept. It was the only one in 16 units in that building. It was not just rundown, depreciated, and worn out. There were no walls, there were no floors. There were dogs and cats running through the bottom area. She walked up those steps every night by herself, locked herself in the room, and she said, ``There is one thing I would like you to do for me, if you might.'' And she took me into the restroom and showed me the large gap in the wall above the shower stall. She said, ``At night when I try to take a bath, the roaches come down the wall.…”