Department of Neighborhood Services began inspecting public housing buildings

This comes after public housing tenants accused the Housing Authority of the City of Milwaukee of not responding to complaints

After years of complaints of rodents, roaches and mold city inspectors with the Department of Neighborhood Services (DNS) began inspecting Housing Authority- owned buildings Monday, May 6, 2024.

Public housing tenants, like Carmella Holloway, worked with advocacy organization and nonprofit Common Ground to bring the change.

Holloway has lived at College Court near 35th and Highland for 17 years.

“When I first got here it was such a lovely place. Now it’s gone to hell,” Holloway said.

Holloway said that for at least three years, she has been dealing with a bed bug infestation in her apartment. The bugs are in her bedsheets, in her tub and crawling on the floor.

“They were in my ear. They crawled in my ear during the process of me sleeping at night,” Holloway said. “I haven’t been to sleep for like three or four weeks. I haven’t been asleep at all, even in the daytime. I’m a walking time bomb.”

College Court is managed by the Housing Authority of the City of Milwaukee (HACM).

She’s one of multiple tenants there, and in Housing Authority buildings across the city, complaining of unsafe and unsanitary living conditions.

“They ain’t doing nothing. Nothing at all,” Holloway said about her apartment managers.

For privately owned rental properties in the city, inspectors from the DNS respond to tenant complaints.

But for decades, a legal gray area left DNS without the ability to do the same for public, Housing Authority properties. Tenants told Milwaukee Common Council members that any complaints they made to DNS would just be referred back to the Housing Authority.

“If I’m a tenant and I have concerns and they’re (HACM) not fixing it, that’s it. I have nobody to call, no third party to help me,” said Kevin Solomon, an organizer with Common Ground.

For more than one year, Common Ground has organized with tenants and lobbied the Common Council to change city policy so that DNS would have oversight over the Housing Authority.

In September 2023, the Common Council passed an ordinance to give DNS that authority.

“This is a first step,” Solomon said.

In a news release last week DNS said they have hired two inspectors to cover Housing Authority properties. The HACM manages more than 4,000 units across the city. Most of their tenants are low-income, elderly and/ or disabled.

A DNS spokesperson said inspections started Monday, May 6, 2024. DNS said public housing tenants should first contact their property management team about any complaints. However, if management is unresponsive, tenants can call (414) 286-CITY or submit a complaint online.

In a statement to WISN 12 News, a HACM spokesperson said the Housing Authority supports the new ordinance.

“HACM supports the ordinance that gives the City of Milwaukee’s Department of Neighborhood Services (DNS) the authority to inspect HACM properties and enforce all building code matters under DNS jurisdiction. HACM is committed to providing safe, well-maintained homes for our residents. We view the ordinance as an additional tool to bolster our established processes and complement existing investor and federal inspection requirements. The most efficient and timely method for residents to have their issues addressed remains to be by contacting their property manager.”