‘If you believe it, you can do it’
Carson touts focus on affordable housing ‘crisis’ during Beaver County tour
Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson had just finished reading an astronaut book to the children — the theme: If you believe it, you can do it — when the eight youngsters from Ambridge told him what they want to be when they grow up.
One aspired to be a teacher. Another, a waitress at Buffalo Wild Wings. And three young boys: football players.
“I want one of you guys, instead of being a football player, to say, ‘I want to be the owner of the football team,’” Mr. Carson said.
“I will when I retire,” one of the boys shot back.
It was all about lighthearted exchanges, economic progress and the bright future as Dr. Carson, a former Republican presidential candidate, toured a public housing neighborhood Monday morning, touting his department’s focus on what he called the “crisis” of affordable housing in America.
Along with U.S. Rep. Keith Rothfus, Dr. Carson walked through the community center, then was shown a separate residential unit in Economy Village, a 78-unit development of townhouses managed by the Housing Authority of Beaver County.
Facing a situation where minimum wage workers can’t afford a two-bedroom apartment anywhere in America, the Trump administration is making affordable housing a “very high priority,” he said.
Dr. Carson said the next step is to address the “tremendous backlog of individuals” in need of affordable housing and how to relieve the “true impediments” clogging the system.
“We’re in the process of doing that now,” Dr. Carson told reporters afterward. “We’re in the process of using things like the [Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule] in a positive way. Not in a punitive way. But in a way that we can remove all those barriers so that we can create affordable housing in this country.”
Mr. Rothfus, a Sewickley Republican, added that a “healthy, thriving economy” will help generate revenue to address affordable housing. The congressman has touted the GOP’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 as a driver of economic prosperity in the region and across the country.
Dr. Carson and Mr. Rothfus toured Cyndi Burns’ apartment and listened as she told them about her desire to teach the kids living in the plan how to cook homemade Southern biscuits and gravy.
Several of those kids — including the eight who gathered for the book reading — receive services from the nonprofit TRAILS Ministries such as an afterschool program, lunches and recreational activities in the community center of the village.
The young students meet on Wednesdays and Thursdays when school starts, which for most students is Monday.
“If you can dream it, if you believe it and work hard for it, anything is possible,” Dr. Carson read from the book, reminiscing to when his mother told him the same message.
The secretary and congressman were set to visit the opportunity zone in Midland in the afternoon. Opportunity zones — three of which are in Beaver County — were added to the tax code with the Republican plan, designating a number of economically distressed communities where new investments may be eligible for preferential tax treatment.
Dr. Carson called the opportunity zone program a “win-win situation” that provides an opportunity to spread wealth.