I'm really frustrated by this because there are people who organize from that perspective to create division.  Those same people turn around and say that I create division because I talk about class and I talk about race.  Because I do.  And because I acknowledge the diversity of people in the community and actually have an incredible amount of respect for the lives that people have lived, I am criticized for creating division.  I shouldn't get as upset as I do about it.  The truth is that I win my elections with bigger and bigger margins, so obviously people don't buy it.  But to the extent to which anyone does, I find it really hard because I have to spend my time arguing with people, reminding them about their humanity.

So back to the TIF at Broadway and Lawrence.  A half a block away (and down the street from the Aragon) is a highrise that used to be a HUD building that was in real bad shape.Now it's owned by a not-for-profit that completely rehabbed it and is in the process of turning it into tenant-owned co-ops.  It's 100 percent Section 8, although even so there is a significant mix of incomes.  So it is diverse in terms of people who live there.  And across the street from there is a huge block of empty lots.  My goal is a simple one.  I don't want everyone living on one side of the street to be wealthy and everyone living on the other side to be poor.  Because I want it to be one community, not two.  And my experience is that if we don't intervene, then that's what happens. 

So I've actually been working very hard on that, and my first attempt was sabotaged and fell through.  I want to use the TIF to build some owner-occupied two or three-flats so that we have a mix of both rentals and ownership.  The idea is - my standard for this is that when the people who live in the highrise look across the street and see the new housing that's being built, they have a fair and reasonable expectation that they could one day live there.  And if they do, then it's okay.  And if they don't, then we're building the wrong thing.