Kids poisoned by lead in CHA housing; landlords still got paid

As private landlords increasingly take over the government's role of housing low-income families, dozens of children have been poisoned by brain-damaging lead while living in homes and apartments declared safe by the Chicago Housing Authority.

Taxpayers often still paid the rent.

Federal law requires the CHA to inspect subsidized homes before tenants move in and at least once a year afterward. But since 2010, at least one child has been diagnosed with lead poisoning in 187 homes the housing authority approved for occupancy, according to a Tribune analysis of thousands of pages of inspection reports, monthly payments, court documents and property records.

The CHA paid the landlords of those hazardous homes more than $5.6 million in federal rent subsidies after clearing them to participate in the Housing Choice Voucher program, the Tribune analysis found. Nearly $1 million of that amount was delivered to landlords while they faced housing code violations or lawsuits filed by another city agency, the Chicago Department of Public Health, over deteriorating lead-based paint in their rentals.

Read more: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/watchdog/lead/ct-cha-lead-poisoning-20170406-story.html