It's hard to do a story when you have strong feelings about the issue. You have to set aside your feelings and opinions and present it as equally as possible. When you can't do that, you have a responsibility to the readers to step aside and let someone else do the story.

     About a year ago, I did an investigative piece into multi-family housing and the resistance it faces from small cities and towns. I found rezoning efforts, near-harrassment of multi-family developers - in short, massive movements to zone or regulate multi-family housing out of existence. It is spearheaded by the tax-paying, home-owning citizenry and fully supported by the local civic officials elected by them. On the face of it, the citizenry opposes multi-family housing (read: apartments) because it adds traffic, it's poorly planned, the owners don't keep it up, etc.

     In reality, they mean: "Keep THOSE PEOPLE away from us. We don't want them here."

     Last week, I heard rank bigotry of the kind only the so-called Greatest Generation can truly achieve, disguised behind civil bureaucratic-ease, as a local town voted a one-year moratorium on any more multi-family housing while they rezone the city. As much as I admire those who survived the Depression, theirs is the group most likely to scream into the phone at me on a Tuesday morning or spout nastiness at the city council meeting.

     "The whole idea behind rental housing is the hope that one day, they will buy homes, settle down and become contributing members of the community," said one lady from the planning commission. "But that isn't what has happened."

     I'm NOT a contributing member of my community because I don't own a house?

     I'm a demographic dream for advertising executives. I'm a professional working woman, with a working spouse and a child. I buy groceries, gas and household goods in my local stores, order toys and books for my son, plan minor vacations close to home. I pay my income taxes and sales taxes. I'm involved in my community, a member of a local church and a patron of the local library. Yes, my son will attend public schools, but my exorbitant rent does pay for it, through my landlord's property taxes. In the meantime, I am helping to support a private day care center with a ludicrous percentage of my salary.

     I didn't know I was a "burden" to my community, to the school districts, to the public safety officers. Once, a police officer gave me a ride home when my car broke down. That's about the extent to which I have been a burden or nuisance to the Our Town Police Department.

     Suddenly I was very glad I live in a different town than the one I cover.

     It had been a long, nasty day, and there's nothing worse than taking impartial notes and writing an impartial story when you feel personally insulted by the people at the podium. But the worst of all was watching the slate of cowards up at the front faced with 60 - yes, 60 - senior citizens who don't like seeing THOSE PEOPLE move into the duplex that used to be someone's old house 50 years ago. 

     Because what they mean by THOSE PEOPLE is Poor People. Black People. Hispanic People. That's what we're really talking about, and all the talk about lawn care and parking spaces won't change the underlying prejudice. We don't want THOSE PEOPLE here. Make them go away. That's what we elected you for. Get rid of the blacks, the Hispanics, unwed mothers and poor people.

     And, I guess, reporters with families to feed.

     I don't consider myself less of a member of a community because I don't have a house. I want to own a house! I'd pay about 25 percent less per month if I owned a small house than renting. I don't know anyone who sits in an apartment and says, "Gee, I love living in two rooms off a common hallway. Who needs a lawn and a mortgage-interest deduction?" But thanks to the U.S. Department of Education, my less-than-frugal college credit cards and the ridiculous cost of day care, I won't be able to own a house for many years. For a newly-divorced mother of two, working a minimum-wage job that doesn't even cover the cost of babysitters, the situation must be even harder.

     But one day, I will buy a house and "settle down." I will become a "contributing member of the community." 

     And you can be damned sure that a community that refused to welcome me when I was a renter is not the community I'll choose when I buy a house.