May 20, 2002
 
 The illustrious Kevin Bell has returned! Now we get to hear more about how much we need new housing here in the city of Cumberland, even though 14% of our housing stock is vacant.
 
 Lucky us.
 
 Yes, Kevin Bell,- Annapolis lobbyist, developer of low income housing, and colleague of Casper Taylor, who brought him here in the first place - has returned to Cumberland to try again to build a low income housing project on 4th Street in South End.
 
 Only this time around, his low income housing project will be for SENIOR CITIZENS, as opposed to LOW INCOME FAMILIES. And that, says Cumberland Mayor Lee Fiedler, is a good thing, we assume in part because he hopes it will shut everyone up.
 
 Mr. Bell is claiming that his infamous market study, conducted the last time around to justify his initial low income housing project for families, approved by the Mayor and Council last spring, also justifies low income housing for senior citizens.
 
 That is some market study. That market study seems to justify whatever project Mr. Bell has in mind at the moment, making it a pretty handy sort of market study to have around. And it's especially handy when dealing with elected leaders who are incapable of figuring out what a market study actually says, even when it's been interpreted for them by an independent economist.
 
 Remember when the city had Prof. Peggy Dalton, of Frostburg State University, analyze Mr. Bell's market study, to determine its reliability and accuracy? As we recall, Dr. Dalton pretty much said it was a loser (see Kevin Bell Study a Stinker), for a variety of reasons.
 
 Mr. Bell is using that very study to now claim that we need low income senior housing. That sounds a tad more logical than low income family housing, given our demographics, but we still have a few questions about the project that we'd like to see answered.
 
 For instance, where is Mr. Bell going to find tenants? We checked with the various senior housing opportunities in Cumberland - Booth Towers, JFK Apartments, etc. - and found none had a waiting list of any length. We also glanced through a market study done for the Cumberland Housing Authority, which manages Jane Frazier Village, Benjamin Banneker Homes and Fort Cumberland Homes, and that study - which really WAS independent - noted that there is no need for additional low income housing in Cumberland, even for the elderly.
 
 The one exception to that finding was an anticipated need for
 additional assisted living units, in which seniors receive help with their daily activities while still maintaining their own residence.
 
 The county recently announced that a company dealing in assisted living projects was looking to build in Allegany County, which is good news.
 
 So - has the Mayor and Council looked into the need for senior
 housing?
 
 If Mr. Bell can't rent his apartments to seniors, does that mean he can then rent to anyone?
 
 We also wonder what management company Mr. Bell plans to employ. If it's Edgewood Management, the company he had planned to use for his first project, we're a tad alarmed. If it's the same Edgewood Management that we know, the company was involved in a dispute with tenants of a low income housing project in Baltimore (see Owners to Hire a Lawyer). Poor security, problems with parking, refusal to fix wiring, plumbing, etc., to the point where bathrooms were sinking through the second floor to the first and sprinker systems failed to activate following a fire - we're not engineers, but that doesn't sound good.
 
 Is that the sort of management this project will have? If Mr. Bell would like to build here and be a good neighbor, good for him. If he wants to build here, make a fast buck and then disappear, he should be encouraged to go elsewhere.
 
 We have enough problems.