Rose Hill Courts – Los Angeles CA

Description

Rose Hill Courts was the smallest of the developments in Los Angeles, CA completed under the city’s New Deal–era public housing program. In 1941-43, the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles (HACLA) constructed 10 public housing developments for $16 million, funded 10% by city bonds and 90% by federal loans from the United States Housing Authority (USHA). Located in the Montecito Heights neighborhood, Rose Hill Courts was completed in 1942.

In September 1941, the City of Los Angeles demolished 79 homes, 71 of which were deemed “substandard,” to make way for Rose Hill Courts. Completed in December 1942, the development was made up of 15 frame-and-stucco buildings on 5.23 acres of land: 14 two-story residential buildings and one administrative building. The residential buildings featured 100 dwelling units and were built in parallel groups to create a series of courtyards.

The other nine HACLA/USHA public housing projects were: Estrada Courts, Ramona Gardens, Avalon Gardens, Pico Gardens, Pueblo del Rio, Rancho San Pedro, Hacienda Village, William Mead Homes, and Aliso Village. They were all designed as modern, garden-style complexes with low-rise, one- to three-story buildings.

To make way for these housing developments, HACLA conducted federally-sponsored “slum” clearance of outdated, inner-city neighborhoods. While former residents and low-income families were promised priority, nine of the ten projects were temporarily converted to wartime housing reserved instead for defense workers and their families. After the war, the HACLA developments transitioned to public housing over a period of five years (1947-52) and became open to the low-income residents for whom they were originally intended. In contrast to federally owned housing developments, HACLA complexes were racially integrated at a time of widespread segregation, housing Americans of different races and ethnicities.