The public housing towers are the shame of New York City, ungainly and forgotten stepchildren, according to an article by Michael Powell in today's edition of The New York Times.

The article noted that "the federal government has cut a cumulative $666 million in financing since 2001" that "city and state officials tiptoed away, too, cutting all funds," and that "the New York City Housing Authority has shed 3,100 employees in the past 15 years."

Sarita Latchman, a vibrant 42-year-old mother and former parks worker, has a sound like a baby's rattle at the back of her throat, which is not surprising, the article said, as her apartment in the Jefferson Houses in East Harlem is speckled with soot-black mold: "A thick carpet of it runs down her bathroom wall and across the ceiling of her children's bedrooms. Rub it and the spores float, landing on sink tops and children's hair. They also journey through Ms. Latchman's nasal passageway into her lungs."

The article said that the authority records note that the mold has "dispersed throughout" her apartment since she first saw it in 2006 and last December, an inspector wrote: "Suggest the occupant be relocated immediately." Ms. Latchman and her five children are still there, along with hundreds of other families in such conditions, the article said.

In this most expensive city, the article said, "these towers offer affordable homes to nearly a half-million working-class and poor New Yorkers, a population greater than Cleveland's. And New Yorkers took pride that conditions never became so bad that hard-hats had to blow towers up, as mayors did in more hapless cities."

"Matters have improved," the article continued, adding that "the number of working tenants has increased steadily, to about 50 percent. And public housing has loyal champions. Manhattan Together, a coalition of congregations and nonprofit groups, has organized the East Harlem and South Bronx houses and is working with Ms. Latchman. Good Old Lower East Side advocates for the forests of towers on the Lower East Side, and so on across the city."

The authority's management under Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg was deft in refinancing and using land and buildings to pay for new roofs and elevators, although it has lagged in attempting to arrange a badly needed new round of financing. The Bloomberg administration has many proud victories on the affordable housing front, but it averts its eyes here, the article maintained.

"A glory of New York is the peculiar statistical bible known as the Mayor's Management Report. If streets are dirtier, if inspectors record more heat complaints, it's there. But the Housing Authority's chapter appears to be an exercise in fantasy. It claims workers respond to emergencies in 20 days. A reader might be incredulous: 20 days in an emergency? But signs suggest that the performance is worse. The Washington Avenue Houses in the Bronx have a backlog of 5.98 work orders per apartment; at the Stanton Street Houses on the Lower East Side, the backlog is 5.54 per apartment. The East New York City Line Houses are the worst, with an average work order backlog of 8.08 per apartment," the article said.

"The mold appeared in Ms. Latchman's handsome home above First Avenue five years ago, and workers tried three times to paint it over. Her five children got sick so often that a school attendance officer came to visit. She saw the petri dish of a ceiling and exited on the run. Ms. Latchman has to stop talking, because her breath is short," the article said.