Tensions between tenants and Winston Salem’s public housing authority are running high ...Middle East

Crystal Towers is the focus of conflict between tenants and the Housing Authority of Winston-Salem. (Photo: Greg Childress)

Residents of Crystal Towers and Healy Towers in Winston-Salem are locked in a seemingly intractable battle with public housing authority officials over concerns about safety and building repairs.

Relations between tenant groups and Housing Authority of Winston-Salem (HAWS) Executive Director Kevin Chesire have deteriorated to the point where group leaders are demanding the HAWS Board of Commissioners fire Chesire.

Tenants complain that Chesire is inattentive to their concerns and has failed to maintain safe and sanitary housing at the two apartment complexes and other buildings managed by HAWS.

“I want to see Kevin Chesire resign,” said Michael Douglas, president of Crystal Towers United, a tenants’ group. “He is very arrogant about his position. He cares about optics, but he doesn’t care about what we [tenants] see.”

When asked about the demands that he be fired, Chesire said, “The mayor appoints the [HAWS] board [of commissioners] and the board decides whether to employ me.”

“We can’t even get our toilets to work right”

Tenants at both Crystal Towers and Healy Towers have long lists of grievances. At Crystal Towers, residents complain about leaky plumbing, mold and mildew. At Healy Towers, bed bug infestations and other pests are concerns. Balky elevators at Crystal Towers were replaced but had been a major concern for the mostly disabled and elderly residents who live in the 11-story building.

At a protest rally earlier this month, Healy Towers resident Edith Chisholm, took issue with HAWS spending money to refurbish the King building on North Cleveland Avenue to serve as its headquarters. The building, on Sixth Street, is a short walk across a parking lot from Crystal Towers. It replaced space the housing authority occupied downtown.

“[HAWS] refurbished a building for themselves, and we can’t even get our toilets to work right,” Chisholm said. “We can’t even get bed bugs out.”

Chisholm was part of a large crowd that gathered outside of the King building to demand HAWS fire Chesire and make repairs to Crystal Towers and other public housing facilities.

MeKaann Evans, a public housing resident and member of Housing Justice Now, a housing advocacy group, said faulty plumbing is a primary concern for Crystal Towers residents.

“The water goes through the walls and there’s always puddles of water on the floor,” Evans said in an interview with NC Newsline just ahead of the tenants’ rally. “They also need to go in and kill this mold instead of painting over it because, as we know, you can die from mold. Mold is serious and a lot of elderly people in this building already have breathing issues.”

Board backs the executive director

The HAWS Board of Commissioners’ monthly meeting was held on the day of the tenants’ rally. Crystal Towers and the rally outside were main topics.

The commissioners’ support for Chesire appeared solid as he guided them through a presentation about the state of the city’s public housing communities. He’d made a similar presentation to the Winston-Salem City Council in March.

Chesire explained that Winston-Salem, like cities across the country, is struggling to figure out how to maintain outdated high rise public housing buildings. Crystal Towers and other older buildings managed by HAWS are in desperate need of modernization, Chesire said. And even after modernization, such facilities would not be optimal for disabled and elderly residents, he said.

“This is not an issue that has snuck upon us nationally but needing modernization is a lot different than what has been described to the [city] council and what I’m presuming is being described out in front of this building today,” Chesire said. “Needing modernization is different than suggesting that our maintenance team, who I’m extremely proud of, is ignoring work orders and is not fixing what is broken.”

Chesire was more succinct during the March city council meeting, where residents shared concerns with the council.

“I categorically reject allegations of plumbing system failures, defective work order system, non-responsiveness of management or maintenance staff, and we certainly categorically reject accusations that nothing has been done,” he said.

Chesire noted that HAWS spent $607,000 on maintenance on Crystal Towers in 2024. He said that of 108 plumbing work orders received so far this year, 94 closed within 24 hours, most within same day. Across the city’s public housing, Chesire said HAWS received and closed 1,712 maintenance work orders entered by residents in 2024.

Advocacy group backs tenants

Dan Rose, a House Justice Now member, contends that there are serious plumbing concerns at Crystal Towers. Rose and tenants have asked the city council for money to make needed repairs. He said the city made a promise to make the repairs in 2022 when tenants successfully fought against the building being sold.

“The residents want their plumbing issues addressed first because of the mold, because of the mildew,” Rose said in an interview with NC Newsline. “We know that these outdated pipes leaking inside their walls and ceilings are making them sick.”

Rose acknowledges that the housing authority has made improvements to the elevators at Crystal Towers but says little else has been done to address residents’ concerns.

“They’ve just done a lot of cosmetic stuff down in the lobby and put in some new elevators, which is important but not the only thing,” Rose said. “The residents have decided they want plumbing to happen first, because again, it’s making them sick, and they know it.”

Tensions between tenants and officials who manage public housing properties are not unusual, housing authority officials and tenants agree.

They also agree that conflicts are inevitable when tenants feel unheard, unseen and believe critical property repairs come too slowly or are never made. And when federal underfunding, competition for scarce resources and other impediments prevent housing authorities from meeting tenants’ needs, the outcome can be chaotic, they say.

Still, in Winston-Salem, the ongoing tension between public housing residents and housing authority officials can sometimes feel next level.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if residents were this angry everywhere,” Rose said. “I don’t mean to toot our [Housing Justice Now] horn too loudly but I do think that it’s [the tension] very much a result of our organizing efforts.”

Chesire and his critics are in agreement. “I think the unique situation here is the involvement of Dan Rose with Housing Justice Now and his strategic utilization of media,” Chesire said. “You typically don’t have an outside group that is attempting to direct the message the way that we have here.”

Tragic death spurs tenant safety demands

Tragedy struck Crystal Towers on Jan. 25. A second story fire led to the hospitalization of tenant Abraham Woods, who died Feb. 1. Woods lived across the hall from the apartment that caught fire due to a cooking incident. Triad City Beat reported that Woods died due to cardiopulmonary arrest as well as diffuse hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy, which is brain damage that can occur due to carbon monoxide poisoning from smoke inhalation.

Daniel Woods, Mr. Abraham’s nephew, was one of the protesters outside of HAWS’ headquarters on April 8. Woods said the family wants to prevent others from suffering the same fate as Mr. Abraham Woods.

“We’re still feeling the loss, that’s why we’re out here,” said Daniel Woods, who described Mr. Abraham Woods as a gentle giant and beloved family member and tenant at Crystal Towers.

Daniels Woods told NC Newsline that his uncle had Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and that the family believes smoke inhalation contributed to his death.

Chesire shared details of the fire with HAWS commissioners during the board’s monthly meeting.

“The fire was small, it was not a smoke billowing out the window situation,” Chesire said. “It was so small that it didn’t even meet our [insurance] deductible.”

Chesire said that Woods evacuated the building under his own power. Once he got outside, he had a “medical event” and collapsed and was rushed to the hospital where he died a week later, Chesire said.

“I’ve seen nothing from any medical professional that attributes the cause of death to smoke inhalation,” Chesire said. “I’m not suggesting that was not a contributing factor, I’m simply reporting to you all that that was not identified on the death certificate as a causation of the death.”

In recent months, Woods’ death has been a point of contention between Crystal Towers residents and HAWS. The residents say they have safety concerns because the housing authority doesn’t provide fire extinguishers in apartments, which the tenants say leaves them vulnerable to fires.

Fire extinguishers are available at each end of hallways, they acknowledge.

“When we asked for fire extinguishers, they refused to give them to us,” said Douglas, the Crystal Towers United president. “And then they said, ‘if we gave them to you, you wouldn’t know how to use them.’”

Instead of fire extinguishers, the housing authority installed stovetop fire stops that are designed to extinguish gas fires on stove tops. The devices work by automatically releasing a fine, dry powder that smothers the fire. Both Douglas and Rose say the devices were out of date when installed.

Douglas, who was passed over for an opening on the HAWS board, said HAWS denied Crystal Towers tenants’ request for emergency evacuation chairs to help disabled tenants get downstairs in case elevators stopped working during a fire.

“The elevators are constantly out-of-order,” Douglas said. “They refused to buy us any of those [emergency evacuation] chairs. We’ve got people in wheelchairs. You can put them in those chairs and take them down the steps because when we have a fire, they cut the elevators off.”

Chesire addressed the request for evacuation chairs during the board of commissioners meeting. He said the housing authority retains a list of residents who need help being evacuated during emergencies. The list is shared with first responders so they can assist them, he said.

“We can’t have other residents or staff physically moving people,” Chesire said. “It’s a liability issue, it’s a potential injury issue, so we’ve got to wait on first responders.”

Douglas sees it differently.

“They treat us like second class citizens,” he said. “They make decisions on stuff that affect us but never take our thoughts into consideration.”

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