Maybe that was too much to expect for any agency with a history as troubled as the DHA's, though of late it had appeared headed in a responsible direction. Perhaps it is, and the present difficulty will turn out to be just a pothole.

But what does it tell you when the agency's own auditor fires itself for fear of getting tarred with the same brush?

The present troubles, as we understand them, have to do with DHA's mismanaging Section 8 vouchers -- the paperwork allowing needy folk to get taxpayers' help with their rent.

Last month, the U.S. Housing and Urban Development crowd gave DHA a grade of "troubled," thanks to its alleged failures to document the rental rates landlords were charging Section 8 tenants, or verifying that Section 8 applicants really qualified for tax-paid help.

Some of this echoed the feds' findings in 2004-'06, when scandals over misused money and some wheeling-dealing led to a housecleaning and a couple of years when DHA couldn't spend a dime without the feds' OK.

That was hardly the first time Durham's Housing Authority came into other authorities' -- and the taxpaying public's -- cross hairs.

DHA is an entity apart from either the city or county government. It was established in 1949 as a channel for public money allocated by Washington for relieving a slum-housing situtation.

At first, the authority set about clearing slums, fixing homes and building public complexes such as Few Gardens and McDougald Terrace. Then, in 1956, two of its board members were indicted for illegally wiretapping a tenant. Both pleaded no contest and kept their seats.

In the '60s, high-handed management, along with DHA's inability to build housing fast enough to accommodate citizens displaced by Durham Freeway construction, made it the local flashpoint as the civil-rights movement had its phase change from desegregation to Black Power.

In 1967, the authority's insurance got canceled due to excessive fire and theft, thieves making off with $27,000 in rent receipts (as well as the DHA's own safe), a near-riot at Few Gardens and arson at three other complexes.

DHA and its customers patched relations up somewhat, but the '70s brought contention over upkeep, vermin and an invasion by the drug trade.

So now the feds are again displeased and the accounting firm of Rector Moffitt & Lindsay said it was washing its hands of the Durham Housing Authority to protect its own good standing.

That's all too bad -- for the housing authority, for Durham, for public confidence in local government, for taxpayers everywhere.

Most of all, it's too bad for the poor folks the DHA was set up to help. They're the ones getting ultimately shortchanged. But by now, they ought to be used to it.