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HomeMy WebLinkAbout10-19-2023 Housing & Community Development CommissionHOUSING & COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION (HCDC) October 19, 2023 Regular Meeting — 6:30 PM Iowa City Senior Center Assembly Room 28 S Linn Street 1 TF74TMIT, 1. Call to Order 2. Consideration of Meeting Minutes: September 21, 2023 3. Public Comment of Items not on the Agenda Commentators shall address the Commission for no more than 5 minutes. Commissioners shall not engage in discussion with the public concerning said items. 4. Housing Trust Fund of Johnson County Overview Ellen McCabe, Executive Director of the Housing Trust Fund of Johnson County will provide an overview of the organization and answer questions from Commissioners. 5. Introduction to the Consolidated Planning Process Every five years, the City of Iowa City develops a new five-year Consolidated Plan, known locally as City Steps, in accordance with U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development requirements. The intent of the planning process is to assess affordable housing and community development needs and market conditions, and to make data - driven, place -based investment decisions for federal Community Development Block Grant and HOME Investment Partnership Program funds. Staff will provide an overview of the planning process that is anticipated to begin in 2024. 6. Staff & Commission Updates This item includes an opportunity for brief updates from staff and Commissioners. Commissioners shall not engage in discussion on updates. 7. Adjournment If you will need disability -related accommodations to participate in this program or event, please contact Brianna Thul at bthul cDiowa-citv.oro or 319-356-5230. Early requests are strongly encouraged to allow sufficient time to meet your access needs. Upcoming Housing & Community Development Commission Meeting: Regular: November 16, 2023 � r � MI; Omni, CITY OF IOWA CITY 410 East Washington Street Iowa City. Iowa 52240-1826 (319) 356-5000 (319) 356-5009 FAX www.icgov.org Housing and Community Development Commission Meeting Packet Contents October 19, 2023 Agenda Items #2 • September 21, 2023 Draft HCDC Meeting Minutes Agenda Items #5 • City Steps 2025 can viewed online at: https://www.icgov.org/actionplan MINUTES PRELIMINARY HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT JULY 20, 2023 — 6:30 PM FORMAL MEETING THE CENTER ASSEMBLY ROOM MEMBERS PRESENT: Kaleb Beining, Karol Krotz, Kiran Patel, James Pierce, Becci Reedus, Kyle Vogel MEMBERS ABSENT: Maryann Dennis, Michael Eckhardt (resigned 9/21), Jennifer Haylett STAFF PRESENT: Rachel Carter, Erika Kubly, Brianna Thul OTHERS PRESENT: Zaden Issah (University of Iowa USG) CALL MEETING TO ORDER: Beining called the meeting to order at 6:30 PM. CONSIDERATION OF MEETING MINUTES: JULY 20, 2023: Reedus moved to approve the minutes of July 20, 2023. Patel seconded the motion. A vote was taken and the minutes were approved 6-0. PUBLIC COMMENT FOR TOPICS NOT ON THE AGENDA: None. IOWA CITY HOUSING AUTHORITY OCHA) OVERVIEW: Carter began with a general overview stating they have 1575 Housing Choice Voucher Program vouchers, otherwise known as Section 8. Specialty vouchers are earmarked for populations with higher barriers such as people with disabilities, people experiencing homelessness, veterans experiencing homelessness. Carter explained they administer those largely in conjunction with Shelter House and the Coordinated Entry System, then the rest of the vouchers they administer within the Housing Authority. She noted they also have a public housing program in which they own and manage the units and rent is capped at 30% of the tenant's income. There are 86 public housing units in Iowa City and the Housing Authority also manages 16 affordable units that aren't funded through the Public and Indian Housing or specifically HCVP, but they do keep those affordable through partnerships with the Housing Fellowship and some IFA funding. Krotz asked if the 30% of the client income is 30% of their gross income. Carter replied it is the adjusted gross income so there are deductions. For example, if somebody has medical expenses that are more than 3% of their annual income or somebody is elderly or disabled, the cost of their Medicare Medicaid insurance is deducted as are childcare deductions. There is a myriad of different deductions. Krotz asked about the affordable housing the City owns that is not affiliated with Section 8, are there guidelines to what affordability means for those or is there a range for rent? Carter explained they have to stay under fair market rent. The payment centers are based on some percentage of fair market rent and they have to be within a range. Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 2 of 15 Krotz noted fair market rent is very high and is more than some people make with their social security disability and SSI. Carter agreed that the cost of housing is high here and so HUD reflects that with the fair market rents and the City is able to assist people who otherwise wouldn't be able to afford a rental here. Carter stated those are the two large programs, they also have a Family Self Sufficiency (FSS) Program, which helps clients in the Section 8 program build an escrow savings account. They have had a lot of success in that program with people exiting the program to homeownership. That ties into the other program, a small homeownership program where they can use Section 8 vouchers for homeownership payments. They have also had people starting businesses and going off assistance completely through FSS. There are 164 clients in that program right now. Regarding waitlists, Carter stated the City has just completed updating the waiting list. A year ago, they had a waiting list of 29,000 people for the Housing Choice Voucher Program. They updated and sent letters to everybody on the list and made sure they were still interested in the program, hadn't moved, and had basic eligibility. After that update, as of this morning, there are 8,825 people (households) on the waiting lists so while less that's still a really significant waiting list. Right now, they're serving people who applied in July 2019 so over a four year waitlist and she doesn't see that need decreasing anytime soon. For the Public Housing Program they haven't done an update letter in quite some time so that waiting list has almost 13,000 people on it. Vogel asked regarding the waitlist, do people that have existing vouchers, like families with existing vouchers from outside of this jurisdiction, whether it's Linn County or out of state or Des Moines, do they have preference on the waitlist versus new applications of families within Johnson County? Carter replied, if a person has a voucher somewhere else they canport it into the Iowa City Housing Authority. Federally, it's required that a Housing Authority accepts any imported voucher from anywhere in the United States. It is up to the City whether they absorb that voucher or bill the other Housing Authority. If they want Iowa City to absorb the voucher, Iowa City would just give one of Iowa City's vouchers instead of sending a bill every month. So they continue to have voucher and do not go back onto a waiting list. Carter did note that on the waiting list there are preference categories. Preference category number one is for anybody fleeing a federally declared disaster area, and that's very rare. Preference category two is where they pull all of the applicants from the entire client pool who's elderly, disabled, or has minor children living or working within the jurisdiction (which is Johnson, Iowa, and Washington County north of Highway 92). Vogel asked how Iowa City generally handles those outside transfers or imported vouchers. Carter replied they generally absorb them because if they are billing another housing authority, they are putting the federal compliance in the hands of another housing authority and they have to submit HUD paperwork on a monthly basis and don't want to be out of compliance. So far this year they've gotten 17 for requests for transfer vouchers so they don't get a lot. Vogel asked about porting these vouchers, if Iowa City has a finite amount of vouchers, will it then will kick somebody else off the program to absorb this new voucher? Carter explained it doesn't kick somebody off the program. Iowa City would only absorb them if they had an open voucher. If they were at the point where they had no open vouchers, they would have to just bill the other housing authority for the sake of keeping all the vouchers that Iowa City has. However, they do have about 200 vouchers a year turnover, whether somebody moves or is no longer eligible, or in the best -case scenario they're making enough money where they no longer need the assistance, or people who pass away. Vogel asked if then in that case the imported voucher would take precedence over anyone that's on the waitlist. Carter replied no because it's not a waitlist voucher yet. Reedus stated they can also probably assume that person porting in had gone through the waitlist in another community. She asked what the options for folks on the waitlist are during interim of time, how Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 3 of 15 can they afford housing while they're waiting for a voucher because they're obviously low income. Carter acknowledged that a difficult situation and there's not a great answer to that. Krotz noted when she was on the waitlist the only groceries that she got for herself were beans and rice and ate beans and rice for almost every meal for a couple years. Reedus stated she is looking for the nonprofits, transitional housing, homeless shelters, Rapid Rehousing to help. Also things like the food pantries and such are providing some assistance. Krotz stated she was illiterate with all the social service agency possibilities so that could have been helpful, but almost her entire almost Social Security check went to rent. Reedus acknowledged that's unfortunate. Regarding food, there they had a Hunger Project Hunger Action task force, seven or eight years ago now, and there's a website Johnson County with literally everything listed related to getting a meal or getting grocery assistance, so they've done a good job trying to get the information out. She noted the nonprofits are filling a gap and therefore this Commission should take a look at funding priorities and making sure that they have enough support going to the kinds of agencies that are providing that interim housing assistance, because four years is a long time for a family to survive if they can't afford the basics like shelter. Krotz stated what would have been very helpful to her because she had never participated in any financial assistance programs before for any reason and it was foreign territory, so in addition to just not really understanding anything it was difficult for her to access information on where to ga. She has always thought it would be nice if there was one very well-known place that had information for everything, and it was kept current and complete. She is not sure that anyone's doing that but that would be very helpful. Reedus noted that nonprofits and the services and the benefits that people can get are so vast, they almost need a yellow pages directory for all of it. She stated there's enough partnership and cooperation among the agencies that they will send people to different places. Reedus asked about the vacancy policy of someone leaving their home for more than four weeks, and it was changed to up to two months. How well has that gone, has it caused a lot of vacancies because there was a concern out in the community that people who get public vouchers should utilize it all the time and that it would increase the vacancy if people wouldn't be there. Carter confirmed the policy did change so they can be absent from the unit for up to 60 days without prior approval, however they are not hearing about it when they're gone for that long and really don't have a lot of interaction about it at all. She believes in the past year it's come up one time that someone has been absent for longer than the 60 days. Additionally, they haven't had any complaints from landlords. Beining wondered if they were able to track any kind of increase in the waitlist since that policy was implemented. Carter doesn't think so, the waitlist has been growing pretty steady essentially since 2020 and they can all make the presumption of what happened in 2020. The absent/vacancy travel policy was enacted at the end of 2021, beginning of 2022, so it likely didn't have any effect on the waitlist. Krotz noted she was happy to hear they hadn't had complaints from landlords, especially people not paying their rent while they're gone. Carter stated in reference back to the idea of a yellow books of sorts for services, Johnson County Social Services does a guidebook and that's pretty phenomenal, and they have a staff person dedicated keeping that updated. Carter also shared, relevant to the waitlist, it was interesting to know in the last 12 months 38% of the people they pulled from the waitlist to give vouchers to were literally homeless at the time, so at Shelter House, DVIP or sleeping and living someplace not meant for human habitation. Unfortunately, if in the last year, 38% of those they placed were homeless, that is probably a pretty good reflection of what the rest of the list looks like and right now.. Again, they do have those preference categories, the P2 category which are anybody elderly, disabled, or with minor children working or living in the jurisdiction and that portion of the voucher recipients is 1126. The remainder of the recipients, which is 92 people as Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 4 of 15 of this morning, are P3 people who are not elderly, disabled, nor with children in the jurisdiction, and preference categories, four, five, and six are all people outside of the jurisdiction. Patel asked if they have any idea the number of people that just never apply because they would assume that they would never get it. Kubly replied they don't specifically have that data, but they do have data on cost burden in the County and that's pretty high, the cost burden from renters. Thul noted on the City website there's a tab under Community Development for other plans and documents and there's several housing studies there that would have that information. Carter noted they do have people apply that are say 59 right now, not disabled, don't have minor children, but three years from now they'll be 62 and be in that preference category. Pierce noted it was mentioned that the waitlist from the last time it was updated was something like 29,000 and now it's between 8000 and 9000. Do they have any sense of how all those people have transitioned off of that waitlist, did people move away, or are they no longer eligible, etc? Carter replied in the P2 category they lost about 800 because they did not reply to the two letters and an email if they had one. Some did respond that they had passed away and some who didn't respond either moved or they're just not interested. Many of those were people on the list from outside of the community, many outside of the State. A lot of those came back in return mail, % of those that were removed, came back as undeliverable. Krotz asked how they calculate the amount of assistance that people are able to receive. And if folks in Washington County, north of Highway 92, are calculated the same way as for somebody in Iowa City or somebody in Lone Tree? Carter replied, the method to calculate their adjusted gross income is the same anywhere in the United States. Their income limits, like the area median income that qualify somebody for the programming, is different in different counties. Washington County is lower than Johnson County, so yes the thresholds of which someone is eligible for the programming is different and the fair market rent or payment standards are different in different communities. So while the method to calculate adjusted gross income is the same everywhere, the rent amounts and the income limits are different based on the area. Vogel stated for example, someone can theoretically be not eligible in Washington County, moved to Johnson County become eligible because of the higher cost of living in the area. Vogel asked about fraud. He stated it happens occasionally where they find people who are hiding income or are on the program they where they shouldn't and have other sources of income coming in. He asked if those cases are investigated internally or does the State come and investigate those. Carter replied the State can come and investigate, historically, the Housing Authority has utilized them to investigate those but it depends on how much of the fraud they're looking at. They have utilized a federal system, HUD mandates they utilize this federal system, to verify income so if it's earned income it's going to show up if they're using their Social Security Number. Of course, there are instances of earned income, maybe cash, that they don't see on that system so in the past they have utilized the Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals to do those. They haven't had one of those in quite some time, thankfully. She noted it's not a rampant issue in this community. If someone has either been found not reporting income or misreporting income, they're entitled federally to enter into a repayment agreement to repay the additional rent that was paid on their behalf. Krotz asked how they find out if somebody's getting cash under the table for something. Carter acknowledged that cash under the table is one that often goes unnoticed for quite some time, because it doesn't go through a federal income reporting system. A lot of times, honestly, they end up reporting it, and sometimes they find out from the landlord. Carter also noted last year, right under 60% of the clients on HCVP were elderly or disabled and are not working jobs, they're relying on fixed incomes of pensions and Social Security and VA benefits and those are all verified through the federal verification system. Vogel asked about earnings, do they base off earned income or Social Security, and if child support is included and considered an actual income even though it's not a guarantee income? Carter confirmed it was. 4 Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 5 of 15 Vogel noted Carter was nice enough to come to their apartment association meeting a couple months ago and speak as their monthly Lunch and Learn speaker. He thinks federally HUD looks at Iowa and says, oh, well Iowa's average rent is $400 for a two bedroom and obviously that is not the fact in Iowa City, Ames and Cedar Falls. You can likely still find a $400 apartment in Keota but who wants to live in Keota? He asked her to explain how that process works because Iowa City has been able to increase those levels recently and it has been a boon for a lot of the four- and five -bedroom families that they've been able to help in the last six months that they wouldn't have been able to help before. Carter acknowledged that was nice to hear that because that was their intention. The fair market rent is a number based on American Community Survey data that they decide this is what the rent in each community costs and what is the fair rent in the community. Then Housing Authorities have the choice to go between 90% to 110% of that fair market rent and HUD has some calculation about how Iowa City gets funded between that 90% and 110%. However, Iowa City is still at a point where HUD funding for what we're spending out so that's good. Iowa City did move up the payment standard because what they were seeing is those threes, fours, and fives were very difficult to find a house to lease up in. The payment standard had been at 93% so they increased it pretty significantly to 108% which gave a little wiggle room. It helped astronomically and people are being able to lease up quickly. Krotz asked about the data and Carter replied it is ultimately from census data from the Census Bureau and they send out a random survey to a group of households and ask about income, expenses, etc. Krotz is guessing that a lot of the really low-income people who have so many other pressures about living every day and paying for rent and paying for groceries and stuff likely don't take the time to fill out a census form. Patel noted also they would miss the ghost tenants who don't want to report to the federal government that there are more people living in the place than the landlord approved. Pierce stated hopefully people are filling it out but agrees that the problem is probably larger in places like Iowa City where people are moving super frequently, who are low income, they're not going to be caught in that extensive survey. Vogel noted one of the things they used to be able to do was if there was a rate difference, they could get somebody moved in for the first month, or even two months for a lower rent and then after that 60-day period just get that automatic increase. Unfortunately, they have been informed that's not allowed anymore. Carter stated that is based on a federal regulation. She did state on the flip of that, what happens then is that family is paying significantly more than 30% of their income to rent. Krotz agreed noting its real scary when a landlord raises the rent by $100 a month and someone has to try and make that work with the requirements of the Housing Choice Voucher. Vogel stated on an annual basis if on the lease renewal the rent goes up, the landlord does have to give 60 days notice to housing, and then they can readjust on an annual basis what the HCVP portion is as well as the tenant portion. So, in that case, the tenant doesn't eat the full increase and luckily this last year, because of the new increases, most tenants didn't see an increase on their end at all. Vogel noted the staff does an incredible amount of work and he doesn't know how they get any of it done just because the pure amount of paperwork involved is mind boggling with the whole bureaucratic process. There is a reason why a lot of landlords do not want to participate. But luckily, they're blessed in Iowa City, Johnson County and parts north of Washington that they are lucky enough to have Iowa City because in Jackson County, Missouri, where he worked before it was not this kind of streamlined process. Vogel has heard from friends up in Cedar Falls and Des Moines who do not have the same kind of relationship with the private landlords as Iowa City does, so he appreciates her coming tonight for sure. Carter noted they are actively looking for ways to make the process easier and coming and speaking with the tenants at that lunch was so helpful, she got some feedback during that meeting that she thinks for next summer during moving season is going to make things a lot simpler for a lot of landlords. Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 6 of 15 Kubly asked Carter to talk briefly about when they'll see with the next Administrative Plan and what they're looking at moving forward with the Housing Authority. Carter noted every public housing authority has a document, an Administrative Plan, and Iowa City's hasn't been fully updated in a while. HUD produces between 20 and 30 notices of new regulations or regulatory changes a year so there is a lot of updating needed in that document. She has spent a lot of time in the last year updating that document and believes they're on the homestretch to getting it in front of everyone look at some of the changes. The changes will include consolidating some of those preference categories, like if they have preference categories that they've never pulled a client from, it just seems like administrative work to have them, they could put them all together. So overall it is just simplifying some things, clarifying some internal policies to make things easier and simpler to support tenants in their housing, and landlords in providing that housing. Carter noted when they're talking about the numbers on the waitlist, and what it looks like, and how they should be prioritizing how they use these vouchers - that's a really important discussion and we should be making sure they're putting vouchers in the hands of the people who need it the very most. Housing is health care and the rate of death or serious disability due to homelessness is incredibly high. She welcomes the discussion about how they can use those limited resources most ethically to make sure people aren't experiencing those negative mental and physical health effects as a result. Vogel asked if they ever see HUD developing a deposit program for HCVP qualified households, because he still sees that as a primary hurdle. He acknowledged right now the Housing Authority does not provide any funds towards security deposits. Reedus stated however the City does have some programs for that, CommUnity has one. Vogel agreed noting they are lucky to be in Iowa City because of the fact that Shelter House, Veterans Affairs and a handful of other organizations do have deposit programs. However, when those monies get returned to the tenant after move -out, they don't get returned back to Shelter House, so those monies aren't available for re -use. Vogel noted he's not an owner, he's just a property manager, but probably 10% of deposits are literally paper checks, he has a folder in his desk of paper checks and after a year those monies just revert to the owner. A lot of people just assume they aren't going to get their deposit back, or don't have to worry about it, because they didn't pay it because it came from Shelter House or whatever, they just kind of forget about it. Obviously, his clients sure don't mind getting that money a year later, but it is a lot of times tax funds, CDBG funds, HOME funds that have flowed into Shelter House. So he's just curious if they've ever had that conversation at a regional or national level. Carter said she has been having that conversation her entire career and she has worked in affordable housing for 18 years in one way or another. Hypothetically, they could use administrative funding for deposits, that's also how they pay staff, so that's a dangerous area to pull money from. She thinks HUD is getting closer to realizing this and they're certainly looking at programming that partners housing authorities with community partners like Shelter House or HACAP a lot more. The last 5, 6, 7 years have demonstrated that greatly with the number of new vouchers they've received in partnership with Shelter House or the Coordinated Entry Process so never say never. She stated it's similar to asked about HUD-VASH vouchers, from her previous position she knows that they've taken a lot of HUD-VASH vouchers in units, which are vouchers for veterans experiencing homeless and instead of funding a deposit with HUD-VASH, the federal government created SSVF, which is what HACAP uses to house veterans. Reedus noted they've probably explored this before, but with the security deposit programs that Shelter House and Community has, why can't there be any kind of caveat that they have to return the money? Vogel replied the State law trumps everything and the laws state the deposit must get returned to the responsible party of the lease. Carter added programmatically once they start talking about federal program income the staff time it would take would require a full-time person to process and then would have spent more on the staff time than on funds they would have gotten back. Reedus stated that's exactly the issue with nonprofits trying to administer that kind of thing, they don't have the staffing time and the capability to do anything like that nor enforce those type of things so it's difficult for them. Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 7 of 15 Carter stated all of their housing program assistants have approximately 300 clients each, so they are busy and pretty much pushed to the max of what the federal funding is for administrative time. She noted they do have a lower staff to client ratio than almost any other Housing Authority in Iowa. Reedus requested having a conversation in the future about the housing gap for people that are on the waitlist and still waiting for housing. AID TO AGENCIES SUBCOMMITTEE UPDATE AND PRELIMINARY DISCUSSION OF POSSIBLE CHANGES TO LEGACY AID TO AGENCIES PROCESS: This discussion regarding possible changes to the Legacy Aid to Agencies process was requested by Commissioner Reedus. Reedus stated that since the last Commission meeting there was a meeting with the Agency Impact Coalition which comprises agencies that would receive money from the Aid to Agencies process with the City and possibly some agencies that didn't. She stated there were a number of areas that they discussed and had send out the information to the agencies ahead of time so that they were prepared with the information that they wanted to give for feedback. Reedus did acknowledge it wasn't as lively as discussion as she had anticipated and that was surprising to them all. However, the information that they got back was about enough for them to digest and be able to work on. One of the areas of discussion was the size of the application and she is working on reducing or making some modifications to the application that she'll first present to the subcommittee and then bring forward to the Commission. She noted they are not huge modifications, because some of the information is good. It is important that those people, such as the Commissioners, who are reading the applications and making the decisions, still get the information, but not as a part of the active application. There was some feedback on scoring, which Reedus thinks they can address through some more education because it appeared to be a misunderstanding of the scoring, how to interpret it, and how to make changes as an agency on the application because of the scoring. Some feedback on the outcomes was really good, which was a point of hers and one of the bigger things that she wanted to change with the application content. One of the other things they talked about was taking a look at the review of the applications. They want some feedback from the Commission on having an internal working review group for the applications, rather than having all of the Commissioners reviewing them, as they've done in the past. The review would be still working with the City staff because their first review and analysis and subsequent recommendation and scoring is very helpful. Additionally, they'd have somebody from City Council, which would hopefully be good to have input before recommendations are made. Then once the review team has reviewed the applications and scored them and recommended funding - that would come to the Commission, at which point they would have discussion. Then the Commission would makea final recommendation to City Council for funding. Reedus requested feedback from other Commissioners. This new process wouldn't entail HOME or any of the public housing projects, just the Aid to Agencies, which is an every other year process. So they would need to set up an internal working group. Beining thinks it's a good idea and stated he has noticed, from his time on the Commission, that there's differences in expertise. He has feels that there may be an opportunity for those with the expertise to really take the bull by the horns. Krotz stated she doesn't like that idea and wasn't in the discussions on all of that. She didn't have any way of finding out when the subcommittee meeting was as she doesn't have a computer right now and has been homebound for a while. For her, a big thing is just the lack of communication. Reedus asked if Krotz was at the last Commission meeting in July because they stated the date of the meeting. Krotz admitted she is not good at getting her things turned in, but does think that as a Commission they come here with the expectation that they're going to have these things to do and she's not so sure that once everything has gone through this other smaller committee, that once it comes back to the Commission, there might not be enough time for the Commission to really digest it and make any make any suggestions or have anything changed. Secondly, it just feels like the Commission as a whole would be rubber stamping something. Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 8 of 15 Reedus noted that not every Commissioner gets their scores in on time, which has been problematic but everybody's getting the information to read. Patel was new on the Commission at the last scoring session and therefore chose not to score but still had access to read them the applications. Reedus stated that wouldn't change, the Commissioners would still have access to everything even if they're not scoring, they still have access to everything and can be a part of the discussion. She noted even while there's only been a couple of Commissioners that are coming up with questions for the agencies, everybody has an opportunity to listen to the questions and to hear the responses from the agencies. Reedus is in favor of it because it will bring the conversation down to a smaller group with a little bit more expertise, but there's also some non -expertise, and the Commission can decide how many people they want on that smaller group, probably a couple or three the most. This way if someone doesn't have time to get their scores in, it's not a big deal because all they really have to do is read the applications and then weigh in on the discussion. They would still be a vital part of that discussion. If someone doesn't like the review groups recommendation for scoring, that's where they would enter in their opinion. Beining asked if this new process would be the review committee dictating the scoring in its entirety but would give the entire Commission recommendations, and asked if the Commissioners would still have the opportunity to formally vote on it. Reedus replied yes, the smaller work group would do the work of reading the applications, coming up with questions, getting additional information that they need, and then scoring the applications and then submitting that information to the Commission so that the Commission is making the final recommendation. She noted it's not really that different than what happened this last time - all Commissioners weren't able to provide scores. A smaller group really provided scores. The Commission would still have the opportunity to be a part of the question -and -answer session, so it's not a lot different. It just means that everyone won't have to score the applications basically. Vogel agreed with Krotz and even though it's what they've been doing already, the small group of people who are comfortable with the information make the scores. His issue is, as volunteers on the Commission, the purpose of the Commission is to have multiple voices and multiple thought processes and multiple inputs primarily from people may not have the knowledge of the of how the sausage is made. He thinks by limiting that and having just two or three folks be the ones that do the work and create the questions, they're taking away the opportunity for that bright -light question from out of left field. Taking away that opportunity during that process for someone who is brand new to ask new questions that may have not been asked before. He gets more education out of people asking questions he didn't think to ask because he didn't know that organization. No offense to staff, because yes getting the scores in can make their life difficult and he cannot promise he won't continue his long-standing tradition of waiting to the last minute, but in the end, the purpose of a Commission like this is to have as many voices and eyes on a subject as possible. Reedus stated speaking for herself, although she knows she's not the only Commissioner that feels this way, it's a little frustrating when things are presented the night of the meeting or the day of the meeting and she doesn't have time to review because someone doesn't submit their scores until the day of. It's not just staff that are inconvenienced, she also doesn't then have time to go through that information right before the meeting. Vogel stated he is the exact opposite, he is absolutely the guy that sets aside three hours of his afternoon on the day of the meeting to just look over everything. He knows that's just not a possibility for everyone and he did do better last time than the previous one year so he's getting incrementally better. But again, he just thinks it's really important for everybody to have a voice because that's why everybody is giving up three years to be here. Krotz suggested maybe they should look for ways to help get everybody's scores in and everybody's participation rather than changing the whole thing. They should look for ways to improve what they've got and help all the Commissioners feel like they've volunteered for something meaningful and that they're somehow contributing something meaningful in their own way. Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 9 of 15 On the other stuff, Vogel doesn't hate the idea of a City Council liaison being involved in some way whether that is just being in the room on score discussion night but perhaps not a part of the discussion. That way when staff goes to present the recommendations, at least one person on Council already has a general knowledge and understanding. Krotz agrees with that and thinks he made a valid point in terms of the Council member being here and absorbing everything that's gone into the discussion. Reedus stated the subcommittee hasn't really discussed that. This is more about developing a small review group. Pierce stated he has not been through the process yet, but he's been part of organizations where they've done a similar thing to this and used smaller working groups to deal with the more granular issues and then they bring recommendations to the larger body. He did acknowledge he was looking forward to the scoring personally, but maybe it's his role then to be part of a smaller group. He noted this is one issue where he's going to teeter on the fence and see both sides. He's inclined to say this is one of the things that intrigued him about the Commission over other ones - they help score and determine recommendations for funding agencies and that sounds like a really cool thing that he would want to contribute with. Reedus stated it's a fun process, but it can get complicated because of the application itself and its joint funding. There are portions that they love. One of the first questions they asked was should they split it up and all entities (Iowa City, United Way, Johnson County and Coralville) have separate applications. The subcommittee did not want that. They all like the one application. However, as they get into the questions, the one application is what's creating most of the problems because the outcomes oftentimes don't even match what they're funding for because so many agencies have different outcomes. With four different funding sources, they could be asking four different things and some of their outcomes are going to be relevant to Iowa City and some of them aren't. If they can fix some parts of the application and staff can change some of the scoring, she thinks that's going to make a huge difference. Reedus also noted she had a discussion with Nikki Ross, who is from Table to Table, and she stated that they do four quarterly reports if they if they're awarded funding. The quarterly reports are only two questions shorter than the application so, in essence, they're doing the application four times a year and perhaps that's the other thing that they can reduce. Vogel noted in the minutes from the meeting, there was a comment that is hard for agencies when the Commission asks a question and the agency just has to sit back and sometimes hear the Commission talk about things that are wrong. Whether its misunderstood or a number has been misrepresented. The agencies feel like there's no chance to respond after that in a useful way, so is there a way to allow post - conversation before the final numbers and voting on recommendations? Reedus agrees if the agency representative is here and hearing what the Commission is discussing and feeling that something is wrong, maybe they could have time to speak to correct or explain something. Thul stated anyone can come make a public comment at an HCDC meeting. Thul's interpretation is that part of the frustration from the agencies is that they feel like funding decisions are being made with that information. Thul continued that it's really important to take advantage of the Q&A time because it's such a good opportunity to clear up those misconceptions with the agencies. Reedus asked if they can invite the agencies to listen while the Commission discusses the scores or is it too late? If the agency feels that the Commission didn't get some information right, they could submit something to the Commission that goes into the public record and is added to the agenda to be discussed at the final meeting where they are recommending scores. Kubly stated that again the agencies can do that anytime. They can provide public comment or communication to the Commission anytime and they can also go to Council when they are discussing the recommendations and say, hey, this is what happened with my agency and I feel it's unfair. Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 10 of 15 Vogel noted perhaps at the end of the meeting where applications are being discussed there could be an announcement to the agencies that if they've heard anything during that meeting that they feel needs to be addressed, please put it in writing and get it to staff and they will make sure the Commission clarifies it. Reedus stated another issue that came up during the feedback was the scoring. Her interpretation of the comment is that by using 100-point scale, if they get low, there's no way to dig out of it. She thinks exactly opposite. If they change it to a 10-point scale score and they get a one or a zero on a section, there'd be no way they'd get aid. She asked staff if the agencies get feedback for their score and it's available but not automatically sent out. She thinks they need to educate the agencies that they can contact staff and if they got a 57 they can find out exactly where they scored low. They might have scored high in some categories and low in others and staff can give feedback in terms of how the Commission rated that. That could also happen before the final decision is made and again if they feel that the Commission has made a mistake in the scoring because of the information being used, they could give corrected information before final decisions. Thul commented that they do occasionally have people call and ask what they could have done to improve their applications. Kubly stated that if agencies have questions about Commission scores, and staff don't have the scores ahead of time, that's where the problem comes in as they're not able to look at the scores and see how they're being rated. Reedus agreed and summarized that she seems to be hearing that the majority of the Commissioners don't want the smaller review group and she is also hearing that some of the other problems that they're having, that the agency had difficulty with, could be alleviated greatly by Commissioners being diligent and getting their scores in on time. Next steps for this subcommittee is Reedus redoing the application. There's going to be some issues for future discussion and one of those is funding priorities. Everybody is a high priority, but not every issue is a high priority and they need to figure out how to do a better job on that. Vogel noted there was a discussion on one of those pages about someone who brought up units of service or how they determine scores and last year when he did his scores. There were a handful of them that, when he saw other's scores, he was surprised that people had scored higher. Part of it was because, well they do a lot but they were only helping two families, and so on. That whole "how many families are they helping' - they need to know how they are going to score those. An agency could get 95s across the board except for these little areas where, compared to these other places, that are serving 300 families and they were only serving two families. So it would be nice to have some way to determine not just by how many families are being served, but the time, the effort, and the outcomes. Reedus agreed they need to collect the data in a different way. It's the same thing with a food pantry - they might have 5,500 families registered but of those 5,500 families, some use it more frequently than others. So they shouldn't ask how many people are being served, maybe they should be asking how many meals they provided. That's also another area of getting the financials and the data, making sure to get accurate data. Her other issue was with the financials. There's a lot of confusion on whether they're asking for completed financials or projected budgets. So some organizations are giving completed financials and others are giving budgets and those don't make any sense. Again, there's just a lot of problems with how the applications are put together. She is going to come up with an application that is going to be better, not everything will be fixed, there are still some problems and she'll give staff a laundry list of the issues she thinks in the future they should take a look at. Good discussion. CONSOLIDATED ANNUAL PERFORMANCE & EVALUATION REPORT (CAPER) AND UPDATE ON CITY PROJECTS AND PROGRAMS: Thul introduced the report and explained that the CAPER is an annual report to HUD that says what has been accomplished in the last fiscal year. The City's fiscal year runs from July to June. CAPER stands for the Consolidated Annual Performance and Evaluation Report, and this report is specifically looking at the 10 Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 11 of 15 federal CDBG and HOME Funds. Thul continued that the City has other local initiatives and many things going on outside of the federal funds, but the main part of the report is the federal funds and what the City does with those dollars. The report is an assessment of the progress made towards achieving the goals and those goals and priorities are identified in City Steps. So the activities that HCDC just approved in the Annual Action Plan - next year around this time, they'll be looking at the progress that agencies have made on those activities. Thul stated the report is due to HUD within 90 days of the end of the fiscal year. The City uses a federal database called IDIS to submit the report which limits the formatting. Thul explained that staff supply tables in Appendix A and encouraged commissioners to check them out if they haven't already. The next slide shows impact from our federally funded dollars. The last fiscal year has been very busy. Agencies that the City works with have completed quite a few projects. Things were kind of stalled for a while after the pandemic, but things are moving again. Thul highlighted accomplishments listed in the report including completion of three neighborhood improvement projects completed in low to moderate income areas of Iowa City. Seven low to moderate income buyers were provided with down payment assistance. Nine units of affordable rental housing were acquired or constructed, and a piece of that funded the 501 Project completed by Shelter House. The figures count the two HOME assisted units of housing, but as a greater part of that project there was 36 units of permanent supportive housing provided to the community. Almost 2,000 people assisted with public service funding, 37 businesses provided with technical assistance, and that funding comes from the economic development portion of the funding. Two rental units and 19 owner occupied units were rehabbed, and then 1,500 individuals were assisted through public facility improvements. Thul highlighted a project photo of Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County's Pheasant Ridge Center where they repaved the parking lot where they serve low to moderate income families to provide childcare. Other highlights - over 2.3 million dollars of CDBG and HOME funds were spent in FY23; the highest amount of spending in a single fiscal year in the last decade. It's been very busy. Subrecipients have completed in a lot of projects. The City also passed the timeliness test in May and 100% of the CDBG-CV funds were expended by the end of this year, and that includes funds from the State and from HUD directly. Construction and rehab activities were back in full swing. There were a lot of hiccups during the pandemic, just with supply chains and finding people who could complete the work. Also partnering with Green State Credit Union to develop a down payment assistance program that's been going really well. Thul highlighted project photos from Inside Out Reentry and The Housing Fellowship and moved on to challenges in FY23 noting that these feed into what Carter was saying earlier. Staff capacity to administer all the existing programs and then also taking on new programs like HOME -ARP and ARPA funds. Meeting HUD timeliness standards is a challenge when projects are delayed. Training and compliance for new HUD requirements. It adds a lot of complexity to projects, and it takes a lot of more staff time, and also time of subrecipients and contractors. Developing and updating policies and procedures. Again, similar to what Carter was saying, new regulations that come through require updates to all of the policies which takes staff time. HOME -ARP allocation plan delays. HCDC saw an amendment in July as staff are trying to get the plan in order for HUD. As Kubly said in July, HOME -ARP is a completely new program so they are still learning it. Lastly expansion of efforts to meet the needs of the community while providing the same level of services for existing programs. Overall, there is a lot going on at the City right now. Kubly provided updates on programs administered directly by the City. These programs are federally funded. Starting with the South District Program — the City purchases property and resell it as owner occupied housing in the South District. The City provides up to $25,000 in down payment assistance through the federal funds. The City has sold 5 units to date and have one property available - 2129 Taylor 11 Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 12 of 15 and are working on additional units on Sandusky that they're excited about because they're larger units, one is three bedrooms and the other is four bedrooms. Those will be ready in November. When they rehab the properties they focus on sustainability and affordability. Some have solar panels and other sustainability updates. All of the buyers have been under 50% of the area median income. Kubly continued that the City currently owns seven additional duplexes in the neighborhood, eight were bought at the same time in 2021. Some of them are occupied and when the tenants move out voluntarily, the City will move forward with rehabbing. Kubly moved on to the City's Green State Program that will also now include Hills Bank. The City provides up to $15,000 for eligible home buyers by in low-income census tracts of Iowa City, which is a large portion of Iowa City. They have had five closings with this program. They started working with Green State the first year and now have expanded to working with Hills Bank. They also have a dedicated part- time staff member now that works on this program which has been really helpful. The program has been going well. Next was the City's Neighborhood Improvement Program. Staff discussed this a little bit at the July meeting. The current project to improve curb ramp accessibility is what they're working on in the next two weeks and $75,000 is set aside for the program each year. With regards to CDBG and HOME rehab, Kubly stated that the City has a long standing City administered owner -occupied rehab program. They do a combination of grants and loans depending on the owner's financial situation. They also can serve mobile homeowners in some situations. Assistance can be used for emergency repairs, accessibility improvements, aging in place, energy efficiency, exterior, and comprehensive updates. With this program they serve about 20 households annually. Reedus asked what the program is called. Kubly responded that it is the City's Housing Rehab Program. Next was economic development. Kubly shared that CDBG economic development funds are used to provide assistance for nonprofits who provide technical assistance to low income and micro enterprises. Those are small businesses that are made up of 5 or fewer employees, and one of those employees owns the business. Currently, the City is funding 4C's to support in -home childcare providers. 4Cs also serves the immigrant and refugee populations. It's a really good program that not only helps the low- income business owners, but they're also working on the childcare crisis in the community. Kubly moved on to highlights from local funding. $615,000 of general funds went to 21 agencies through Aid to Agencies, this excludes CDBG public service funds, which is another $124,000. This is important operational funding for agencies, it's flexible and they can use it for staffing and it's really important to help them leverage other funding that they receive as needed to accomplish their goals. GRIP is part of the City's housing rehab programs. It's an extension of the federal funds and the owners can go up to 110% of the area median income and they can qualify for low interest loans. GRIP served seven homeowners in FY23 and it's another tool used to help maintain the City's existing housing stock. Security deposit program was discussed a bit earlier. It is $70,000 provided to the program administered by Community and they served 77 households under 50% AMI. Healthy Homes served 73 households. A large portion of that was spent on radon mitigations efforts through The Housing Fellowship. Lastly every year the City gives $700,000 to the Housing Trust Fund of Johnson County to allocate out to agencies that are creating housing. $200,000 of that is for LIHTC. Kubly moved to the next slide which highlights ARPA funding. The City received 18 million dollars in American Rescue Plan Act funds and there are a lot of really good projects going on. About 10 million has been allocated to date. 12 Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 13 of 15 Krotz asked about the remaining funds available. Kubly responded that it is categorized for how Council wants to spend it, but they don't have specific projects yet for all categories. Reedus confirmed that ARPA funds do not come through HCDC and Kubly confirmed that those go directly through Council. Thul explained next steps, after looking at this plan staff would be asking for a recommendation for approval. It's due to HUD next week, so they would be submitting it by the deadline. HUD then has 45 days to review the plan and then they will send approval. Patel asked about the remaining South District unit for sale. Kubly responded that it's a duplex unit with three bedrooms. Pierce had a follow-up question about the City's Green State downpayment assistance program. Is there any idea about a success rate metric to it yet or any idea of people who are getting into home ownership that might be falling into foreclosure. Kubly explained that the program is fairly new and if someone had a foreclosure the City would get notified because they have lien on the property itself. There have been no foreclosures so far and hopefully it doesn't happen at all. Krotz was excited to read about the South District Program and noted that it sounds like there are some good things happening there. Vogel moved to approve the CAPER as presented. Seconded by Reedus. A vote was taken and the motion passed 6-0 6��3�:[K�L�P1F�Y[il�l�J�7\ice'? Thul noted they had a recent appointment to the Commission Tuesday but then then Michael Eckhardt resigned earlier today so they will be back to having a vacancy. If anyone knows of someone who might want to apply tell them to apply online or to contact Thul. Shelter House was supposed to come in October and present on street outreach and that's going to be moved to November at the request of Shelter House. While they are here maybe they can touch on some of the topics mentioned earlier about how people on the waiting list are managing. They might have some insight on that topic. There's a flyer in the packet for the community police review board community forum on October 3 if anyone's interested in participating in that. Kubly noted also in the packet was the NDS annual report. If anyone is wondering how they're spending the money and where the affordable housing fund going, where CDBG and HOME funds are going, that is all detailed in the appendix. Reedus mentioned the recent Council discussions about ADUs - accesory dwelling units. She has read some of the criticisms and questions how it will affect affordable housing in the future. She is wondering if somewhere down the line when staff is ready, or whoever, would speak to us about that, and might give a presentation on that also. Krotz thinks that's a valid concern, she wasn't able to make either open house where they were presenting their plans, but Reedus made a valid point on how might this affect affordable housing and are there any limitations or restrictions on who and how much rent to charge. Is it open for them using them as Airbnb's or is it to make up for the lack of housing already in Iowa City. Kubly state they can talk to the planning staff and see if they have any resources to provide or if they'd be willing to come to a future meeting. 13 Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 14 of 15 Vogel stated that the State has specifically told municipalities that they cannot put restrictions on short term rentals so he thinks what they are going to see is people doing AUD and utilizing them as Airbnbs Reedus stated it might be an unpopular thing but as a homeowner, it doesn't contribute to community. Having a lot of rentals that move in, move out. She lived there three years before anybody said hello, because she lives around renters who moved in and moved out, so there are problems with it, too. She is interested in seeing what the concept of tiny houses is because that can have a big impact on things that are important like homeownership and affordable housing at the same time. ADJOURNMENT: Reedus moved to adjourn, Vogel seconded the motion, a vote was taken and the motion passed 6-0. 14 Housing and Community Development Commission September 21, 2023 Page 15 of 15 Housing and Community Development Commission Attendance Record 2022-2023 Name Terms Exp. 9/15 10/20 11/17 1119 2/16 3/30 4/20 5118 7/20 9/21 Beining, Kaleb 6/30/24 O/E X X X O/E X X O/E X X Dennis, Maryann 6/30/25 O/E X X X X X O/E X X O/E Haylett, Jennifer 6/30/25 X O/E O/E X X O/E X O/E Krotz, Karol 6/30/24 X X X X O/E X X X X X Reedus, Becci 6/30/24 X X X X X X X X X X Vogel, Kyle 6/30/26 X X X O/E X X O/E X X X Eckhardt, Michael 6/30/25 X X X X X X O/E O/E Patel, Kiran 6/30/26 O/E X X X X X Pierce, James 6/30/2026 X X Subramanian, Saranya 06/30/2025 Resigned from Commission Kev: X = Present O = Absent O/E = Absent/Excused --- = Vacant 15