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HomeMy WebLinkAboutJuly 2024 HCDC PacketIf you will need disability-related accommodations to participate in this program or event, please contact Brianna Thul at bthul@iowa-city.org or 319-356-5240. Early requests are strongly encouraged to allow sufficient time to meet your access needs. Next Meeting: August 19, 2024 HOUSING & COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION (HCDC) July 15, 2024 Regular Meeting – 6:30 PM Emma J. Harvat Hall 410 E Washington Street (City Hall) AGENDA: 1. Call to Order 2. Welcome New Members The commission will welcome two new members, Daouda Balde and George Kivarkis. This item provides an opportunity for new and existing commissioners to introduce themselves. 3. Officer Nominations The commission nominates and elects a Chair and Vice Chair each July in accordance with the by-laws. The commission will nominate and vote for the two positions. 4. Consideration of Meeting Minutes: June 13, 2024 5. Public Comment of Items not on the Agenda Commentators shall address the commission for no more than five minutes. Commissioners shall not engage in discussion with the public concerning said items. 6. Discuss Calendar for Fiscal Year 2025 This item includes a review of planned meeting dates for the next fiscal year and an opportunity for commissioners to express areas of interest for potential presentations. 7. Staff & Commission Updates This item includes an opportunity for brief updates from staff and commissioners. Commissioners shall not engage in discussion on updates. 8. Adjournment CANCELLED Housing and Community Development Commission Meeting Packet Contents July 15, 2024 Agenda Item #4  June 13, 2024 Draft HCDC Meeting Minutes Agenda Item #6  Staff Memo – FY25 Tentative HCDC Calendar MINUTES PRELIMINARY HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION JUNE 13, 2024 – 6:30 PM FORMAL MEETING THE CENTER ASSEMBLY ROOM MEMBERS PRESENT: Kaleb Beining, Horacio Borgen, Maryann Dennis, Karol Krotz, James Pierce, Kiran Patel MEMBERS ABSENT: Becci Reedus, Denise Szecsei, Kyle Vogel STAFF PRESENT: Sue Dulek, Naomi Mehta, Brianna Thul OTHERS PRESENT: Ellen McCabe (HTFJC), Scott Hawes (Habitat), Megan Schmidt, Kathryn Davis (DVIP), Christine Hayes (Shelter House) RECOMMENDATIONS TO CITY COUNCIL: Dennis moved to recommend approval of the FY25 Annual Action Plan. Patel seconded. A vote was taken and the motion passed 6-0. CALL MEETING TO ORDER: Beining called the meeting to order at 6:30 PM. CONSIDERATION OF MEETING MINUTES: MAY 16, 2024: Krotz moved to approve the minutes of May 16, 2024. Dennis seconded the motion. A vote was taken and the minutes were approved 6-0. PUBLIC COMMENT FOR TOPICS NOT ON THE AGENDA: None. CONSIDER CHANGING THE REGULAR MEETING DATE AND LOCATION OF THE HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION: Based on Commission feedback, staff proposed shifting the regular meetings of the Commission to Emma Harvat Hall on the third Monday of each month at 6:30pm. Patel moved to shift the regular meetings to the third Monday of each month at 6:30pm. Krotz seconded. A vote was taken and the motion passed 6-0. REVIEW AND CONSIDER RECOMMENDATION TO CITY COUNCIL ON APPROVAL OF FY25 (FFY24) ANNUAL ACTION PLAN: Thul noted this is a plan that staff brings to the Commission every year for review. The City determines community priorities through public input through the consolidated planning process which they are getting ready to do again. The Annual Action Plan includes specific projects for the next fiscal year that are designed to address the priorities identified in the five-year consolidated plan. Both plans are HUD required documents the City must complete in order to receive federal CDBG and HOME funding. The Housing and Community Development Commission June 13, 2024 Page 2 of 6 2 Annual Action Plan for FY25 includes the activities that HCDC recommended at the March meeting. Thul noted this process is a little bit delayed due to the federal budget this year and staff is bringing it to the Commission later than normal. Thul explained the plan is in a HUD required format and that the most concise way to view the projects and funding recommendations is Appendix B which is a summary of how the City will use the funding based on what HCDC recommended. Thul also wanted to point out the HOME allocation was reduced for FY25. When staff bring HCDC the funding recommendations they are operating on an estimated budget to complete the process in time. HUD grant allocations are posted later in the cycle. HOME funding across the board was cut about 20% at the federal level. Staff was not anticipating the adjustment but the City does have enough program income to still fund the projects HCDC recommended. Some of the sources of the funding in the Appendix B might be different based on final allocations from HUD and program income, but the budget amounts recommended are the same. The projects that were recommended by the Commission will support public facility improvements and affordable rental housing. HOME funds require a 15% grant set aside for community housing development organizations. They have to be certified and meet specific requirements in order to access that portion of HOME funding. Thul noted some communities struggle with that but Iowa City is lucky to have two organizations that meet the CHDO requirements. The Housing Fellowship through this last round of funding will be able to access the set aside. HUD also allows a portion of the CDBG funding for public services and that portion of funding supports the City's Aid to Agencies program. Thul pointed out the cover photos on the plan are from the Iowa City South District Program which is a program where the City purchases duplex properties, rehab the unis, and then they're sold as affordable homeownership to income eligible buyers. Both units pictured have been sold and are currently occupied. Kubly stated the plan has been posted for a public comment since May 17 and no comments have been received to date. Today, HCDC will consider a recommendation to City Council to approve the plan and staff will present the HCDC recommendations at the Council meeting next Tuesday. They will also present staff recommendations since the HCDC and staff recommendations were slightly different. If you remember from March, staff had concerns about the Shelter House project. Council will decide on the final approval and then staff will submit the plan to HUD and wait for approval to move forward with those projects. Krotz asked about the concerns mentioned for the Shelter House project. Kubly replied that Shelter House has applied for facility rehab for Cross Park Place. Staff had some concerns due to the number of projects Shelter House had ongoing and the capacity to take on another project. There are several facility improvements underway. One of those was an HVAC project that's just now closing out but was underway at the time of the staff recommendation. Additionally, some of the some of the work that's being done, such as carpet repair, would be considered maintenance under CDBG and is not eligible. Therefore, staff is recommending that Shelter House reapply next year and work with staff to find eligible costs. If City Council agrees and the funds aren't going to Shelter House, staff would recommend they go to The Housing Fellowship and fulfill their full request as they were the next highest scoring applicant based on HCDC scores. Dennis asked if they could apply for HOME funds. Thul noted Shelter House can apply for HOME but they need to meet the City's underwriting requirements. Any rental housing project is required to submit a pro forma that meets the standards. Krotz noted Appendix C states that the amounts with 30% median income from this year and last year went down this year which was interesting. For instance, for a one bedroom, the rent went down from $922 to $902 so that was a pleasant surprise. A question on page 49 when it's talking about the actions to reduce the number of poverty level families, it states the City has began exploring partnerships with Kirkwood Community College and Iowa Workforce Development - is Kirkwood still in Iowa City? The building looks vacant. Kubly replied they might not physically be in Iowa City, but the City does continue to work with them, especially through ARPA projects. Krotz thanked staff and noted the plan looks nice. Housing and Community Development Commission June 13, 2024 Page 3 of 6 3 Dennis moved to approve the FY25 Annual Action Plan. Patel seconded. A vote was taken and the motion passed 6-0. STAFF & COMMISSION UPDATES: Thul noted June is the end of HCDC terms for people serving a three-year term which includes Beining and Reedus. Staff wished to thank them both for their service, and noted Beining has served two full terms as chair. Beining noted he enjoyed his time with the Commission and gained a lot of valuable insight from all the community members as well as each Commissioner. Thul stated based on the decision tonight, the next HCDC meeting will be July 15 at the Emma Harvat Hall at City Hall. She will send out a reminder and also prepare a calendar of dates for the upcoming fiscal year. At the July meeting they can discuss if there's other presentations, updates from agencies, or other things the Commission is interested in and staff can work on plugging those into the calendar. Kubly noted staff has been working with a consultant to update the five-year Consolidated Plan and will be holding some stakeholder sessions sometime in July and August as well as public input meetings to gathering input to determine the priorities for the next five years of funding. Thul mentioned that Commissioner Borgen asked about alternative ways to track attendance. Asked if people like the attendance survey or if there's an easier way to get responses for people on meeting attendance. Would it be helpful for staff to send calendar invites as well. The Commission agreed the survey works well and adding calendar invites wouldn’t hurt. Dennis thanked Beining and Reedus for their time on the commission. She continued that Beining is the best chair she has seen and also highlighted that Reedus did not miss a single meeting in her entire term. Dennis stated she attended a panel last night at the Coralville Public Library of local experts to talk about the affordable housing issues and how their organizations are working to address the issues. The event was hosted by the Community Foundation and sponsored and facilitated by the Affordable Housing Coalition. There was an overview of the issue in the country, Johnson County, and Iowa City by Ellen McCabe with the Housing Trust Fund. She pointed out Iowa City as the most expensive place to live in Iowa to rent. Other panelists included representatives from The Housing Fellowship, Shelter House, Iowa Catholic Worker House, Open Heartland, Iowa City Community School District, Iowa Habitat for Humanity. The panel provided excellent information, not only about the issues, but also about strategies they implement to address the local crisis. Dennis shared the outreach data for Iowa which shows the affordable way of earning wages in Iowa City to afford apartments and some other information that's really fascinating. There are thousands of households in Johnson County who are cost burdened and to afford to live in Iowa City one would have to work two and a half full time jobs at minimum wage to afford a two-bedroom apartment. DISCUSS LANDLORD INCENTIVES: (Moved to end of meeting incase Commissioner Szecsei could be present). Krotz asked if there is anything else that the City does to assist landlords in helping the people who really are needing housing. Kubly replied the risk mitigation program is not open broadly to everyone, just specific populations so they may look at expanding it as a pilot project. At this point, the City does have security deposit assistance, that doesn't help landlords directly, but does help get people into units. There is also a Climate Action Pilot Program that gives $25,000 as a forgivable grant for energy efficiency improvements in exchange to the landlord accepting a voucher for five years. That program is for units in Iowa City that are duplex or single family. The City is trying to figure out ways to incentivize more landlords to accept vouchers. Krotz asked what ideas the staff has on ways to increase efforts. Kubly stated they have been doing some research and some of the things that came up are landlord bonuses, one-time payments, a signing Housing and Community Development Commission June 13, 2024 Page 4 of 6 4 bonus type thing. The City had a rehab program for rentals but that wasn't highly utilized – possibly the issue was related to the funding source that made it really complicated. They could try some sort of rental rehab program with a different source of funding that perhaps landlords might take advantage of. Krotz asked if that translate into landlords accepting more people with vouchers. Kubly explained it depends on what parameters are put on the program. Some other ideas online were more procedural like offering mediation services to support landlord tenant relations, or tenant and tenant disagreements, fast tracking inspections, and maybe waiving the permit fees. Overall, just more relationship building and working more closely with the landlords and learning what their issues are. Borgen noted when he was working for the Center for Worker Justice, he helped with a couple of cases where tenants were claiming that the landlords are charging them two or three months after they left the property. Egregious amounts of money for repairing the unit beyond taking the deposit from them. Claims were also passed to an agency collector and sometimes even the landlord didn't have any proof that the unit was broken they just charged the tenant knowing they didn’t understand their rights. Then it hampers those people from finding another place to live if there's a landlord who's claiming they owe money to them. Dennis stated there's a big body of landlord tenant law in the state of Iowa. The landlord legally cannot not return a security deposit without following the law. Even if they don't have the forwarding address, they have to at least send it to the place where the people live with an itemized bill of what they're using the security deposit for and if there's more damage, or if they haven't paid rent, landlords can add those costs on and the tenant then would have the opportunity to go to civil court to say it isn't true. Krotz noted there was a big case a few years ago where a landlord was charging tenants for carpet cleanings, and it went through the court system and was deemed as the landlord's responsibility not the tenant’s responsibility. But she is concerned if people have legal representation to help them through this, Dennis stated they can call Iowa Legal Aid. Dennis thinks it's a great thing to try and get for-profit landlords to accept vouchers but there's a lot of things around that. One is the stigma of having a voucher and secondly, the landlord has to do a few more things than if they don't accept the voucher like the pre-rental inspections, but they are guaranteed rent every single month. Krotz noted there was a pamphlet out one time that the City put out that prospective renters could hand to landlords outline the benefits of having somebody with a voucher, that might be something to resurrect. Dennis is not saying she doesn’t think private landlords should not provide affordable housing, but what it costs to actually operate rental housing is a lot. Last night, one of the panelists was saying insurance has gone up for landlords, protection insurance, then there's property taxes, maintenance, reserves, and all kinds of stuff that they have to do. They may have to take care of common areas if it's a big apartment complex, elevator, etc. In her experience, the way to reduce rent is to lower the amount of hard debt. This Commission can help with that if they want to come in and apply for the federal funds. HCDC would recommend to Council for funding. Vogel has stated for as long as she can remember that HCDC only recommends funding to 501(c)3 nonprofits - if they don't come in and apply for HOME or CDBG funds, they can’t help them. It’s like hoping to win the lottery, but never buying a ticket. Vogel would be a good one to do a presentation about his operations because he runs a lot of rental housing and he does have properties that accepts vouchers. Also maybe the City could get on the agenda of the Landlord Association to let them know there’s federal funding that the City receives for housing that they could apply for. Businesses would have to understand that if they receive federal funds, there's a whole lot of regulations that that come with those and a lot of private landlords don't have the expertise to comply. They also don't have the incentive because what they really want to do is make money. It’s a complicated issue. Krotz asked if they could put this on the agenda again and continue the conversation when Vogel and Szecsei are present. Housing and Community Development Commission June 13, 2024 Page 5 of 6 5 Dennis stated just as it behooves the Commission to educate themselves about the process. It really would help private landlords if they could educate themselves about how to comply with these regulations. Ellen McCabe (HTFJC) noted Tracy Hightshoe from the City did attend the Landlord Association meeting and gave a presentation within the last year but it’s hard to convince landlords without an incentive. Kubly stated there is a page on the City website with incentives for affordable rentals, it's more geared towards developers of housing and that stage, rather than an existing landlord that's looking for incentives. The City also has staff that regularly attends the association meetings, mainly Housing Authority and Housing Inspection staff. Thul added that it hasn’t happened during her time, but the City has worked with for-profits in the past on federal projects and also noted that when funding opportunities are announced, a press release is sent out and also forwarded to previous subrecipients which does include some for-profits. Krotz asked if there is a way to include private landlord information to that section that's already on the webpage about incentives for developers. Kubly replied as they develop incentives to offer, they would add them to the website. Kubly also stated one other thing that they've discussed at the staff level is working with the Affordable Housing Coalition to send out a survey to the private landlords and get some input from that group about what kind of incentives would benefit them, specific to the acceptance of the Housing Choice Vouchers. Patel moved to defer this agenda item number of the discussion of landlord incentives to the July 15, 2024, meeting. Pierce seconded the motion. A vote was taken and the motion passed 6-0. ADJOURNMENT: Dennis moved to adjourn, Krotz seconded the motion and a vote was taken and the motion passed 6-0. Housing and Community Development Commission June 13, 2024 Page 6 of 6 6 Housing and Community Development Commission Attendance Record 2023-2024  Resigned from Commission Key: X = Present O = Absent O/E = Absent/Excused --- = Vacant Name Terms Exp. 4/20 5/18 7/20 9/21 10/19 11/16 3/21 4/18 5/16 6/13 Beining, Kaleb 6/30/24 X O/E X X X X X X X X Dennis, Maryann 6/30/25 O/E X X O/E X X X X X X Krotz, Karol 6/30/24 X X X X X X O/E O/E X X Reedus, Becci 6/30/24 X X X X X X X X X O/E Vogel, Kyle 6/30/26 O/E X X X O/E X X X O/E O/E Patel, Kiran 6/30/26 X X X X O/E X O/E O/E X X Pierce, James 6/30/26 -- -- X X X X O/E X X X Szecsei, Denise 6/30/25 -- -- -- -- -- X X X X O/E Borgen, Horacio 6/30/25 -- -- -- -- -- -- O/E O/E X X Date: July 8, 2024 To: Housing & Community Development Commission From: Brianna Thul, Senior Community Development Planner Erika Kubly, Neighborhood Services Coordinator Re: FY25 Tentative HCDC Calendar As you know, the Housing and Community Development Commission (HCDC) recently shifted regular meetings to the third Monday of each month. Meetings will now be held at City Hall (410 E Washington Street) in Emma Harvat Hall. The new meeting dates are anticipated as follows for FY25 (July 2024 to June 2025):  July 15, 2024 6:30pm  August 19, 2024 6:30pm  September 16, 2024 6:30pm  No October meeting - staff will offer optional one-on-one assistance to commissioners in lieu of meeting.  November 18, 2024 6:30pm  No December meeting – winter break  January 20, 2025 6:30pm  No February meeting - staff will offer optional one-on-one assistance to commissioners in lieu of meeting.  March 24, 2025 6:30pm  April 21, 2025 6:30pm  May 19, 2025 6:30pm  No June meeting – summer break A calendar will be prepared with tentative agenda items. Staff are looking for two to three areas of interest from commissioners, related to the work of the HCDC, to include as educational opportunities where possible. Examples of presentations provided to the commission last fiscal year included:  Housing Inspections Overview – City Staff  Housing Authority Overview – City Staff  Housing Trust Fund of Johnson County Overview – HTFJC  Street Outreach and Engagement Overview – Shelter House Staff have scheduled a session on Fair Housing based on interest expressed previously by commissioners and are open to additional suggestions for the upcoming fiscal year.