HAC Meeting and Strategy Subcommittee Meeting   8/25/2020

Brenda and or Erin, do you have a thumbnail sketch of where we are in deployment on these city programs?

That's 25 for reentry, 16 for homeless and 47 for rental assistance.

That's application or deployment?

Deployment, as far as I know.

Upcoming notes we should know about on that.

I'm sorry?

Brenda, could you repeat the breakdown again, please?

So that's all the numbers that I have access to right now.

I forgot what happened with that.

Sorry, that was kind of convoluted.

But we're happy to work with you offline.

So it's a it's an internal capacity issue really, and procurement issue.

Does that make sense, Brenda?

Yes, and we should talk because that is one of the things we are smart enough to know is that there are other people that know more about this than we do.

I appreciate it.

I don't know if that data is gettable.

And Anthony, I know you're involved in these conversations too, so that we do have continued funding extending through longer periods of time to help, you know, everybody.

So, and I'd love to help, obviously.

But just to give you an idea of rent relief versus mortgage relief, that's what that particular program is showing.

A handful of minutes on this.

I just want to make sure everybody knew that we came back with that.

So Anthony has offered to pick up the slack on that and take us through developments and where we are on our short and medium terms.

I'll do my best if there isn't anybody, but does anyone, is anyone obliged or interested in doing so?

What were you talking about?

And if anyone wanted.

Some sort of note taker as we go along on these so he can data plop.

I wasn't volunteering, I was just asking for clarity.

So, all right, well, I'll do my best.

Anthony, I'm happy to help.

had not started, which was engaging people with lived experience.

Or do you wanna try to share a screen or what you wanna do here?

And next one is being aggressive or other questions about that one, other pieces on that before we move on.

People with lived experiences and you referenced CHA.

So does that help a bit, Lisa?

So it's another organization that's tapping into different ways, but it is involving people with lived experiences.

Lisa, any updates there?

I don't wanna speak for you.

My screen's messed up.

You're good.

Is there anything else Lisa that I missed?

If we decided to do a survey out to individuals, these individuals, we could send that survey and ask them to tap into landlords or some of them may be doing property management themselves, but that would be a very extensive list of individuals who could have knowledge and could add units throughout the city.

But yeah, thanks for working with Matthew on that.

Hey Lisa, could you tell me again what that group is that you're the member of that had the 2200

So that whole entire group, I can pull that roster, and as a member, I can reach out to them.

I'm a slow note taker, so sorry to have to ask.

What's the survey for?

It's to find out how we can get better participation with private or third party or for-profit landlords.

And if they are better educated, if they would be willing to participate in the voucher program, which could increase the number of units, affordable units that we would have available for renters.

It's more like an intensive just browbeat them into submission.

Well Stacey, I think that any information that we can gain from them is a positive and if they have legitimate concerns about why they don't participate then I see that as a positive and that's something we need to work on.

I've just from experience, if they're not having problems filling units, it's going to be really tough to get them to accept the vouchers.

But I think that any information that we can gain is a plus.

Yeah, I'm just wanting to, I just needed to understand better because having done that for several years, it's it's a difficult sell, to be honest.

Not that Stacy isn't 100% right and it's gonna be like, it's gonna involve a lot of beating one's forehead against a wall.

Don't set high expectations for the outcome.

But I think that's a good next step is to work on that and get that out.

But your point, Anthony, is that if we can find a way to reduce their expenses or to make more money, we will get to them better.

So anyways.

Please take my money as a great opener.

I don't know if there's anyone who can speak to specifics on that, but what are other next steps that you will see for this?

It was like a listing service, was it?

It wasn't BRAC, was it?

I think it was, yes, it was, it was.

Blue Ridge Apartment Council, I think it was, yeah.

And a lot of them were through the nonprofits.

Which is interesting because the nonprofits have a more expansive view of this world than the private landlords do.

Or who should lead this?

Yes, absolutely.

But that, at least as a part of it, is certainly going to happen.

Is it contemplated that the housing hub may be part of the emerging fiscal or financial opportunity center?

We should check in with Sunshine on that.

Either not talking or muted, I can't tell.

In terms of space, there is no space right here unless there is space in another city facilities.

But if there's any help we can get on that, we could probably bring that online a little quicker.

Yeah, but have you requested for inspections?

Yes.

Pull it up if the inspection has been requested.

Appreciate it.

I can't remember what it's called now, the rent relief or the risk mitigation program.

No, that's no longer, I think it's on wherever you guys discussed it the last time, that's where it's at right now.

The last time I remember it, if anyone please jump in and correct me, was that it was basically ready for an RFP as I remembered it.

Yeah, that's where I don't think there is any traction on that right now.

On releasing the RFP or, okay.

The RFP, releasing the RFP, yeah.

Do you have any clarity on what's holding it up?

from this point.

Anyone have any other updates on that?

So Rick, you can speak to what you said during the meeting.

And so that was my contribution to this offline meeting that we had.

And I would think that that's something we might want to visit in some more detail in our next meeting.

It may have been discussed prior to me coming, but it has not been discussed since I've been there.

It's a PowerPoint.

So if we're saying this, we need to make sure that everyone is clear and we're being transparent in what we're saying, because I think that they have a different understanding of what their responsibility is in tying it back to the hat.

Is that accurate?

After they leave, what's going to happen?

I think that's totally valid.

We still need to have that process built into our procedures to ensure that we have equity and we're being socially conscious about our decisions that we push forward to the city.

I think that's a, I think that's an important point that, you know,

So just to sort of monitor how we make progress.

We will have to move on, but Phil, please do make that a point to continue that discussion of how to include people with lived experience.

So that should be a part of what the planning department is also helping to do in the community.

Thank you, Joy.

It's 2.45?

1 to 2.45, yes, ma'am.

OK. Well, maybe the person who sent out the reminder notice and the invitation needs me on the same page.

I know that the state moratorium I think is ending at the end of this month, if that's correct, if I'm not mistaken.

Elaine, can you speak to the eviction status and where we're at on all of that?

Can you all hear me?

Yes, we can.

Hey, Elaine.

So just feel free to email me if you are interested in getting involved.

Much appreciated.

Thanks, Elaine.

And I'm not sure if this is a new one, but there aren't really any notes here on this one.

Yeah, I'm not familiar with the provenance of that line item.

This seems to be a community ownership.

I know you, when we looked at this, we were looking to add resources, more resources.

Yeah, funding resources, right.

We've added HUD certified housing counseling capability to our staff.

This individual is HUD certified as well.

Are they already connected?

and he's HUD certified as well.

That's ongoing, I'm assuming Elaine, I don't know if there's any particular updates there.

Do you want me to speak to the other one too?

Please.

But if you want to see what that might look like, Northern Virginia has created some anti-eviction task forces that I think we could model our program after.

I don't know, the capacity to send us some of those resources or the website or something like that that we can take a look at.

Can I just send that to Phil?

That'd be great.

Yeah.

And I think again, like it's something we need to continue, but TJPDC is still as a leader and I would venture to say it's ongoing unless anyone else has any other updates there with this kind of outreach to landlords about these programs.

I can tie you with a CAR resource where when you have updates like this, you can share it with them and they will blast it out to our members.

Okay, Phil, is that our time?

If there are a couple of items that you think we need to hit, but I know there's only so much tolerance for this sort of review before one's, before one's entire function.

So, yeah, if you don't mind, let's just run through those.

Absolutely.

I don't know if anyone from AHIP's on leave.

Okay.

Different updates in that regard, Dan, it seems like the same thing that we just talked about previously for renters, is that correct?

and it's not atypical in an emergency situation but that's where a lot of that's happening right now.

With the CAT program?

City has essentially suspended collection of delinquent taxes by any aggressive means at the moment.

Dan, do you have any other update here?

So that we're working on it with NDS.

Okay.

Do you see issues with this?

Okay.

Does it seem like it's not happening?

or you mean the mortgage relief program?

Sorry, yes, the mortgage relief program.

but there seems like there needs to be some additional capacity for people simply making phones.

So people can leave a message and they will be getting a phone call back

Is there Spanish language capacity among the new people?

But that is a gap that they're trying to fill that I know about.

I really appreciate that.

OK.

This is another community ownership one, which is always difficult to move forward, but any thoughts on this, any other progress from individual organizations on your part in providing financial coaching

It's free and they do it.

All right, that's a great resource.

They can send you their information if you need it.

And then

Is there any way we can call on her so she can ask the question?

Jeanette, can you speak?

Can you hear me?

We can.

And I just wondered if this was up and running and if there's a number to call, et cetera.

I do know that that was in the cards as well, but I can't speak to the details of it, so.

Phil, could you phrase that as a question for Stacey as a follow-up from the hack?

County Relief Fund status.

Ongoing?

Yeah, we've finished 10 since the beginning of COVID, and we've got six more that we're hoping to CO in the next few months.

I'll defer to the will of the chair or of the group on how to move forward.

Because I wanna make sure that we're doing due diligence to a lot of these topics and not just rushing through them at the very end.

Yes, Lisa.

Ongoing topics that have continuously been going ongoing.

Anthony, if you can sort of scroll up and sort of between you and whatever notes Ridge took on this, sort of hit the high spots of what we're going to reconvene to discuss.

Are we good until 2.45 or is this?

So, but we're at 2.15 now.

Do we have other agenda items?

But I also note the tolerance for being able to go through the spreadsheet is only before, you know, you start losing higher brain function.

Bridge, if you can help me out here with any of the notes that you've taken, we'll try to identify a particular next step and an owner for these that needed them, so.

So is this, this is still immediate short, really short term stuff that we're doing?

If there is another tab here that has the kind of the original version, but we just for formatting sake, we've been focusing on this three to six months.

So we need to make sure that we're not looking at...

So I got Kevin's letter.

either that we do or that we throw back to the subcommittee to do is to make sure you do a scan of the green and then the next color to make sure that we're not getting ourselves off track in terms of restricted timelines.

and then we can easily kind of sort those out like you said that rely on things like the CIP but one way to do that thing maybe we just to categorize these into different kind of groups in terms of what needs additional funding and is you know it's required for that to move forward or what kind of has the funding needed but maybe needs other types of efforts and it may not be just funding if there's anything that for example needs enabling legislation on the city's calendar for

So it's just whatever, whenever we should just look through and see if there are time sensitive things that have to time with processes that are exterior to what we, or outside of what we can control and make sure that we're, that we've got a plan for dealing with them.

Or do you think that needs its own group

My sense is that it's probably better for the smaller committee to make a recommendation than the big committee, than the big group.

So we may have to do this via email with some sort of work around.

Do some committees need public notice for the hack?

Yes, well, they should if we're conducting any business, it's actual business.

It's a time-consuming way to do it, but it's not holding a public meeting.

Who do we deputize for that?

or is it just too much to absorb?

I'm up for it.

I mean, I guess the rough cut, but I've got to leave, but in a minute or two, but I'll jump in if that's the will of the group.

I think we should work through this as a group.

Okay, well, let's give it a shot.

But yeah, let's at least take a swing at it.

So that is reliant on funding sources.

if that's possible.

that could support this project.

Is that a budget thing for next year?

Good question.

OK.

We had a conversation about this one in terms of the kind of need for that at the HAC as well as additional to the housing strategy, but the housing strategy portion is already underway as far as I can tell.

Those are items that are not related to funding but have to be at the top of our agenda the next time we meet because they're recurring themes that have to be addressed or else none of the rest of this really matters, I think.

I don't know enough about that one.

you know, a huge lift that we need to entertain, but I don't think it's related to any pressing deadline that I know of, unless it has to do with low income housing tax credit deadlines, which Sunshine is more familiar with than I am.

So that might be just a timeframe to put there.

Okay.

OK.

Before you move on real quick, under the topic increased down payment assistance program, why does that reside only with PHA?

I think because

So I think that's why that was sort of, that was an active ongoing adventure that he was in the middle of.

to increase the equity of home ownership, the opportunity of home ownership for down payment assistance.

Am I misremembering that?

And it is not just residing in PHA.

So.

Since we did that work together, that was hopefully a collaborative process to identify, but do people agree that we could prioritize those next time and not worry about the other ones?

I think that's good.

So I'm not sure what the rationale was for skipping over that, but I just wanna make sure we don't lose focus on that particular goal.

But that may not be a great reason to skip over it.

I'm sorry.

It was the very last line in the section just above home ownership that had to do with community organizing based on ongoing services.

Yeah, line 27.

Got it.

And I just want to make sure we're supporting those organizations that are doing that work and acknowledging their efforts.

We'll highlight that one for next time if that's okay, Dave.

Ridge.

So can we take a stab at collapsing those categories with these subtopics underneath so you know what got collapsed so we can really focus our attention on those?

So I will grant that permission and take the consequences.

Because I would be a little bit hesitant to just get rid of some of them, but I think- Yeah, I think that's great.

Any other business that needs to come before this committee in the next three minutes and 14 seconds?

Thank you very much, Anthony, for stepping in.

So any other matters?

I'm going to go to stenography school.

Anyone?

Motion to adjourn.

Thank you.