CRHA Regular Meeting   7/23/2018

Welcome.

I'd like to call to order the meeting, our regular board meeting of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority.

It's Monday, July 23rd.

Commissioner Bellamy?

Commissioner Oliver?

Here.

Commissioner Rector?

Thank you.

First, we'd like to have our moment of silence.

If we can just call for a brief moment.

Thank you.

I'm glad to have you with us.

And thank you for volunteering for this service.

and I would like to send well wishes to our Commissioner Rettger who is home healing and might miss a few meetings.

She was in a car accident but it's going to be just fine, just not able to make it tonight.

So thank you all so much for your thoughts for Miss Rettger.

With that, we have time for public comments now.

Are there any comments this evening?

Good evening.

My name is Annette Wilcox.

I'm currently at 1400 Monticello Road at apartment 102 in Charlottesville, Virginia.

As I explained once before, I don't like to make the,

Yes, if I have any concerns about how many apartment uses for low-income rest for people who have retired and disabled, not just for working people, I should get information from Tamika Grooms, who will be my sectioning housing income choice

Specialist next year.

If I see, surprisingly see, yes, it's nice to see some cute new changes going on which I see on Carlton Avenue at the Belmont Station.

I'm pretty certain you explained to me that they're going to start in 2019 or 2020.

Otherwise I said I'd read about it at the Secretary of Charlottesville Act.

Great.

Not at all.

It's nice to see you.

Y'all know where I live, so I'm not gonna give my address out.

They did work at West Haven Saturday, did a very good job.

They stopped about two o'clock, L resection,

The only thing that got weed-eated was my yard for the first time in four weeks.

My yard, Richard weed-eated my yard and he actually went around it, trimmed it, and like he was supposed to for the first time all summer long my front yard looks decent.

But you've got to remember we've got two parts of the elderly section that hasn't been done and nothing's been taken care of.

The back heel hasn't been taken care of.

The grass is still high.

I'm still having interim problems, and I'm running out of glue traps, which the man's supposed to come Wednesday, I believe.

Also, the maintenance men was cussing each other the other day, and I do mean they were throwing the F-bomb out like you wouldn't believe.

I was sitting in the chair in the living room, and I got up and looked out to see who it was,

and I can tell you who it was.

You all probably already know.

So, but I'm not the only one that has complained.

There was another woman that was supposed to come with me tonight and she's done fed up with everything.

She said she wasn't even coming.

But if we don't speak up and speak out, nothing's going to get done.

And the maintenance people are smoking in the vehicles.

If we're not allowed, I don't smoke, but if they're not allowed to smoke in their apartments or whatever,

The maintenance people shouldn't be allowed to smoke in the brand new vehicles.

But when they're getting out there cussing each other and throwing the F word around, especially down there where there's little kids and everybody else can hear it, it's not like the kids over there don't throw the F bombs.

Because every time they get up on the roof over at the nursing clinic, there's three or four of us have to holler and tell them to get off the roof or we're going to call the police.

And we get cussed every time, but we're used to that.

But y'all have got to do something to the Italy section

When I first moved there six years ago, I was told by two different property managers, Crescent Hall and the elderly section on Hardy Drive always come first to get everything done instead of working their way down at Run Street and working their way up.

By the time they start at Run Street, it's about four o'clock by the time they get to our section.

They might not get to our section for two more weeks.

And that's not right.

I mean, I heard there's other people on Hardy Drive that's also having problems with black snakes in their yards.

But if they don't keep their yards mowed, you know, they're going to have black snakes and stuff in their yards.

But the elderly section, we can't get out there and mow.

Thank you.

It's open for public comment.

Well, my name is Gloria Beard.

I was here at the last meeting, and I just need some answers so I can get my minds straight.

I seen on Facebook that the community got together and gave these people at Crescent Hall some fans.

Now, if everything is okay down there, why do they need fans?

I'm not sure what's going on, because people know.

I know I know when I'm hot or cold.

If I don't have sufficient air, then I can't breathe well.

And then they did a cleanup at Hardy Drive.

I don't know if this was right or wrong, but I thought it was a good deal.

Because I goes down there, Connie, she's a good friend of mine in Rosea.

So I go there a lot, and I see the wrong, what's going on.

She's right about those men that's cutting the grass.

If I hired them to come cut my grass, guess what?

I'd be looking for somebody else.

They have cut the grass, and I'm an outsider, and I can see that.

And I'm not just complaining.

I just don't understand what's going on.

People don't take pride in their jobs anymore, it seems to me.

I'm from the old school.

I don't care what kind of job I had in my life, I did it well.

And I'm just concerned about these low-income people, because I was in low income for 11 years out there at Square.

What can happen?

And why are these people so overlooked?

It's because you're poor.

You shouldn't be punished.

I'm still poor, but thank God I was able to work all my life and I got out of that.

You know, I bought a home.

But some people will never be able.

They don't pay us any money in this town unless you are a professional.

And I know I retired from your VA.

So something got to give.

And I made a suggestion to one of my friends on Facebook

I'm willing to do an organization to gather things for people in need.

I would work hard.

And I've got so much stuff in my house, my son would be glad if I gave it away.

But you know, we've got to do something for each other.

Because I don't like it.

And it bothers me too about the gentrification.

I'm not getting no good answers.

I'm worried.

Not because I don't have nowhere to go.

I have three sons and eight grandchildren.

But some of these people won't be able to move and live comfortably.

If they don't have no transportation,

What are they doing to us?

And my taxes went up this year.

So now they got this project they're working in up there on Preston or Grady Avenue.

My tax is going to go up.

Now I know I might qualify for some help because I'm a senior and I'm disabled.

But some people won't.

What's the plan?

Why are they moving us out?

And who's giving all this?

I mean, who's agreeing to all this?

They can't take our neighborhoods and bring in the rich people charging one bedroom apartment for $1,000.

Who makes that kind of money in trying to feed children and do whatever?

I'm concerned about this town.

Not about me, because God is good.

I believe in the Lord.

And God's always said, He's supposed to demand justice for His people.

And I believe in the Lord wholeheartedly.

So I know it's my mission.

Whatever happens, I tell my kids all the time, one day if you don't see me, maybe you go in the back of your eye, it might be hanging from the tree.

Good evening.

Nancy Carpenter, thank you for this opportunity to speak to the board.

One administrative question I have, and I've never been able to get a good answer, why is there no agenda pre-published on the

Housing Authority's website or the board minutes so that people who are interested and want to know what's been going on can find out what's been talked about in the past, who feels a certain way on certain issues when it regards public housing.

For years, that has been a problem.

I don't know if it remains with someone in the city of Charlottesville or whether it's someone who's tasked through CRHA, but it certainly would be beneficial

The other question.

I want to say is I want to thank the community people who stepped up and wanted to offer their time and their equipment and their services to help folks do some basic maintenance, landscape maintenance there.

Again, I'm questioning where does that task really fall to and why is it that if the public housing developments have a playground for the kids, why do we allow the weeds and everything to grow up doesn't always happen with any of the other

Parks and Rec facilities that I see in town.

And of course, they're maintained by a different city department.

But it would be nice if that would be nice.

Because I'm a renter.

I don't have space for yard equipment.

I mean, I have a small pair of pruning shears.

And that's about it in my apartment.

We have our bushes there that need to be taken care of.

So you don't always have the wherewithal to house something in your apartment or the money to house something.

So hopefully that

This exercise that occurred this past Saturday will allow the administration here to perhaps re-evaluate the tasks, re-look at what people do so that our public housing unit's landscape can look lovely.

I mean, they should.

Everybody should have a place that's

looks nice outside and inside and all around.

They shouldn't have to worry about fans for air conditioning again.

And thank goodness that the community stepped up for that, because I don't think the staff there at that facility seemed capable of being able to address that concern or how to address that concern.

That's probably something that should be talked about within the staff meetings, however they occur.

But I do thank you for this opportunity.

Hello, I'm Deborah Booker, President of the Teen Association at Crescent Halls.

Thank you for this opportunity.

I'd like to first of all give an update on the fan situation.

We've handed out about 30 fans.

I have a few more for people who are in need.

And they were handed out because people's air conditioning wasn't working or wasn't working properly.

So that gives people a way to kind of hold on and bear it until something better happens.

and I want to thank everyone in the community who came forward and helped with that also.

Also, I asked for some help in getting the Tenant Association together because a lot of stuff has been going on that the residents disagree with, a lot of working against me as president of the Tenant Association rather than supporting me.

and I'd like to thank the ones who stepped in and helped to support us in getting that straight.

We had a really good meeting last month and I think we had a better turnout of residents than we had for a long time.

Good evening.

I'm Brandon.

I work for the Public Housing Association of Residents, the duly elected, duly recognized Resident Advisory Council and Resident Advisory Board for all residents of public housing in Charlottesville.

and I actually had the opportunity to email these comments to you just a little bit ago.

So you probably haven't read them and it's a lot of comments.

An hour ago.

An hour ago.

I read them.

And I think they're actually pretty solid.

I'll try to paraphrase because I don't want to talk all night, though I could.

So the first thing, there's a bullet list here of just a couple of things that I think would be really great for the public to hear.

this evening just some updates and maybe that was already being planned on being discussed but it would be great to to just get an update on these things the situation with the trees at West Haven what's what's going on with that as well as how you all have been handling replacement housing and repair those

Holmes.

Would love to see, since there's a new committee and that committee met, would love to see on an agenda in the future a report back from the Maintenance Advisory Committee.

I think that was a super positive meeting that happened a couple weeks back.

So it would be great to get kind of an update on that.

Would very much like to hear about staffing situation.

I would love to hear as much information as possible about preparation and communication about the August 12th weekend.

And I think if somebody can give some kind of report back from the meeting with security that happened at Crescent Halls, that would be pretty good for everybody to hear what happened at that meeting.

I'm actually going to skip ahead since some folks mentioned these things a moment ago.

I'm going to skip ahead to customer service and maintenance.

So as I said, we'd love to hear about staffing and movements toward the call center, which I believe you had slated for August 1st and a report back from the Maintenance Advisory Committee.

On the call center, I'm a little concerned that you're probably not quite ready to do that.

So hopefully when all the ducks are in a row, you can get that out there and it'll make a huge impact.

But certainly if that's not the case, let's make sure it works right.

So back to Maintenance Advisory Committee, one issue that was particularly interesting was a conversation about the proper pairing of maintenance techs with jobs that fit their skills.

So, you know, you've got folks who can do different things and sometimes the person who knows how to repair a stove, for example, doesn't need to be the person who's going out sweeping up afterwards or doing some other task.

And similarly, we began discussing lawn care and landscaping.

and this has been something that PHAR has been pushing on for a number of months which is your staff is spending too much time on the landscaping.

They're not doing a great job of it and what's happening is that they're unable to get into homes and repair homes.

turn units and fill vacancies.

So they're spending time doing a job that they just can't keep up with.

So we suggested contracting for landscaping for the housing authority like you used to do.

There was a maintenance guy who said what used to happen is actually you had one maintenance guy and that was his job.

He did all the landscaping and that worked well.

But things are at such a point where we're doing that right now is not really something you can reach.

So there was also discussion of could you do a one-time contract

get everything up to a certain level and then restructure the staff to have that happen.

So I think in any event we do need to address landscaping but we really need to address what's going on inside people's apartments and I think there's a couple other things that are going to help with that.

So we also discussed landscaping.

The need for a comprehensive review of the maintenance needs of all the homes in CRHA and kind of line those up in the different boxes What's going to head towards redevelopment?

What needs modernization?

What needs rehab?

What just needs basic maintenance?

And sort of setting up a schedule and I think everybody is into that idea.

I know there was some discussion

and some help with trying to get that going but it faced a lot of challenges.

So hopefully that challenge can get worked through sooner than later.

But I think that was a great conversation.

Ultimately, we deeply urge you to move forward with staffing a facilities manager and a lead program manager as soon as possible.

I know those things are on the street.

get those folks in, get them hired, pay them well, get really top level management positions in here to really get things under control.

You combine that with the call center model and perhaps some changes to both the HCV system, the computer system that will also benefit the public housing program computer system.

I think that's going to make a big impact and I'm glad to see we're moving that direction.

As far as the substantial rehabs, looks like two are almost ready at Sixth Street followed by another two at Sixth Street pretty soon after that.

That's exciting.

That means there's rapid movement on the rest.

So we would like to see that shift to West Haven where the need is pretty great for the substantial rehabs as soon as possible.

All right.

So I'll go back to the back.

I know I'm talking a lot.

The bond.

Tonight you're going to discuss a bond and I hope the public can understand this.

The Housing Authority is going to ask for the city to float a bond of I believe $50 million to get started.

And I think the city is going to seriously consider this.

I just want you to know that PHAR definitely supports this.

This is the kind of money that can have a huge impact on this community, make sure we move into the future and provide resident-directed redevelopment.

So PHAR definitely supports the resolution you're going to support tonight.

and we are also prepared to support this directly to the city council and advocate for that and I think you will find the broader public in Charlottesville can be motivated to also support this.

I think it's in your best interest to support whatever things that can be done to tell the city here's how you could finance that bond, here's how you can pay for the debt.

I think that's just a good faith thing.

It's really up to the city to figure that out but if you all can be supportive of what they come up with, I think that's gonna be helpful.

I'll just let you kind of read the rest.

HCV I do need to get into.

So we're really glad that admin plan is moving forward.

Been talking about this for six years.

Finally got it underway.

We're really excited that you partnered with Harrisonburg.

I think they've done a pretty good job.

PHAR and Legal Aid are going to need to offer some comments about the plan.

Almost everything that you've put in there is pretty beneficial to people and to the community.

We do have a deep concern about the preferences system as relates to working families in that it could be a fair housing violation because as we know formerly incarcerated individuals are not a protected class but race is a protected class and what HUD has determined and others

is that because of mass incarceration and a racist imprisonment system that those who are formerly incarcerated are victims of racism and should not be discriminated.

In fact, there should be proactive measures to include people who are formerly incarcerated.

So those formerly incarcerated people face huge barriers to employment.

And so that's a fair housing violation in our opinion.

I think we can outline that.

and as well I think that will also impact single mothers who can't work for a variety of reasons and I think that's also a fair housing violation but we'll offer comments about that.

Thank you.

Are there other comments at this time?

Do you have to wait until the end?

You already went.

Thank you.

Sorry.

I would comment about security at Crescent Halls, our last meeting.

to kind of have a coming together on issues there.

And I guess I'd love to kind of report back first of all that Commissioner Slaughter really hit the ground running.

She ran that meeting and was excellent input throughout, so that was wonderful.

But we were able to address issues kind of on both sides of the table from the security perspective and from people who have been

for security, kind of heard both sides of the story.

I tell you, I really came away feeling like security is really doing an outstanding job considering it's a very, very challenging environment and we're trying to work through some bugs to get up and running.

There were two kind of potentially egregious situations that were particularly talked about and we couldn't get to the bottom of them quite as much as we might have liked only because both of the two offending parties for the security company

No longer work there.

That was their recourse was pretty immediate action which I think in it'd be nice to resolve these things but at the same time they took very proactive

to see that that issue was resolved as completely as possible.

I know it's something we will continue to work for but I think we all got to be on the same page and try to find common ground on that because the idea of security on that site is for protection of our residents and that really needs to be number one and then beyond that we'll need to see what hurdles there are.

Thank you.

And I agree with you.

I think that was a great meeting.

It needed to happen and I'm glad it happened.

I also feel that there are other meetings that need to happen and that those meetings need to be a part of the housing authority, the city police, and Millennium.

And we might need to be looking at putting Millennium on all the sites because all the sites right now

are dealing with things that's going on outside of the unit.

We have a lease for those who live in the unit.

But what's going on on the sites, on the grounds needs to be dealt with.

And it needs to be dealt with ASAP.

We cannot continue to play around with this.

It needs to happen.

So I'm going to ask the board tonight to make sure that a meeting is set up

so that we all and this board needs to be a part of the meeting because you need to hear what's going on on the sites.

Mr. Duffield and Miss Mason had experience at what happens on the sites this past weekend and it was not in the best interest for them to be out there in the situation that they were put in and I don't want to see any more staff have to be put in that situation so at this point

If you don't want cameras, then we need securities.

Thank you Miss Oliver.

I will say we have Sergeant Haney here from the police department who's going to answer some of our questions around security and some of the things brought up in Pharr's comments.

If you all are ready we can invite him up or if we have other comments.

Good evening.

Thanks for being here.

I'm good.

So I don't know if you have any general comments you want to make or if you just... No, I'm going to open up the floor to you all.

Well, we had, I guess, Miss Oliver has sort of questions and concerns about

safety and security, Crescent Halls and beyond.

So I'm just at the point right now, and I know that I've talked to you this weekend and that you thank you for what you did.

I really appreciate that.

You're very welcome.

But my biggest concern is that I think that we're at the point right now where we need to be meeting with the police department and with Millennium because we need to figure out what you all are going to be allowed to do when you come on the properties, or what you're allowed to do, or what you all can do to help us control

No and I think you bring up a great point because last year when we went around to the different properties we kind of spoke openly about some of the issues and I know one thing that we've tried to do this year since those meetings is one of the concerns is more outreach programs we've tried to bring you know some

Ice Cream at the Cop, we're driving some you know some other initiatives but actually going door to door and literally trying to speak with everyone on these properties and find out what the issues are and you know I'll tell you when I got that phone call from Grant the other night I didn't know a thing about it and we were out there that day

for a community event speaking with individuals and as soon as he brought that up, you know, I put some things in motion and I tried to have some individuals over there immediately to deal with that situation.

and that's issues that we need to deal with.

You know, I don't know if I knew we had a line before where people could call and anonymously, you know, call us back.

There are residents that need, we need to put a line or something there to make that where folks are comfortable making these calls.

Because they come to my phone.

They started in my phone early Saturday morning, late Friday night.

and was gone the whole time.

So they come to my phone.

And they went directly to Julie.

What I got, I sent to Julie.

And what I got, I sent to Grant.

So they come, but we need to figure out how we get residents.

Because residents are tired of this.

They're tired of people coming and disrespecting us.

Public housing is not wide open country.

So for those of us who aren't aware, can we elaborate on what happened?

So we received, well I received a phone call from Mr. Duffield in reference to a party that had been spread over Facebook on South First Street.

So we heard about that and Miss Oliver reached out to Mr. Duffield and said that she had been getting complaints from residents.

So literally as soon as we found out about it I spoke with an evening shift supervisor just to make him aware of the situation and possible individuals coming in that maybe do not live in that area and there's concerns of Miss Oliver and other residents.

I don't think there were anything that arose out of that party and it was taken care of but it was just the information getting out there because we were there, it's funny, we were there for two hours the day of and we didn't hear any concerns, you know, speaking with residents.

So a lot of residents attended the party.

And it was for Denzel who passed away.

There were totally violations.

All kind.

All kind.

And if we want to discuss that later, we can discuss that later.

But there were violations all over the place.

Right.

But you still not, are you seeing, okay, so someone will have another conversation?

Sure, and just to be clear, Audrey did reach out to me.

I did get calls from residents myself saying, hey, Mr. Duffield, you know,

We're concerned about the party because last year's party sort of ended in several fights and the grounds were left in bad shape and we really don't want to see that happen again.

I had one resident who said, look, I've got to get up at five in the morning and I'm concerned that my peaceful enjoyment basically is going to be disturbed.

When I had the opportunity to talk with the host resident, just reminded them that our policy says you're more than welcome to have a party.

There's no reason you can't.

Your guests do need to be in your company, either in your house or in the backyard area, in your immediate company.

They seemed receptive to that.

Also reminded folks that if we have guests who don't have visitor tags on their car, there may be a chance that they are towed.

So remind guests that they need to either park on the street or have a guest tag.

and that's, I mean, we try to be responsive to everyone's complaints, especially residents.

If we hear something, you know, I'll do anything and everything I can to help out.

So what would have been the proper way for them to handle this situation?

Because, so one, I mean, I knew about the party for a while.

It's an annual event to celebrate a young man from over there who got killed.

Right.

You know, trying to,

They're really just trying to show respect and love to Denny, or Denzel, excuse me.

So what would have been the proper way?

Do they need to get a permit moving forward next year to have a gathering maybe at the community center, as opposed to it being at a residence?

I just want to help alleviate this issue because it's something that means a lot to those residents, and I see it's a very passionate topic amongst commissioners.

So what's the proper way to go through it?

They're going to want to continue to do it.

And I mean he's from there.

So how can we do it the best way?

You have to deal with the crime control for one thing.

You have to deal with respect to the residents for another.

You had a parking lot that was full.

Residents was coming in, had nowhere to park.

You had cars on both sides of the street from Layford Avenue clear up to almost Hartmill, way past the

and the maintenance office.

You had kegs of beer that were sitting out on the main sidewalk and a grill outside of the gate.

Anybody's child could have got hurt on a hot grill.

There was all kind of violations there.

Like I said, you had fights that broke out last year.

The property wasn't even prepared for that kind of

that kind of situation.

And not only that, they're lease violations.

They're clearly lease violations.

Who does that?

Who does that in public housing?

So again, you're bringing me the problems and I asked you about the solution.

Well, you got to know what the problems were before you can deal with the solution.

Well, can you allow me to finish?

Thank you.

Again, what is it that we can do to let them know the proper way for them to be able to have this party?

Is there another way?

So do we need a policy?

I would say that's what our community centers are for.

and then when you're talking about the community center, you're talking about a certain number of people who are allowed in the community center.

So I have a question.

I know we do a South First Street Day, we do a West Haven Day, Mickey Drive, we do all of these days.

What is the

Okay.

So should the person that's given the Denny day, what was it?

Commission about Denzel Day?

Denzel, yeah, more.

So would the person that's doing the Denzel Day or the person that's doing any type of day on the property be the sponsored person for the-

for the, I guess, fellowship or block party that's going forward.

Would they be identified as the sponsor?

Or could they?

And I'm just asking this because I see that the policy about parties or whatever the policy is or the protocol is not updated, obviously.

And so, I think what's going to have to happen is a capacity

It's going to have to be established how many numbers, you know, is considered a party.

And then, you know, how many numbers past that will be considered a block party.

and then that way we can identify whether it can be in a home or whether it needs to be in the community center or whether it needs to be identified as a sponsored block party or fellowship in order to put some things in order.

I totally understand Miss Audrey.

I understand Wes Bellamy.

I know that the community does celebrate

And I just think that that's a part of the policy that hasn't been updated.

And in order to figure out where to start at, we might need to start with numbers.

So if we want to talk about violations and being rude and disrespectful on the property, then maybe that should be something we should look at, whether it should be

and the House, how many people?

The community center, how many people?

And if it's gonna be a block party, how many people?

Okay, thank you.

I would agree with that.

I think there's gonna have to be some flexibility in the policy.

I mean, in an event, what if someone, I think about when Denzel first got killed, there was a large cookout and gathering

at the House.

I mean, we hope that things like this don't happen, but when unfortunate incidents happen, it normally brings about a large contingent of people.

Well, I mean, not to interrupt, I mean, repassed and, you know, ceremony, repassed and those kinds of events take top priority for our community centers.

That is the nature and purpose of our community centers for those kinds of events.

events, and we do have a pretty clear community center policy.

We also have clear policies regarding parking and asking for guest parking permits if you're gonna have a large event at a community center, and we have clearly established guidelines in the lease about noise and things.

I think all of the elements of what you just brought to us exist across several different policies that we have, so perhaps putting them all in one place so that it's clear is something that we can do.

I was going to say I appreciate this conversation but we do have Sergeant Haney here and we've gotten a little off of just sort of security and safety in general and I don't want to take too much of your time but as you are here we have been having discussions with our security company, with our residents about preparations for the

weekend of August 10th, 11th, and 12th.

You and I spoke briefly about that.

So as of right now, the preparations are still being made.

We're going to have a lot of resources on hand that weekend.

and we'll have resources on hand to respond to anything that may pop up in these communities and public housing.

Just general safety guidance.

If you want to stay home, stay home that weekend.

Downtown, there's going to be some streets that are blocked off.

There's going to be some parking that will be taken up.

I just tell everyone just to be wise about that weekend.

Okay.

Chairman Jones, I'll just add on to that and we've spoken.

I want the commissioners and the community to know that we have engaged our security contractor, Millennium Security, to provide additional patrols and presence at Crescent Halls, at South First Street, Sixth Street, and at West Haven throughout the

10th, 11th and 12th, the entire weekend.

Absolutely.

Like I said, we are going to be well prepared.

Yeah, so we do have some other events coming up.

We just finished ice cream with a cop, and that went extremely well this year.

And next year, we want to go to other public housing neighborhoods as well as other venues around the city.

We also have our second annual Charlottesville night out.

which is a community event that the Police Foundation as well as other city resources are gonna participate in where we will have free food, bouncy maze, we're gonna have face painters, Kona Ice, the whole string of pizza, free sliders for Mission Barbecue.

So DJ, it's open to the entire community and we're gonna have some flyers out there for that.

So we welcome everybody.

Thank you.

Do commissioners have other questions for Sergeant Haney?

Thank you.

And another, we have another guest here for commissioners who might have questions about the air conditioning at Crescent Halls.

Thank you, Mr. Davidson.

Yeah, Andrew Davidson.

So Colonial Webb is the contractor that works with the housing authority to handle all of the systems at Crescent Halls.

Sure yeah and I'd heard some comments on some fans that had been passed out and we're awfully

We are very concerned if any of the individual tenant spaces do not have cooling.

We try and address those on a case-by-case basis.

To tip my hat to Mr. Duffield, when we're made aware that there's an issue in a tenant space, we try and respond as quickly as we can.

I can say that the equipment serving the base building, which would be the chiller that the chiller you guys made a large investment in a year ago, is running as it should, which essentially supplies chilled water to the entire building.

The challenge on a building like Crescent Hall is each room has a respective

It's called a valence unit.

And what can be a little deceiving about a system like this is that people think that there is a blower blowing air.

That is not the case with the design on this system.

It's called a passive system.

And so chilled water goes through a beam.

As hot air rises, it goes across the beam and falls back down into the room to cool the space.

And so what happens in those types of systems from time to time

Valves can become closed or stuck or thermostats might be faulty and as those situations arise I encourage you or anybody in the room that lives in Crescent Hall please call in and create a service ticket because as we hear of those calls one-on-one we're able to run the service calls and in most cases if the valve is

If we're not able to fix it on site, we are at least able to get it open so that you're going to get cooling that day.

And really they have to be handled on a one by one basis.

But it sounds to me like there might be some more that are not having cooling.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah.

And so, and that's been part of the maintenance contract that we set up with you guys is a walkthrough essentially.

And during peak, I guess the summer peak months, we're there weekly ultimately.

And what we do in those times is inspect the base building equipment to ensure that, you

you are getting chilled water through the building.

Now it's a little bit tricky to coordinate getting into tenant spaces.

Obviously there's some logistics that go behind that and we don't want to intrude on anybody's personal space.

But what we can try and do is check in at the front office and see if there are any specific instances or any rooms that we need to get into.

We are happy to help and want to engage just as quickly as we can answer the phone so I encourage anybody that lives in there please reach out to

So I have one question.

So how quickly are you all receiving the phone calls for tenants who are having problems with their ACs?

Yeah, I don't know.

Okay, so you wouldn't know that information?

Yeah, by the time we get the call, I mean, it would be us there within the same day, I'm not sure.

Yeah.

How effective can every AC unit within the building, can it be repaired?

Yes, they are all repairable.

Varying levels of sophistication depending on which type of unit it is.

I'll say this, so each floor in your hallways per floor, those units have a blower, okay, they're served by what they call a make-up air unit and they pull

air from outside, they condition it and then supply cold air to the hallways.

Okay so those are actual air handlers.

Those you know actually Grant approved a few quotes this weekend and we have parts on order that are going to be repaired hopefully by the end of this week.

The room spaces, the tenant spaces,

There's always a way.

Sometimes the parts might be obsoleted, but we can find something else that can replace it, if that makes sense.

The building's got some age to it.

Some of the rooms might have parts that are 25 years old.

So you just have to find something that you can retrofit that with to make it work.

But it's a perfectly acceptable system.

And in many ways, the way this building was designed, engineers got away from it for a while and it's actually coming back and almost is in vogue having a balance unit.

Low hanging fruit, there's two main culprits and that is there's a chilled water actuator valve that meters water going into the balance unit.

Here lately we've seen quite a few of those that have failed and the ones that are failed are maybe 20 something years old and getting those replacement parts in, they can be replaced.

It takes a little while to get them.

Well, what we've been trying to do is, say we come across one or two, we'll order a surplus.

So maybe like, okay, if there's two bads, reason we'll think that maybe in the next week or so we could see some more, especially when you see

Let's see and this is going over a couple weeks I think at any given time I think the highest amount we saw were five actually down and we were able to in one day we were able to actually get the valve open.

Now that's what we're made aware of and that's to say I always want people to anyone that lives there please don't

Please speak up.

If you're uncomfortable or you have an issue, have no fear of retribution or anything like that.

We want to help.

And so ultimately, we're only as good as the information that we get.

And you don't have to suffer.

Please make the phone call.

We'll do everything we can.

Our guys, we've talked about it.

I have a safety meeting tomorrow morning, and I will talk about that group then.

If you guys have a call and you're not comfortable,

We will make sure that the room has cooling.

It might not be able to be metered directly on the wall, but we'll get cold water coming to that chilled water beam and get you some cooling.

12, I would say.

And you've referenced room several times.

It's typically two balance units per room.

And when I say that per unit, I'm sorry, yeah, per unit.

And I'll share with commissioners in your packets tonight, you've got a work order summary.

Let's see, a number of property calls to Crescent Halls that indicate air conditioning matters.

I think so.

There may have been some late last week that, let's see,

That's what I see.

But again, please, please don't suffer.

Call.

And I mean, it is what's, we're in a high humidity environment in Virginia.

And in a building like that, it can get very hot.

And when you have days of 90 degree temperature sustained, it puts a lot of stress on any system.

And so things are inevitably going to break in the system, but they can be fixed.

So we've been getting a lot of requests.

I mean, you've been here from the beginning of the meeting.

For people to have their air conditioner fixed or there's been a huge push to get fans delivered and whatnot.

I know I've been over a few different times and walked the halls, walked every floor.

And it seems as if things were cooler, but people were saying that they weren't.

Can you respond to that?

I mean, cause we've still been getting a lot of complaints about it being hot.

I think, I think there's always a little hyperbole if you want to say it, you know, when, when, when this time of year and by that, I mean saying, you know, yes, we've seen cases where it,

How do I say this politely?

It isn't always as bad as it seems.

What can compound the situation is if the hallway unit is also not working for whatever reason and then someone has a room, a tenant might have a room that's not cooling properly and they go outside for relief in the hallway and that's not working, it makes it worse than it sounds.

There have been a few instances where we've been called in and there wasn't a problem within the space and we were able to go in.

make no adjustment and the person was happy when we walked out, let's put it that way.

But nonetheless, that there is any number of things that can happen in a building like that that can cause someone's body temperature to go up.

Well, as we heard earlier, it was over nearly 40 fans that have been distributed.

Yeah.

by something just doesn't, I don't, yeah, I'm with you like that.

I, when I heard all the fans are, there's not, there hasn't been 40 subsequent calls of no AC, you know what I mean?

So like if all those fans are being passed out,

Yeah, I mean, because we haven't had that many calls proportionate to say, hey, let's go in there and look and see why the air condition isn't working.

Yeah.

And so that's still fresh in everyone's mind.

And if I were walking out into the hallway and there's no relief,

Oh my God, it's happening again.

Exactly.

Right?

Yes.

And we did, you know, again, we found ourselves in a position where we had to make a significant investment just last year because something major breaks.

even when the system's working perfectly in your unit at 95 degrees sometimes it's just hot I have my fan on and my air conditioning also so I appreciate the the fans and the support the community has given to add to people's comfort no doubt and I also

I'm pleased that people did call even if their unit weren't experiencing difficulties and we'd much rather check a unit and have it actually be working than have someone suffer.

It could have prevented something from happening.

Absolutely.

I have a question for Grant, but thank you, Mr. Davis.

Thank you.

I need to check on that and see.

I don't know.

So I know they have the portable ACs that you roll up and then you just put them inside the window with the hose and it blows cool air.

I'm wondering if commissioners can have a conversation about maybe purchasing a few of those for when the ACs go down and it's extremely hot.

I know when it's hot, it's hot.

I don't care if you have a fan, it's hot.

And it might be 95 degrees outside and the fan just won't work.

And so I'd be interested if we could price those and see if we can have some on hand and have, when we get the calls in, have maintenance to go in and install them.

And once the system is running and up and running properly, we can have maintenance to go in and take them out of the windows and also work on the

Turnaround time for maintenance to get those into the window and to get them out of the window.

I think that when it's 95 to 105 degrees outside, a fan is just not gonna work.

It's just not gonna work.

and so I know those portable AC's work really well.

I think it's a good idea for a board head discussion about seeing if we can purchase those and turn around time for maintenance to get them in the units and turn around time for maintenance to get them out of the unit.

We've gotten a little bit off of our agenda and I'd like to pull us back, but I wanted to make sure that our guests got to speak earlier in the evening.

Also, I have one more thing before we move ahead.

All in favor?

Aye.

Thank you.

Next on our agenda, we have spent several months and some great hours and work sessions hashing through an update to our administrative plan for the housing choice voucher program.

And at this time, I believe we have a document that we would like to put out for public comment.

Mr. Duffield, do you want to speak briefly on this?

It's a 45-day public comment period.

Yes.

Madam Chairwoman, members of the commission, before you, attachment B is the Charlottesville Redevelopment Housing Authority Housing Choice Voucher Section 8 Administration Plan as updated and revised July 2018.

As Chairwoman Jones alluded, much work has been done both by the commission with input from the public and staff at the direction of our consultant partners from the Harrison Berg Redevelopment and Housing Authority.

The document before you is one that is fully up to current HUD guidance standards and also includes certain elements that the CRHA Board of Commissioners

requested we include within the HCV admin plan as a means to make the overall HCV program more efficient, more effective, more responsive to the needs of those who participate within the program.

I'll point to just a couple areas, and Mr. Collins alluded to some of these during his comments.

Page 31, for instance.

includes what is a significantly expanded list of local preferences that are proposed to be included within the admin plan.

This is a departure from the strategy that we've used previously and seeks to place certain values for certain families in various situations.

Page 39, we have an adopted payment standard for our housing choice voucher landlord participants of 110% of the fair market rent for this area.

That again is a departure.

The document again brings CRHA into compliance with current HUD standards.

As Chairwoman Jones alluded, we have at this point the commission needs to accept the document as presented.

That will allow us to put the document out for public comment period following the close of public comment period.

We take those comments.

Thank you.

I was just looking, have we scheduled a meeting where we would propose approving this?

So if we open a 45-day comment period, we will next probably look at this at our September board meeting.

So it'll be slightly longer than 45 days and then probably a vote for approval in October.

I would think that's correct.

It would be the full timeline.

I want to thank my fellow commissioners for the time and work that they put into this document and to say I personally was once again really impressed with my colleagues and their thoughts and really felt like

We are very much on the same page in terms of lowering barriers for entry to our programs, increasing fairness, increasing equity.

There's still a few things in here that we're working through the details on along those lines but really appreciate that we all have a very similar approach and I'm very pleased that I think there's a lot of things in here that will increase our efficiencies but most importantly have made the program more accessible and more fair.

Along those lines though there are some significant changes both in policies that we had to adopt to be in compliance with HUD and most importantly as Mr. Duffield pointed out implementing a preference system which will require a reordering of our wait list.

And so I don't know Mr. Duffield if you want to just speak briefly in terms of preparations that staff will be making to

Fair enough.

Can I just ask in that regard, are we planning on just totally flipping the wait list of something new or is there going to be some

The way our, we're not opening the list.

So we have a list now and the way that it currently works is it's a lottery system.

But once we adopt this plan, we will have to send notifications to everyone on our list informing them of the preference system

giving them the opportunity to apply for those preferences and then reordering the list accordingly based on preferences and date and time stamp.

But I actually appreciate you for bringing that up very much because it wasn't a dumb question at all and I want to be clear that you know we have a waiting list for this program now that is closed so you can't actually apply for to be on our waiting list at this time.

So it's really with the pool of people that's currently on that list.

Are there other questions about this and the program?

Before we move forward, I had a question Osteen.

So the list that we have, we're going to implement the new changes.

into the list so that people can apply for the preferences.

So with that being said, some of the people that are already on the list may move up the list because of the preference, the way the preference is going to be reordered.

So I guess my question would be, should we deal with the list as it is now and then once we reopen, grant, apply the new way?

Because these people that's on the list have been on the list for so long,

and then you have some people that's on the list that are just right there and we're saying we're going to apply this preference which means that they may get dropped all the way to the bottom of the list.

I agree with you.

This list operates differently than the public housing list where you can call in and figure out where you are.

with the HCV waiting list, it's all a lottery system.

So you might have applied five years ago and you might have applied last year and you have an equal chance of being pulled in the lottery.

So am I correct, Mr. Duffield?

So when we move to the preference system, we will actually create one that says if you've been on the list long, you'll actually

your time date stamp will make you closer than perhaps it'll be more fair.

But as soon as we adopt this, we can't have two different lists.

As soon as we adopt this, from what I understand from what we asked Harrison Burke, we have to go with this new system.

So I thought that we had talked about doing away with the lottery for this list.

So if we're doing away with the lottery but we adopt this, then that means that there is no more lottery once we adopt this.

Right now, there's no bottom or top of the list.

Once we go through this, we will have an ordered list.

If somebody has been in our system for a very, very long time, just given the date and timestamp of when they applied, they will

So before we send this out, I mean that's something that we might need to think about.

I know we were in a meeting and I know we want to push this because we want to get this approved, but I would like to know what's going to happen to those people.

Like I said, if we're taken away from the lottery, like you said, now it's not a top or bottom because it's a lottery.

Once we adopt this, there is no lottery.

So what happens?

Nobody has the understanding.

What happens is those within the list that have

Qualified preferences come to the top of the list.

And we have the qualified preferences based on the values that the board and the community identified as these are participants that we feel we need to house more expeditiously than others.

Could we add a preference that you were on the waiting list on a certain date?

Page 34, 5.9, order of selection.

You've got the preference scores are the first.

A tiebreaker then becomes the date of the application.

That's totally not fair to the person who's been waiting and doing everything that they're supposed to do in order.

I think we need to find a solution to

being able to house that person as well as the person with the preferences.

I mean, because once we reorder this list with preferences, we don't know how many people are going to come to the top of the list for somebody that's been on the list for 20 years.

And I mean, I just think that's something we need to think through.

I mean I do think we had a long discussion in our work sessions about preferences and about the priorities of this housing authority with an understanding that you know our preference before had only been live and work in the area and that we would be sending a message and making a great change if we adopted a preference system but by doing so we communicate our values and we do try to offer

Because that's basically what we're getting ready to do.

We're getting ready to send something out for approval or public comment, and we don't know, we haven't worked through

that portion of it.

Well, I welcome comment.

We do have a 45-day comment period.

We can talk to Harrisonburg and we can talk to HUD Richmond about how to handle these kinds of transitions when you change a preference system so drastically as we're doing now if they have advice for us.

Thank you.

Are there other thoughts and comments?

If not, I have a motion from Ms. Rosenstein.

All in favor?

Aye.

The motion passes.

Thank you.

Next on our agenda are redevelopment updates.

And I would have you all turn to tab two, no, sorry, tab three in your binders.

and find a draft that is very nearly the final draft of the RFP or Request for Proposals for a Development Partner.

So as you all know,

Six weeks ago or so we put out a request for qualifications seeking development partners who might be interested in working with us specifically as we look at new developments on the vacant properties of the housing authority.

Through that process we qualified six

are potential partners and the Redevelopment Committee has been working diligently and very hard meeting weekly to draft an RFP that lays out more specific guidelines of our vision and criteria by which we would like to judge potential projects for those two sites.

This will go out to those six partners seeking and hopefully they'll all choose to respond to this RFP and then we will have a selection committee that then works through choosing a development partner.

So I'm very excited that we are making substantial movements forward in our redevelopment and new development efforts.

Are there questions, comments, thoughts on this RFP?

Special use permit.

as this goes out is now on the onus of the Redevelopment Committee and this authority with our partners to really have even more conversations with residents, particularly residents at South First Street about this process and about where it may be heading.

So that's certainly part of the plan.

and the Redevelopment Committee wants this out we'll get to focus on some of the other pieces that we've been working on which are as you all will remember we voted to separate to move just to begin the process to make it easy to go easier to go through the HUD hoops to free up property at Levy Street and the vacant portions of South First Street for development and that involves

surveys, and then an application to the city for replating those properties.

And so that work is underway.

Those are two major redevelopment updates.

Are there any others?

If not, I will say that the Redevelopment Committee also did discuss, now that we are moving quickly down the path of building something, how we will pay for it.

And it was brought to the Redevelopment Committee that perhaps this is

an ideal time to have a conversation with city council about using bond authority to support redevelopment initiatives and to that end under tab 4 you will find a resolution that was recommended

sent to us from the Redevelopment Committee concerning the city, requesting that the city use its bonding authority on behalf of redevelopment of public housing in Charlottesville.

Now I will give you all a chance to look that over and questions and comments are welcome.

You are still up here on the RFP?

Yeah.

So in the RFP we are for the Section 3 portion that is part of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Section 3 fosters local economic development, neighborhood economic improvement, and individual self-sufficiency.

Section 3 is the legal basis.

for providing jobs for residents and awarding contracts to businesses in the areas receiving certain types of HUD financial assistance.

Businesses which can provide evidence that they meet one of the following criteria qualified as Section 3 businesses.

Is that saying have businesses on site?

Is that what that's saying?

It's saying that we want to ensure that the development partner we choose is in compliance with HUD section three rules.

which doesn't mean that they'll, it could mean that they'll hire subcontractors that are Section 3 businesses.

It could mean that they hire Section 3 qualified employees.

Okay.

Well, it's just a lot of legal lingo.

Yes.

Good question.

So if you've all had a chance to take a look at the request.

Sure.

So one of the things after reading this at length and revealing it, I think that it's something that

We can take into account and definitely mule over, but I think there are a couple of things that we may need to fine tune a little bit before officially accepting, adopting, and moving forward and or presenting it to council.

Being that I kind of have an idea of what they would be looking for and if we truly want this to pass, there are some modifications that may need to be made.

Well, I think when we look at a number like $50 million, and even as Mr. Collins alluded to earlier, presenting this to Council and saying, hey, let's move forward with the $50 million bond initiative without having a pre-described way for Council to be able to pay for the debt service that will come with that.

would be problematic.

I also feel that like, I mean, let's just be honest here.

If my colleagues were to hear that, I think it may scare them or kind of freak them out before we can even really get to it.

And what I would like for us to see us do is try to figure out ways that we can make this come to fruition, opposed to maybe saying something and then hoping like they'll come down and understand it.

I agree.

I just know of what other competing priorities in the city, which public housing or redevelopment is one that's a high priority for us, but how do we get there in terms of how do we pay for it?

Furthermore, council would also like to ask, what's the plan?

So they would say if we were to, excuse me?

All right, so one thing that I know council would say is if we decide to fold a $50 million plan, do you have the developers lined up?

Do you have the relocation plans already in place?

Do you have the site plans of what you want to do?

Is there something that you can present to us?

Those are questions that they would initially have before wanting to move forward because I think that as has been documented, they've stated

Mr. Bellamy, you have consistently asked us to fund different things for the housing authority, which we support, but they always ask me a lot of different questions.

And then the underlying question that they always ask me is, so at what point do we start to see some of the return on our investment?

We've given money in your equity package.

We did this stuff with Ting.

We're giving money for this.

We're giving money for that.

When are things going to come back?

Or when can you show us what's transpired?

And if we don't have a clear plan why we're going to move forward, this may be one that they deny.

And I think us going through the CIP process would be a better suit of force.

Now, that being said, I'm completely open to us pushing forward with the bond.

I don't know if 50 million is the number.

I agree with that.

I think 50 million sounds like a nice round number.

I think we need a budget that shows what the right number is and it might be 50 million but I would like to see some backup that justifies that number.

Mr. Bellamy, Dr. Bellamy, I would just say you're absolutely right.

You've done some wonderful work on behalf of CRHA and on behalf of our public housing residents in securing funding for internet, for substantial rehab work for any number of things.

I think a $50 million ask is nothing for you to be able to get pushed through the council.

I think the primary goal of, well clearly the primary goal is to get 50 million dollars or a significant commitment of

of money, but a close second is to ensure that in all the conversations and all the priorities that happen, and we know that you keep public housing redevelopment at the forefront in council, but that there is, that it doesn't get lost, and that we really do

I want to have, is this or is something like this an opening of a conversation where we

Right.

So there was two things come to mind based off all of your comments.

One, I think the first question that will come back is, Wes or Dr. Bellamy, when you first got here, you specifically asked us to do $2.5 million to the housing authority in your equity package.

So that's $500,000 a year that's already earmarked.

What do you, show us, us counsel, what exactly has happened or what you've done with that money?

That would be the first question.

And if we can't clearly articulate, which I think we can, but we need to clearly be able to articulate what we've done thus far and then what we plan to do moving forward.

Then the second question would be, I think we need to develop a strategy in regards to showing

where the money would come from.

So I know Mr. Norris, excuse me, Mayor Norris and I.

We, to the chagrin of some, and as I sat down at that other end getting yelled at, we worked very hard on the West 2nd development to ensure that there would be a certain amount of units, one, but also the tax revenue that came back would potentially be able to be used for, and what we were talking about was essentially this.

Redevelopment.

So that's nearly $950,000 in anticipated tax revenue.

That would essentially be able to cover something like a $20 million bond, not $50 million according to our calculations.

So that would be something that we would need to talk specifically to council about.

So we know you all approved this.

We know when you approved it.

I even had that discussion on the dais.

Can we look at earmarking that specific tax revenue to float a bond to pay for the debt services?

But we need to have those things in writing, clearly defined plans or potential plans, where we want to start relocation and so forth.

Because if not, the only thing that council has right now is, Wes already said they get $500,000 a year and Wes has bought up that

You may want to use West 2nd to do a bond.

Okay.

So what would your recommendation, I hear you saying maybe not this.

Yeah, so I'll also make no quorums and this may be to the chagrin of

other entities in the city.

While I have a lot of respect for other non-profits, my first priority is public housing.

So I will always be an advocate for public housing first, and that's no disrespect to PHA, Habitat, whomever.

What I would suggest that we do is come back with a number that's a little lower.

I think the $20 million number may be more realistic with

Specifically asking can we look at the tax revenue that's generated from West 2nd to come and float this specific bond.

I'm sorry, and along with Mr. Osteen's budget.

Can we get into the capital process?

Yeah.

Okay.

Yes.

We can get it in the capital process.

So again, that's not me recommending that we say no, I would just recommend that we hold off.

Meetings are at noon, I'm at work.

Sorry, I can't.

Okay.

Just one clarification.

So maybe Julie just didn't type well.

That's very possible that it's a typo.

Okay.

Or I read the wrong calendar.

My apologies.

It's Tuesday the 24th, our normal Tuesday meeting.

Thank you for pointing that out.

Where is it again?

Okay, I'll be there tomorrow.

I will not be there tomorrow.

I will be there.

Okay.

With that, that brings us on our agenda to our executive director's report.

Mr. Duffield?

Yes.

Yeah.

Thank you, Chairwoman Jones, members of the commission.

Behind tab five, we have the executive director's report for the period June 23rd to July 22nd, 2018.

First on the bullets of key accomplishments, smoke-free community policy implementation.

If I might pause for a minute here, I know we have one with the IRC, right?

who has done some initial work at Crescent Halls to make suggestion concerning implementation, ongoing implementation of the smoke-free policy.

My name is Jim Herndon with the Independence Resource Center on Cherry Avenue.

Good evening.

Mr. Vandever and I met with Ms. Mason several days ago concerning the 25-foot smoke-free area that is now being implemented at the Crescent Hall.

and we found that one of the concerns Ms. Mason had was that people with disabilities, particularly people in wheelchairs were going into the circular drive outside the 25 foot area and smoking and this was a danger because automobiles use that of course to

to get around the facility.

So we looked at some options and it seemed like the best option would be to put a gazebo which you guys, I think you've already purchased.

Yeah, in the back in the grassy area.

The issue with that is grass is not accessible to wheelchairs.

So we've helped Ms. Mason identify the perspective of purchasing some temporary lay down surface that would be accessible to wheelchairs to the gazebo.

Thank you.

What else?

Yes.

As you said, we purchased a gazebo.

And so now the issue right about now is trying to get the gate open because it's apparently rusted on the inside.

So we're trying to get the gate open so that we could get the temporary flooring down for our wheelchair.

So those gates are closed under recommendation from the police department for safety issues.

Well right now they're very safe because they don't open at all.

So I kind of think that if we put, it's really like a 12 by 12 gazebo.

So if you put that on the hill, that's dangerous as well because there's traffic that comes through it.

and if you put it on the lower bottom part, that's also dangerous because of speeding traffic going through there.

So the back part of it would be the most safest place that you, with it being 25 feet from the building, that's the most safest place that you could put that.

So the back side is where the grill and stuff is on?

Is that what you're talking about?

So how much lighting is back there?

Well, I think that we had also spoke with security about, because the lighting right now is fine.

I don't know, I mean we might want to check as far as you know what I'm saying, the continuous lighting because it flickers off and on when it gets ready.

but we were talking about speaking with security as far as you know I'm saying upgrading the security a little bit so that they could be you know have a little bit more walkthroughs or you know and it's not very many people that actually come out there to smoke because most of the people have quit smoking.

Thank you.

So I had a question.

No, because you got your...

Right, it's too steep for some people to walk.

You got blind people that, you know what I'm saying, it's too steep for them to walk.

Safety is more important than anything.

We're trying to make it as safe as we possibly can with them.

So it's pretty much in that back part, and then everybody's not gathering around in that

So help me understand the breezeway part in the wheelchair again because that's not wheelchair accessible.

Two things, I spoke to Mr. Vandever today at the office, and there were two concerns, one would be the surplus, you know, make sure that we purchase the correct surplus.

So my concern is just security.

I know you said that you all have a conversation about them periodically walking through, but I guess my concern would be the fact that they already have security issues.

They're on the inside of the building.

and so when you put it out back where there's no security cameras and there's nothing out there for the public to come down or something to happen from you know that Main Street.

We need to make sure that it's covering from the breezeway down to the... Security, lighting, and when you say temporary services, how temporary are temporary in your experience?

You said a temporary ramp and temporary hard surface to accommodate wheelchairs.

I haven't done extensive research on that.

I was with the city for a long time, but when we did it with the city, it was concrete.

But this is something that would serve a purpose.

The ones that I've looked at seem to be durable, you know, fairly durable.

Are they metal?

They're different types.

I think once we

Yeah, the federal guidelines says stable and slip resistant.

That's what the ADA guidelines say.

And there are different types of material.

The materials even they lay out on the sand on the beach, which is in an allowed wheelchair to go out on the beach.

Thank you so much for your assistance with this.

Thank you.

If we're talking about people with disabilities, we cannot forget Wes Haven and the seniors there as well.

That's going to be an issue.

Right.

We knew when we adopted the smoking policy that the first six months are really a study period to figure out where we need to make sure there are appropriate accommodations and that some of those we're implementing already.

It sounds like, Wes, we may need to come up and do a quick evaluation as well.

So, Mr. Duffield, we interrupted you and you had just begun your report.

Let's see.

Also, we completed a REAC inspection at West Haven last week.

Our score has improved at West Haven by 11 points to 70, certainly not

as high as we'd like to see them but it's substantial work in the right direction and feel good about that.

We have upcoming REAC inspections at South First Street and Sixth Street on August 10th and then Crescent Halls I believe on September 19th.

Hats off to PHAR and Miss Johnson and the West Haven community for

Pulling together what is one of the most amazing cleanup day efforts I've ever been a part of in any community I've served.

between seven and three.

This is probably about eight to two for me, but that's, you know, I'm lazy.

But yeah, we had a lot of people out that were doing a lot of hard work, good resident involvement.

We had some community members that came out and showed the load with us, staff, just a fantastic

work effort there and I really feel like if you haven't had a chance you gotta ride through sometime and take a look at the grounds.

Certainly more we can do but that was a nice, that was a nice swat I thought.

Also in West Haven we had a tree fall on a couple of buildings.

You may have heard about that and we had a number of folks

displaced for a period of time on, let's see, July 5th, we had tree fall on the 834 and 836 building.

It's actually a limb of a tree.

We had six families displaced.

On the 5th, Electrician and Dominion Power mobilized immediately on July 5th.

10th, we had a tree company out to remove the limb and remove the remainder of the dead tree.

July 11th, the electrician scoped the work that needed to be done and had to order some parts.

On the 14th, the electrical repairs were made and Dominion Energy was able to turn the power back on to the buildings.

We had move in of

and four of the six displaced families back into the buildings.

We've had two families that are still displaced.

However, they are in the process of relocating within the West Haven community.

In fact, that relocation should be completed this week.

The insurance company has visited West Haven and the contractors have been retained to begin reconstruction work

on the two units that have been most severely damaged.

Estimates are that those units should be repaired and back online hopefully within 60 days.

Many thanks to again PHAR, many thanks to Wes and the city for coming out and helping us during the process of

Caring for the needs of those that were most severely impacted.

We had tremendous, fantastic support from the Holiday Inn up at University as well as the Hampton Inn on Main Street.

They were exceptionally accommodating for us at local food providers that helped step up as well.

It was a beautiful outreach given some fairly terrible situations.

but I think we're on the mend there and potentially we learned a little something in the process but we'll see.

We've had the Crescent Hall security meeting and we have ongoing security and HVAC matters that are being addressed.

I spoke briefly about our August 12th preparations that are currently underway.

Let's see, other things that are of interest, meeting with the UACC representatives about the community gardening projects that are taking place on our properties.

We have contracted for the environmental work at

Levy Avon and that work is underway.

We also have the surveying project at South First Street and at Levy Avon underway as well.

We're coordinating with the standard building on their closeout for

the CO tasks for CRHA, probably need to spend a little time with Ms. Johnson to make sure those folks are covering all the bases that they promised.

We're uploading the capital budget for HUD.

Yeah, lots, just tremendous amount going on.

We've got a fire sprinkler pump.

that we have to replace in the very near future.

The fire sprinkler pump at Crescent Halls is functioning but is in need of replacement and that is a priority matter for us.

We are taking quotes at this point and hopefully we'll have that resolved fairly quickly.

Again, the pump's functional, provides sufficient pressure but it appears that there are significant wear parts that

or demand that we retire that unit and replace it in its entirety.

As far as the fiscal performance of the agency, the first page that you, first graph page that you see will give you the overall summary for our public housing sites.

Suffice to say, at this point within the fiscal year, we should be, we are three months in of our 12 month period.

That means we're at 25% through our fiscal year.

As we look at the year to date numbers, those percentages should fall close to that 25% benchmark.

and by and large, they do the revenue, overall revenues are at 24%, our overall expenditures are at 22%, so our revenues are exceeding our expenditures.

At this point, we're carrying a positive variance of just over $60,000 year to date.

One line that jumps out is a tenant services

Line item, I need to research that some more.

I suspect we have some charges that have been billed to that line item that really belong elsewhere in the budget because I know that's, I know we haven't performed as for the purpose of tenant services.

So again, suffice to say public housing side looks pretty strong.

West Haven's performing well.

Crescent Halls is performing at a loss, but we budget a loss at Crescent Halls.

South First and Sixth Street are performing well, as are our scattered sites.

Housing Choice Voucher Program at this point is showing a paper loss at this point.

This is based on the losses because the funding cycle with HUD has not completed for this quarter.

Once they catch up, we will be back in the black on a housing choice voucher.

And then our central office functions are performing to budget.

The remaining documents there are detailed line items for each.

each department, each program.

As I alluded earlier, there's a work order summary that has been included with this package.

We've had during the reporting period, we had just under 200 work orders recorded.

and I don't have the, what I need to do is make a breakdown of how these work orders fall by property.

You can see the properties but I don't have them summarized by property.

We do have some that are outstanding at this point but it looks like most of those are within a week, maybe a week old and some of them

Yeah, things that are clearly making buildings, making property available for service providers that should be classified as closed out.

And you'll see, clearly there are quite a few calls for air conditioning related concerns at Crescent Halls.

There is no doubt.

Commissioners, I hope that gives you some summary of the activities that have been taking place during the reporting period.

I have some questions.

I very much appreciate your support.

And thank you for everything that you're doing to be supportive of me and my staff.

It's enjoyable to work with you.

So the last meeting that we had, we talked about having the new vehicles as a line item in the budget.

And I don't see that.

I think we said that it would be coming out with this budget.

It should be in here.

But I'm not seeing it.

I see vehicle gas and oil.

I think that's because the financing package has not been finalized.

We have the vehicles that are titled there in our possession, but the final financing document has not been released by the financing entity.

However, we can get that.

We certainly should have that.

Also, I had asked about the evictions list, the eviction list and rent repayment list that we used to get.

And you said it will be added in this budget.

I also asked about the turnaround list and the offline units list.

At the top of each summary roll-up, it tells you how many units

Okay.

So is it possible we can put it in a budget so it'd be reader-friendly back on a separate page like we had it before?

Because this kind of looks like, I mean, I guess for someone who doesn't really understand the budget, this just looks like a bunch of information.

The way you had it before, it was reader-friendly, it was on a separate page, and it was clear and it had clarity that this is what we're reading.

Yes, we have a tree assessment of all the properties.

that's been provided to us.

And yes, there are trees that we need to address quickly.

Are there other questions for Mr. Duffield?

Thank you, Mr. Duffield.

A small request I would make is either next month or September, whichever one coincides with our next report to the city.

I would love an update on the rental assistance program.

I'm not sure.

That'll be in your bucket.

If it's convenient, just when we do that next report to the city I would love to share that report with the board as well just to check in on how that program's going.

All right.

Thank you.

Other comments, questions?

If not, we have a few committee reports.

I apologize, I did neglect to include a maintenance committee report as it's new.

But those of you who attended, if you want to give us a brief summary.

Brandon gave the best report possible I really couldn't think of anything beyond what he was talking about he had a very good summary of it but you know our biggest issue right now is kind of that head facility person is not on staff we're looking for that person and I think Brandon made the point and I think it's critical

you know in the general population you think of that as a technically competent person in all these skills and you know we really talked about that really needs to be a people person as well as a technically competent person that this interaction with our residents

needs to be prioritized going forward as well as the work certainly.

But we are looking at a Yarny system that has the ability to handle the calls, turn them directly into kind of work order requests.

We're looking at kind of a five-year maintenance plan that would be generated by facility inspections that would get us out there in front of a lot of issues.

So rather than dealing with

you know, an unlimited number of issues on a monthly basis as they fail.

Hopefully we could get out there in front of some big systems and address those problems.

But yeah, we'll be continuing to work.

The big announce is, you know, we would really love to have a resident from every site be a part of that committee.

Someone, you know, I wouldn't emphasize how much work it might possibly be, but I'd rather emphasize

We would like that point person so that we're getting some feedback on a monthly basis from what we're seeing on the sites.

Fantastic.

And yes, just let us know when you schedule the next one, thank you.

Miss Johnson just left.

She had to go to work.

Yes, unfortunately I was not able to attend the Resident Services Committee this month.

Were you there, Miss Oliver?

Yeah, I was.

Well, we had a really, really good meeting.

Ms. Carolyn Ward-Wicks was there to kind of facilitate the meeting.

And we basically talked about concerns about people feeling like public housing wasn't

private property, they're coming onto the property basically, you know, doing what they want, disrespecting again the residents.

That was an issue basically happening on West Haven.

And then we just talked, we talked about resident concerns about services that we felt

that social services is not, it's kind of failing our folks rather than supporting the folks that they need to support.

And, you know, I think at one point we're going to make a statement to say, you know, to the public that, you know, this is just unacceptable.

Poor people are not poor people.

They're decent people that, you know, and you need to respect that.

We talked about, there's names that I don't want to put out here, but basically action plans about how

The resident services will be dealing with these issues.

And they are issues, they are concerns, and they need to be supported by, you know, the residents need to support the resident service and the resident's concerns.

And then we, our next meeting will be August 9th at South First Street.

I think it's usually

I have a question.

The second paragraph, it says J. Johnson stated that she is aware of a juvenile who is working without breaks.

Do we know anything about that?

I hope I need a discussion regarding Facebook.

I see, wait.

It says, explained that he investigates employers with six to 14 employees and that that client must have been fired.

We did talk about that and it wasn't a lot of, I didn't get a lot of clear.

Clarification of what was going on with that but I did know that if that was happening then it's a federal violation because they have to

give them at least 30 minute breaks if you're working an eight hour shift.

So Grant, can we check into that and make sure that's being done?

And if they're not getting breaks, Grant, can you make sure they are getting their breaks?

Maybe just shoot out, send out a text message, make sure the employees are getting their breaks.

Certainly.

I was wondering if you'd also be willing to give us a very quick update on the clinic.

Can we put that on agenda for next meeting?

Yes.

At our next meeting we will have a clinic update.

Thank you.

Okay.

I just wanted to add one thing when we're scheduling meetings that we send out meeting dates and times in advance and sometimes I can't get to my phone because I drive the bus so it's hard for me to get back and as you all know I have a hectic schedule with six children so I would appreciate if we can get those out

and if a commissioner does not respond to contact by telephone, things happen.

Sometimes we can't get back.

I know that I wanted to be at the security meeting.

I couldn't because it was during the day.

I wanted to be at the maintenance committee meeting but I couldn't because

It was cutting close in time.

And that's a perfect segue to our meeting date announcements.

As mentioned earlier, tomorrow is a redevelopment committee meeting, Tuesday the 24th at noon at South First Street Community Center.

And there is a resident services meeting on Thursday, August 9th at 1 p.m. as just mentioned.

Don't want to forget West Haven Community Day, which is Saturday, August 4th, from I think 10 to 6.

7 to 3.

That was the cleanup.

The cleanup was 7 to 3.

When she said that in the meeting, I was like, why is it starting at 7 o'clock?

The cleanup starts early.

West Haven stays a little later, but it's always a lot of fun.

I just wanted to say out of respect for the residents, normally I support Community Day at West Haven, but I won't be able to attend this West Haven Community Day.

Thank you.

I also won't be able to attend.

I promised my wife a date weekend.

This will be real quick.

I can't resist saying when you reprint the resolution about the 50 or 20 or on the first whereas in the second line if you could add the word white between be and citizens

What was that again, Miss Ombud?

Can you repeat that again?

So it reads, in 1954, via a referendum vote of the white citizens of Charlottesville.

OK, I promise not to talk a lot.

Brandon Collins, I work for PHAR, Public Housing Association of Residents.

I just wanted to also support the idea of including the tenants' accounts receivable in the reports, a list of how many SUDs and how many pending evictions.

might be out there and their repayment agreements.

I think if you go way back, I think if you go back to prior 2016 and look at finance committee minutes, you'll find a format that I think Miss Talbert was referring to.

I like your roll-up summaries as well, but I definitely want that information as well.

Really appreciate just the brief mention that public housing does not mean it's public property and that's something that I think we all need to remember to abide by and support and particularly when residents stand up for their right to have their property.

Residents are very particular about the housing authority staff coming into their house and we expect the staff to not just come in whenever they want to.

They certainly don't expect

outsiders to show up on

I think the point of the resolution tonight was to just get it in the pipeline for these capital improvement meetings and this discussion about the city's bonding for capital improvement.

And I think it's really important that you have a statement from the Housing Authority no matter how vague.

Absolutely, if you're going to get a $50 million bond from the city, these details are going to be lined out.

I think realistically speaking just looking at the old master plan and putting a price tag on that adjusted for the cost of things right now you're looking at over 150 million dollars for a total cost so I think 50 million

gives you enough to work with.

So I think it's really important that we get this in the pipeline for those work sessions to get in the process of the city's CIP and bond thing.

And I really think a resolution would have supported that.

It would have opened up a conversation.

And yeah, they're going to want the details.

Of course, we want to give them that.

There's an RFP.

A developer will be selected.

There will be pro formas.

there will be site designs, there will be site plans, there is movement on all of this and I really think it's up to all of us to share that with the public in general as much as possible at this point.

I think we really have to just show that this is what's going on but particularly to the council who's been asking for a product and now we have a product.

And I think while we're not all on the same page in terms of how the rest of this is all gonna go, I think we're all leaning towards a process and starting to share a vision of the timing

of overall redevelopment and the parallel track as we move forward.

It's really important that money's going to go quick.

Your equity fund, beautiful.

If that money goes out the door starting in September, it's going to go so fast.

I mean, it's going to hurt.

It's going to be so painful.

And that $50 million, that's not going to cover everything.

That's going to give us a way to fund the rest of it.

And I think you're right to ask for this stuff.

You're absolutely right, the TIF, Water Street,

I think it's really important that the council consider also West Main.

getting that tax revenue put towards bond financing and hydraulic.

I mean the impact from the standard and their tax liability, you know, the impact of the standard on public housing is intense.

And so if we can capture at least some benefit from that from their tax revenue and apply that to bond financing, that'd be great.

And then the small area plan for hydraulic also affecting our public housing neighborhoods out there.

That's going to be huge.

That's going to bring a ton of new tax revenue, not right off the bat, but down the road.

And these are great things.

And we can say, we can capture this.

Charlottesville, it's time to do it.

Let's do it.

This is how we're going to pay for it.

I think you'd be carrying the ball amazingly well.

And just keep in mind, residents, particularly Crescent Halls, want a process that moves fast.

That's why we're moving so fast on this stuff.

That's why, yeah, we've got a lot of work to do on relocation, but we're going to get there.

And the plan is there.

And I really think it was a mistake not to pass that resolution.

May I respond really quickly?

So public housing redevelopment is in the pipeline.

So our first retreat.

Well, I know my first retreat in 2016, we had to list our priorities and that was number two of three, public housing redevelopment.

So that's there.

And then that's how we got the support for the equity package.

We're in the pipeline now.

We can expand that number from the 500,000 that we currently have to a higher number.

Council just wants like plans or whatever we're gonna do.

So I hear what you're saying wholeheartedly, and I think you and I are on the same page.

We just may not have the same number, but we're on the same page.

But I do want you to know again, and all of us,

And that's good to hear and I think your board supports you and I think the public's going to support you.

I think our concern was that we really need to get in the CIP process now and start those conversations so it's directly in the CIP that we're talking directly about the bonds and

you know what the bonding process being in the pipeline is what you mean yeah okay yeah yeah in that process and and get it rolling and uh you know we need we need yeah we need some help so i apologize i didn't i didn't quite under no no no no no yeah let's yeah no we appreciate as much help as we can get getting money getting support and we know your support and uh hopefully you can get the rest of the council to fully support

politically and financially.

Number one, Grant, I've already asked you and I told Robin about the noise that's coming from my Miss Maybell's apartment.

if you can get someone in there to look at that within the next day or two before it drives me and Miss Maybell crazier than, or crazier than what I already am anyway.

And number two, I agree with you totally on the cameras.

The cameras need to be put out.

They need to be put on West Haven.

I've asked for them when I lived at Crescent Hall and finally, six years later, they finally get cameras in over there, which we totally need them.

The lights on the side of the walls at West Haven have still not been fixed.

and y'all said about a year ago before the smoking policy went in effect that y'all was going to be putting little things down with sand in it for people to put their cigarette butts in it.

Well, now they're throwing them out in the street, in the sidewalk and on the steps.

So now we're having to look at the nasty cigarette butts out there so something needs to be done about the cigarette butts.

and you asked me the last time we was here about my window.

Nothing's been done or anything done about the windows so far.

So, I don't know if anybody can be done about them without replacing the whole windows.

So, and I think that's all I have to say.

I'd like to, oh, sorry.

Please.

All right.

That adjourned yet.

There's a movement that we go into closed session.

Is there a second?

I second.