That wasn’t on the agenda!

I hate it when committees do this – and you can’t blame the media for not covering something when they don’t know it is going to happen. But when the mayor shows up – it probably should be on the agenda. Which is why the county doesn’t get covered much, in my opinion, their agendas are atrocious – you can’t tell what anything means by the way it is listed on the agenda and you can’t see the attachments to help explain. Police and Fire Commission have the absolute worst agendas, but CDBG and Community Services come in near the top.

So, are you ready for a tale of two VERY DIFFERENT mayors . . . .

BACKGROUND
Anyways . . .

I attended the CDBG committee yesterday because of the prior post and their trend of continuing to raise their affordable housing levels. Did you know they consider housing affordable if it is at 100% of FMR. FMR you ask? Fair Market Rent. Meaning – a $700+ one bedroom apartment. Um, that’s market rate – that’s not affordable! And we wonder why we have an affordable housing problem . . . but I digress.

Instead tho, the mayor showed up (I confess, I heard he was going to do it earlier that day, but that really wasn’t why I was there – I was there for the former post, the above issue and I wanted to hear what the HUD funding situation is, but I had to leave. There was no handout on that issue that I saw but there might have been one, and of course it wasn’t in legistar.)

ISSUE
Why did the mayor show up? Here’s why.

December 8, 2011

The Honorable Paul Soglin
Mayor
210 MLK]r Blvd, Room 403
City-County Building
Madison, WI 53703

Dear Mayor Soglin,

As chair of the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) committee in the city of Madison, I write with a request regarding the status of our city’s affordable housing trust fund. The Madison Affordable Housing Trust Fund ordinance
[MGO 4.22]- specifically Section (4) -charges our committee with the powers and
duties of disbursement of funds via a prescribed process outlined.

Currently, there have been no funds disbursed in 2011, but the ordinance allows for up to $1,025,653 spending on affordable housing this year. We have just received
an application from a non-profit housing organization (Mavin’ Out, Inc) requesting use of a portion of these funds. This applicant is also seeking state tax credits for financing their proposed project, and therefore, need a decision from the city by early january, 2012 at the latest.

City staff informed our committee that presently your office requests no disbursements be made from the affordable housing trust fund. I would ask you or an authorized staff to come to the january 5, 2012 meeting of the CDBG committee to share the reason for your request to hold these funds, and to answer questions our committee members may have.

I will appreciate your follow up to this invitation. I further request you include our committee in future communications from your office concerning your vision and goals for affordable housing in our city, as we are a policy body serving these purposes.
Thanks for your time and attention. Respectfully,
-justin Markofski
CDBG committee chair

Kudos to the mayor for showing up so quickly. And for being open to discussion. Here’s what he had to say.

MAYOR’S COMMENTS
Mayor Paul Soglin says the question he received was what is happening with the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. He said that the last 7 to 9 months have been spent on the budget and now they are turning their attention to other issues and now they are getting on to this and other issues. At this point, he wants to understand the purpose of the funds, he wants a review done as to what we want to accomplish, what is the process to make the funds available. It concerns him that there is no RFP (Request for Proposals) process. He says one of the things to consider is setting up goals and objectives for funds and to have the process be competitive to get the funds, so we do not have a situation where one organization get the funds in a non-competitive process and then it is not available for other purposes. The other issue he thinks has been resolved is that they need to look at where the money came from to make sure that there are no restrictions on that money and he is following up on that.

DISCUSSION

other issues e thinks are resolved having to deal with where the omeny came from, make sure if borrowed vufunds, any restrictisonand if not, also faollowing up.

QUESTIONS AND DISCUSSION
Russ Whitesel thanks the mayor for his quick response, but he wants to know who is going to set those priorities, will the mayor appoint a committee.

Mayor says that they should do it. He wants to see what was done in the past, look at other models and then send it on to the committee for their recommendations. He says it is difficult because we are doing it in a vacuum with no coherent statement on housing policy that ranks and prioritizes our goals. If we wait for that, it will be another year, but in the interim he still wants to see some discussion and review of the alternative plans. He doesn’t know the answers, he wants to see the work done. He wants to see what other cities have done.

Whitesel says that they would be advisory to the mayor.  (I don’t understand why committee members are so confused about what their roles are – ok, I understand, but Mayor Dave is gone, act like a committee!  Look at your mission, make recommendations, go!)

The Mayor says advisory to themselves, the council and the mayor.

Whitesel says that is the role they play now.

Justin Markofski says that the Affordable Housing Trust Fund ordinance was created and went through a process of defining policy through research and consideration, but it doesn’t have an RFP.  Not!

Soglin says that some things were done when it was created and some of those things were ommited and he wants to see how those fit in now.

Dan O’Callaghan says that there is limited funding available, and even tho it is a big pot of money, it is not what we need and we need to see it grow, originally there was a commitment to do that through the budget, but that isn’t happening, how can we grow the fund?

Mayor says that won’t happen at this point, not under the cloud of the last year and what the state has done to us, we are only sustaining programs and that is a challenge, we got through this year’s budget and he thinks we can get through 2013 (I think that’s the year he said) and after that? At this point growing things is more of a hope.

Whitesel says that they were looking at how to make the money work, and generate support. They were looking at shorter term lending where the pay back was quicker – more of a bridge loan concept and not 15 -20 years but more of a revolving fund.  But they and the council did the complete opposite!

Soglin says that is very attractive view, that interests him a lot.

Markofski says that this question was prompted to you because of a proposal that matched what Whitesel is talking about. $750K for 2 – 3 years, (Missed the interest rate). He says as the ordinance reads right now, we could entertain that and take action on that but we wanted to hear from you. He would want to know more specifics about what the mayor wants in the process.

Mayor says they should look at the length of the loans, consider if it should be revolving, look at the housing types it funds, should there be more SRO housing (single rooms, shared bath often), are we working for low-income families or working families, should we target neighborhoods and it should be competitive in nature. If the pending project is the only one that meets these goals, then ok. He feels strongly about it being competitive, he doesn’t want to give it to one organization, no matter how meritorious.

Shiva Bidar-Sielaff asks about the timeline of when the mayor will get back to them because the money is sitting there. It’s not a lot, but we have a great project. She agrees with the need for it to be competitive, the committee has discussed that and even the applicants agree that it creates and unfairness when it is first come, first serve.

Mayor says he wants to get it back to them by mid-February or end of this month. But they can start working on it now, there is no reason not to start.

Bidar-Sielaff says that the alders (Phair and Bruer are not there) and staff can start working on the competitive process part of it as an ordinance amendment. She says that they could do a first round in June and one later in the fall if there is still more money.

Bill Clingan, Community Development Director says that is what the council talked about.

O’Callaghan asks if there should be a joint committee with the housing committee?

Laughter. O’Callaghan is confused, lots of chatter.

The mayor says that would create delays, after muttering that the committee is under revision.

Anne Monks, Assistant to the Mayor says that if there is an RFP they need to list the goals and say what they are looking for – what are our priorities beyond the ordinance. The ordinance was written pretty simply.

Mayor says they may not need more ordinance changes, but if they want to look at it now, please do.

O’Callaghan says that the criteria is there, the competitive process is just missing.

Monks says that it is difficult to understand the ordinance and which parts they are emphasizing, anything could be funded, there is no sense of priority, for example, should it be public or private developers.

Whitesel says that we are not in a position to say any more than that, we want to see proposals, that might be part of the process – we want them to tell us what we can do, then we pick the best ones, they don’t want to preclude good proposals with the process.

Monks asks how they would decide.

Whitesel says we have a committee to decide that.  Wow.

Monks asks if it would not be in the RFP? Wouldn’t they say their priorities?

Whitesel says they wouldn’t pick a neighborhood.

Monks says they would just set priorities, they wouldn’t be absolute.

Does it scare you that this is how the committee wants to make decisions?

Markofski says that they will look at goals, objectives and priorities, he remembers them keeping it flexible to keep creativity, that is not to say that they can’t refine what they want.

Bidar-Sielaff says that they need to think about how they would score the RFPs, staff should come up with the forms to weigh the RFP, how many points should there be for which descriptors.

Soglin asks them to please take the initiative.   And there you have it.  Committees should have the freedom to do their work, not just what the mayor wants them to do, welcome back democracy!

HERE WE GO AGAIN
Since Todd Jarrell started pushing the idea in 2001, the Affordable Housing Trust Fund has been controversial, unwelcomed by many and basically jerked around. I’m hoping – and pleasantly surprised! – that this discussion might help right some of that. And that this time I can participate because I am not restrained by my year of silence. I’m sure I won’t agree with everything the mayor wants, but goals and priorities and direction (that was mostly removed from the ordinance last time around) is good!