Housing and Human Welfare Committee - Regular Meeting

Awesome.

Thank you. So we'll jump back in. There was a slight technical difficulty there. Next item on the agenda, is approval of our amendments, the housing human welfare committee amendments, from this is 03/17, but I'm assuming this is Approval of the agenda first.

Mister chair, I'd like to make a motion to approve the agenda.

I'll second that. All in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Aye. Excuse me. Next item on the agenda is not approval of the minutes. My apologies. Housing human welfare committee meetings from 03:17 twenty five. Is there a motion to approve those minutes? So moved. Second. All those in favor, aye. Aye. Next item on the agenda is o 3324, process for property development in Annapolis. Is there any comment on this before we make a motion to recommend favorably to the council? Alderman Shandomai?

Yes. Mister chairman, thank you so much. This is a very exciting piece of legislation. This will be my third time hearing it in front of me. It's coming in front of all three of my committees.

So I'm very excited to finally get in front of the council as a whole. I don't know if we want to take a stand on the rules committee amendment. I do think it's appropriate just because with the information we got in economic matters on the definition of what a hearing is, I do think that would would be appropriate for us to make an unfavorable recommendation on amendment one. Amendment two from economic matters is not posted, but we can discuss it so the public can know and take a favorable recommendation on that. And with that, I will yield the floor.

Thank you for that. And so let's start with the amendment number one, which is the, Finlayson, amendment on behalf of the rules of city government committee. As it reads, on page six and line seven after, insert or after the insert last, and it'll read the board of appeal shall reach its decision within forty days from the date of the last hearing. And I believe if I recall correctly, director, opposed the amendment, not its intentions, but opposed the amendment, because by adding that, it further delays the, the board of appeals process, and it would extend. Well, he basically said that a hearing consists of of one issue over several, extended meetings.

But the currently current way we do it is that we have multiple hearings for one issue, which prolongs, the board of appeals process. And I'll allow the alderman from Ward 5 to correct me or add any additional comment there as well.

Thank you, mister chairman. You do have it correct. A hearing can last multiple days, but as long as it is on the same issue, it is still considered the same hearing. And the director did not want the phrase last hearing because it implied that it is acceptable to have multiple hearings on the same issue. In rules, we did not have that explained to us as eloquently as we did during economic matters. And so while I was originally part of this amendment and the rules committee having more information brought in front of us, I do think it is appropriate for us to make a negative recommendation on this. Alderman Huntley, do you have any questions on this front, sir?

Yeah. I do. Thank you. Based on the conversations that you two have heard in economic matters and rules, would it be is there a reason that it would not be more appropriate to say last day of the hearing?

So that exact motion were asked director Gopubiak to come in on the actual to get, like, the best explanation as possible for that. But in a sense, the director explained how you don't make a decision before the hearing is complete, And there is nothing about this legislation that demands a decision be made before the hearing is complete. There is timeline set for when a hearing must start. There is not timeline set for when a hearing must be completed. So they are going to take their time, take their due process with the hearing, usually in these appeals hearings because they are not starting from scratch doing new discovery, doing new explanation of the facts.

It's just here's what happened. Here's this. Here's any new potential information for why we think this is an error. But it's not the long drawn out process like the initial application. So these don't take multiple days usually, but just in case they do, they are still considered the same one hearing point. But by putting the phrase last in, he thought it implied that it is acceptable to do the multiple hearings point.

Right. I get why we don't want the amendment as written. What I'm unclear on is in a situation where there is a singular hearing that spans over multiple days, does the forty day start at the beginning of that hearing or at the end of that hearing, the first day or at the last day?

You can ask a lot to clarify, but my understanding is the forty day is the when the things need to start, not when things need to end and they have to make a decision.

No. But I'm saying,

oh, oh, okay. I see what you're saying.

I must hear the appeal within that forty days, but I can, hypothetically, if the hearing so goes this way, take my time in making my decision, hearing the facts, going through that process. So let's say, hypothetically, this hearing goes multiple days. That clock is not going on. That forty days is not in process. Now that said, I do think your question would be very good to ask director Kubiak.

We did ask him to come to the the council meeting when we explained this legislation because this is a complicated bill. Good questions like that will come up, and I can only explain so much of it. The directors Kubiak did draft a lot had a good hand in a lot of this piece of legislation. So

Okay. Well, I won't hold us up all night on this, mister chair, but I think at some point, it would be good for the law office to take a look at this and just make sure it's totally clear. Because right now, to me, it seems like it's not totally clear as written. I think auto infinitial license amendment was a good step towards clarifying in theory, but I understand how it's not quite right. But I think we need the office of law to make a recommendation.

Well, let let me give the floor to the city attorney, mister Louse.

Sorry, mister Louse. I forgot you were here.

It's okay. Well, a pleasure to be here. We wrote 95% of this bill. It's legally sufficient when it came out of our office. Everything that Alderman Schandermeyer said is correct, and any other language on the timing would be redundant and not effective. The main mission and purpose of the legislation as written is to, provide clarity, and we think it's, legally sufficient and clear. The hearing, goes into recess, at a certain point. The hearing does not end. When the hearing ends, the chair adjourns the hearing as opposed to a recess. At the adjournment, that is when the clock starts to tick.

At the adjournment. Cool. Right. That's what I needed to know.

Thank you.

And and we cleared that with the boards and commissions that are implicated in this legislation. And so everybody kind of has a common understanding about that as well as we added definitions in the in the, in the code as well, as appropriate. So it pretty much, is explanatory from that perspective as well. But we think it's legally sufficient as stated. Any any any changes in my view at this point slows the process down as Alderman Schandermeyer indicated because it it leads to confusion, but it's clear that a hearing continues as long as the chair doesn't say adjourned. It's the same here.

And, Alderman Huntley, did you wanna ask anything in response to that? Or

Nope. I have no further questions.

Okay. And then I'll just point on page the thing that I was and we discussed this a bit, and we're discussing it in full council as opposed to here. On page four, review procedures in in bullet b, it says the board of appeal shall select a reasonable time and place for the appeal hearing no later than forty five days from the date of the appeal filing. And so one of the things that concerned me, Alderman Savage wanted to actually extend it, I think, to ninety days.

There was potential discussion on Alderman Savage brought up a looser definition. I had pitched the idea if we wanted to extend it maybe going to sixty, but economic matters decided to not go in any direction at all.

Yeah. And and I

But all of that was purely hypothetical. No recommendation was made. I personally like the timeline that we have set. But

Well, let me just quickly if we could just take, my friendly amendment on on my behalf on, and on behalf of the Housing and Human Welfare Committee as I suggest in economic matters for thirty days. And the reason I say that is for the reasons I laid out in economic matters, I worry for, like, smaller homeowners, or individuals going through the appeals process that can't afford a lengthy appeals process. And so if the chair takes the full forty five days, to set a date, well, it could potentially not go to the full forty five days because the next meeting, is likely not forty five days away. But if in circumstance forty five days is taken until the next date and you have forty days in until a decision is rendered potentially, including the hearing in between all of that, I just think it it could be burdensome to smaller, homeowners or, or business owners or whomever is applying to the board of appeals. Is is that something the, committee would be interested in in voting in favor?

I'll second it to bring on debate. So I think 45 strikes a good balance. One of the complaints that the board of appeals did bring forward is they were a little concerned that 45 put them under the gun. I think 30 accelerates that concern. The entire reason I ever gave 60 was me trying to placate others who thought 45 was too short with still a set day.

I always thought 45 was a very good timeline in striking the balance between hurry up and get something on the clock while giving the appeals board a little bit of time and flexibility themselves. I understand wanting to hustle it up, but we still need to take into consideration the timing of a volunteer commission.

So that's my thoughts

that's my thoughts on it.

Ultimately, I see a hand.

Thank you. I I totally sympathize with what you said. Think it time is money, and having to wait longer on these things really does mean that people are losing that our residents are not being able to invest as much in the city, and and that really troubles me. The distinction that comes to my mind between thirty days and forty five days is that if thirty days well, or maybe I should say thirty one days means you might not be able to do it in the same month. Right?

If so if they group meets on the second Tuesday of the month and the between August and September, we set a deadline of thirty days. Then if they meet on the second Tuesday, then they might go over thirty days. So forty five to me seems like it lets them meet once in one month, meet once in the next month, and still meet the requirement, while doing it at the same time. But, yeah, I I sure do appreciate the point you're making.

And I respect that. That's something that I, I did not take into consideration. Any further comments on this? Because it was seconded, so we gotta boil it down. Okay. Let's take a vote. All those in favor, aye. All those opposed, no. No. Okay. Let's move on quickly to, the housing human welfare oh, I'm sorry. The economic matters, committee amendment, which would be amendment two, which would be on page four.

Line 17. I'm sorry. Not line

17. It'd be page, line 19.

Yes. My apologies, mister chair.

No. You're fine. And it just, removes parties to the appeal shall be heard. Oh, it removes in person. And so instead of parties to the appeal shall be heard in person at the hearing, it says just parties to the appeal shall be heard at the hearing and shall not be required.

We only did that because, you know, there is a potential for, the groups to meet virtually. And if I recall correctly, there was a complaint forged against one of our committees this year for, you know, incorrectly meeting or something like that as it related to a virtual meeting. So just wanted to take that into consideration. I see alderman Shandomai's hand.

Thank you, mister chair. I don't remember the complaint against one of our commissions meeting virtually, although I'm sure that has happened. I will add that our director did sign off on this amendment because he appreciated flexibility and the simplicity of just removing a little bit of language adding to by just removing these two words, we were able to add that and still make this legislation this what it is. Adding more language would just complicate it.

Okay. We're all good there, or or we wanna take anything else? Alright. Let's take a vote on it's not posted, but it is amendment two from the economic matters committee. All all those in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed? No. I won't I'm sorry. Opposed. I'm not opposed. I don't know why I just said no. I was moving too fast. Alright. Next item on our agenda.

Oh, mister chair, we need to, make any favorable recommendation on the legislation as amended.

You're right. Let's make a favorable recommendation on o thirty three twenty four appeals process for property development in Annapolis as amended to the full council. So moved. All those in favor or second. All those in favor?

Aye.

Aye. Opposed? None. It's it's what I meant to say earlier. Mister Lyles, did you wanna say something else, sir?

No, sir. I'm good.

Okay. Alright. Next item on the agenda is, ID 9325, lease behavior modification version program discussion. So I just wanna wrap this up today. So they'll, and I invited miss, Maddox Evans from HACA over. And miss Buckland, if you if you are, ready to speak, on this, that would be great as well. I'm not sure if she's here yet.

Yep. I'm here.

Okay. Perfect. So in the in last year's budget, I believe we passed $50,000 to assist properties. In particular, there was concerns in Ward 3 And 6 as it related to residential or residents challenges going through lease procedure, understanding their lease, negotiating with, landlords, recertification, just some other things. And so there was programming created to assist the residents, through this process, and it was successful.

The group came to us and asked for funding. Fast forward now almost a year later, we haven't dispersed it, but I'm actually happy we didn't because that has allowed for some things to progress. And I think that's where I bring it, where I'm pleased to bring in miss Maddox seven so, that potentially we we could award HACA with, some of this funding. And and and then the remaining, balance, I'd like to reward to the nonprofit organization that, you know, came to us to do the work on Ward 3. So, miss Maddox Evans, if you wouldn't mind talking about, and I'm looking through my notes here now, just so I can find that program that we discussed in the meeting.

Was it Quantum or so related to the contract contractual assistance that you are receiving

Oh, Quadel.

Quadel. I'm sorry.

Uh-huh. Would you like me to expound on the different services that we are utilizing or we intend to utilize?

Absolutely. And and just for everybody's for the background, HACA meets weekly with the city on Wednesdays, and I've been fortunate enough to attend a few of those. And at this past Wednesday's meeting, they were discussing some of the initiatives that they were going through. And, also, I I'd like I want you, to highlight, you know, some of the work and the progress that you all have made with the $500,000, that we, get granted, to you all last year. But through that conversation, I I found out about this program that we'd be a perfect match, for this funding.

And so, I'll turn the floor over to you.

Great. Well, thank you for inviting, me to attend your meeting, Alderman Gay, and thank you fellow commissioners. And, I am, glad to be able to report to you some of the progress that we have made in recent months since we spoke last. You all are well aware of what our challenges were and graciously agreed, to help support an effort for us to receive $500,000 in funding, to assist us with our capital repair needs and, some maintenance concerns at our sites. Since then, we've have drawn down a $166,000 to go towards maintenance repairs, maintenance staffing, related to, our sites.

We are in the process of drawing down more funds, and we will be forwarding another request, in the May. So we are making good progress. We, since I spoke to you last, we are have now achieved compliance in our public housing program with regards to our, public housing information center scores, PIK scores, which were above 95%, which is our goal, which is a combination of many things with regards to recertifications, vacancies, the properties overall. We've been able to clear, many units for vacancy. So we're now in the process of trying to fill 50 units for occupancy, which is great.

We have many more units to go as far as to clear, for vacancy and to achieve licensing for, but that's all in progress. And we're positive about the progress we've made and the communications with your, planning and zoning staff with regards to coordinating our, inspection and licensing process. We are thankful that also, the city is assisting in on the resident piece as far as compliance is concerned by helping residents by informing them or sending them letters if there are matters that they need to correct. We're at about 84% occupancy rate. Our goal is to get to 95, and we believe surely in the next, few months, we will be on our way towards that.

In order to, assist our efforts, we are hiring a number of different firms and agencies to assist us in various efforts. We have hired Allegiance Management to assist us with, property management, and we will be using in part, city and county funding to assist us with that project. We have hired Quadel Services to assist us with recertifications and annual requirement of public housing residents as well as the management of our wait list, which is a very, detailed, process to assist our staffs in preparing applicants to be ready for occupancy. We have hired a maintenance, operation supervisor. I spoke with, someone that I'm contemplating to hire as a construction manager today, actually, to be able to further assist us with ensuring our units are safe, decent, status, and are able for vacancies.

We are in the process of also, hiring other organizations and groups such as the People, Builders, Consulting Group to help us with a diversion program for our residents. We also have a family self sufficiency and homeownership program for our residents. The latter few programs I mentioned because one of the pieces that we have found, in some of the challenges that we face that it's not just repairing the units that's important. It's also ensuring that residents are prepared to for the tenancy experience. And what I mean is this, that they fully understand their lease.

They fully understand program requirements. They fully understand their, ob obligations with regards to, city code compliance, health and safety. So the piece that relates to the tenant, role. You know, for example, we can fix smoke detectors all, like, all day long. But if tenants don't understand that smoke dismantling smoke detectors is a health and safety, issue as well as a lease violation, the problem will continue.

You know? So there I just use that one illustration, but there are many other things that are contributing to violations of the lease, housekeeping issues, you know, other issues related, to condition of the unit, for example, which requires some ongoing counseling and training, with our residents. And so that is the piece that I think is the final piece with regards to having a a robust, landlord tenant relationship, one in which we have the resources to be able to make the physical repairs of the unit. We have resources to be able to staff the operations of the authority, and we now also are will have resources to assist our tenants with the programming that's needed, to be able to help them be compliant. And I think with all of those things, we'll be able to make a great deal of progress.

As we are fixing units, we wanna keep them in good repair and upkeep, as we get to the point where we're able to fully redevelop all of our sites. And so that's part of what we talked about on the call with the, planning and zoning team. Last week, we have those types of conversations to some extent almost every week because of the social issues that come up as we deal with the physical condition, of the units. But as you know, resources are limited, and resources when we receive are restricted. So funding that we receive for capital repairs, we cannot use for, you know, programming and services, for example, and, you know, vice versa.

And so our goal is just to, diversify these resources so we can do our best job in meeting the needs of our families and residents.

Thank you so much, Ms. Maddox Evans, for going over that in-depth. Any questions from the council at all, in relations to either the grant or in relations to the the request to move the, FY '25 amendment, which was originally positioned. We didn't add any nonprofit, title to it. It was just a sis intended to, go to a nonprofit to include Coyote services, so the packet can move forward with the lease recertification and any other challenges that they face.

And and the wait list, I think that's particularly important. I see all the motion under my eyes here.

Thank you, mister chairman. So we're just taking the unspent money from the original program we put an amendment for last year and just putting into this new thing?

That is the plan. And, miss Buckland, if you wouldn't mind, because when we did this for the funding that was supposed to go, to the raises for or or it was originally intended for raises for the office of community services staff. And then we decided to use it for career ladder programming for them, but we ran out of rental assistance money. So then we reprogrammed it for that. In this process and procedure, would we go through your office, or would we go through law to have the amendment, be fixed in in the language be corrected so that we can move forward with, dispersing funds?

So my understanding, and and please correct me if I'm wrong, is that this was going to be drawing from there was $50,000 that council had voted on that ended up being put within the planning and zoning department's budget for housing. I think the the title was, like, housing quality liaison, but it was it was this kind of idea. And I thought that was the pot of money we were drawing upon for for this purpose.

That's why I wanted to have the somebody from finance.

I did verify with finance that that money was that that was that amendment, you know, passed. It was loaded in into that budget. So that those funds should be available for this purpose.

Okay. And if that's the way we worded it, that's fine. For some reason, when I, put this in, I I kept looking back at least behavior modification for the amendment. But if it was set aside for, a different

I I don't think that was the title, but I think that was the idea was to give give sort of all parties concerned an opportunity to end up in a better situation with respect to housing, whether that was, helping to support tenants in understanding what their role was and what their rights were or, in providing support on the on the, landlord side, being able having some flexibility to to sort of tackle that general question of how do we help people end up in a better situation with respect to their housing?

I appreciate that. And and maybe we tackle that in this in in a a in a coming budget in the coming budget.

Yeah. But but that funding is is there. So, like I said, you know, that's that's set aside for that purpose. So, you know, that's something we can

And and so what I'd like is for us to move, $30,000 to go to, for HACA. And, you know, we obviously earmark it for Qualto services so that we can track and and and be sure that, the tenants are receiving the service. And then the $20,000, would go, to to a nonprofit organization to assist, there for the same exact reasons as we've had admiral Oaks before our committee, at least three or four times. And I think the important thing to add to the language, for the Admiral Oaks is that there should be some sort of, bilingual facilitation, there, because that that property needs that, and the and the tenants need that, need to be able to communicate effectively, with their property management. So Right.

If if that's fine with my colleagues on this, committee, you know, I I'd like to move forward that way. The reason that I bring, into the committee is because we deal with, obviously, housing human welfare, and this is something that I I just think you all should weigh in

I guess my only question, mister chair, is how do we know that this one's gonna get spent this time? We've had some really fantastic we did a really fantastic amendment, and nothing it didn't get off the ground. So how do we know that this one is? Could that might be a question for miss Buckland. Like, do we have more infrastructure in place so that when we approve this, this will this will go forward?

So I think there are I think there are a couple of things that we have now that we didn't have earlier and and really around kind of the specifics. I think when that and, again, my my memory could be faulty, but I don't remember a specific partnership with HACA being part of that discussion when the amendment initially passed. Obviously,

there

at any rate, particularly given, HACA's status as a quasi quasi governmental, I guess, Melissa, is that a fair characterization? The procurement rules specifically allow for us to enter into agreements with an organization like HACA without having to go through, you know, a solicitation process and and things like that the same way we we would with an with a governmental organization. So some of that kind of stuff, we can definitely definitely work on. And and that kind of more specific vision, I I did have a chance to see some of the materials that Alderman Gay was referring to from this particular nonprofit. There was a there was a fairly specific program that's it's sort of not just a it's not a random proposal.

You know, it's a fairly focused proposal, which again was not something that we had in front of us earlier. So I think both of those things are very helpful in terms of execution. Okay.

And, Alderman, rest assured, I will be bothering Ms. Buckland to check on if, finance has been able to get the checks and stuff out. And so just more because the deadline is approaching for us to spend, old money. And so, I Alderman Huntley, did you have anything? I think not no.

No. Alright. So we don't need to take a vote on this because this is, you know, all relies on staff, and, obviously, we appreciate that. Appreciate you, miss Maddox Evans. Nevertheless, she persisted, in everything, and I and I'm proud because I knew that, if we got that money to you all and the work that Christian Kubiak and the vision that he has and and working and partnering with HACA and all that stuff, I'm I'm I'm happy everything is is working out.

And so and and grateful to, the, law office as well and my colleagues on the council, who obviously had, supported the work on on that amendment, and getting everything together. So alright. We're all set there. Miss Maddox I'm sorry. Miss Maddox Evans?

No. Well, we thank you very much for your continued, advocacy, and we we thank all of you for, continuing to, put the needs of our our families first. And, we're glad to be able to utilize these resources and for your, consideration.

Awesome. Thank you very much. Thank you. So that'll close out discussion on, this is, ID 9325. We will check back, on that in our next meeting. The next meeting of the housing and human welfare committee will be May 19 barring, any major changes. Anything for the good of the order? We're all set. Rest in peace to Pope Francis. Terrible day. And so, you know, just everybody stay prayed up and make a motion to adjourn.

So moved.

All those in favor, aye.

Aye. Thank you. See you all soon. Be safe. You too.

Program, but the important thing is that you found it, sort of as an emergency emergency contribution to this. So this means that we don't have to do anything drastic. We don't have to go to HUD and say, you guys take over and solve the problem. Local government, state government