Housing Commission - Regular Meeting

Good evening, everyone. This is the housing commission. We are going to we have quorum, and so we're going to open the meeting tonight. We have a very busy schedule, so I guess we'll just get right to it. Nice to see you all here, especially our guests who have come to present. We welcome you here. Thank you so much for your time. Oh, and commissioner Sharf, thank you for your visit tonight as well. So first of all, we leave our little

call. Could you take those

both calls, please?

Yes. Commissioner Joes? Commissioner Shripathi? Commissioner Jindi?

Yes.

Vice Chair Ryan? Here. Chair Cunningham? Here. For the record, Commissioner Sri Pappy is absent.

Okay. That completes the roll call, and so we will go on to approval of the meeting meeting. The minutes of the 12/08/2025 Housing Commission minutes. Are there any comments about the minutes? I did have a comment. Sure. But in the first sentence or two, it talks about market rate housing, and it should be below market rate.

We'll fix that. Thank you. Okay. Yeah.

And but that's all. Otherwise Yeah. Everything was good. So so I would take a vote to accept the minutes.

Sorry. Wait. Hold on. Procedurally, we we should ask if there's any comments from

the Procedurally. Yeah. Hello. Anybody attending out there here that has a comment on the minutes of the December 8 meeting?

We have no speakers, Cherish.

Okay. And I close that topic?

Oh, do we have a motion and a second? Did that first.

Sorry. I'm sorry.

Yeah. Go ahead.

No. That's okay.

Any motions and seconds? Yeah.

Yeah. Any motion? All motion. Yeah. The last and the minutes. Any second? Second. Second? Okay. It's been motioned and seconded. Can we take a vote on

the Commissioner Joe's? Aye. Commissioner free coffee is absent. Commissioner Jindi? Aye. Vice Chair Ryan? Aye. Chair Zanahan? Aye. The motion carries unanimously.

Okay. Do we have any other postponements?

No postponements.

Okay. Do we have any oral communications?

None. Okay.

Any old business?

No business. No.

Okay. With new business, we can go on then to item two. That is the of a new chair and a vice chair. And for dedication of all of those out in the audience, that happens every year, and it's it's something that rotates among us here. So the recommended action is to elect a chair and a vice chair. And I think probably we should start with the chair. And then after that, we can have the vice chair from there. Or do we vice chair, vice chair, and then

The president should be consigned.

Yeah. I can just briefly touch on it. Yeah. We can vote for a motion to nominate for a chair. Okay. At this point, we can get any seconds. Or alternatively, if you'd like to nominate someone else, we could do that at the time. Okay. And if you'd like, we can allow brief moments for each of the nominations to make Okay. Comments. Then after that, we can call for a vote. And then just, of course, make sure you vote in the affirmative only candidate to ensure we have a majority vote. Okay. And also reminder to we need to open up this item for public comment

before the motions begin. Before the motions?

Yes. And then after the chair is elected, we can repeat the process for a vice chair.

Okay. Thank you very much. So can I have a motion for electing the chair?

I do. I nominate

Oh, it hasn't been seconded yet. Okay. Do I hear a second? Yes. Thank you. It's been motioned and seconded that we hold elections of the chair. Do I hear a nomination?

I would like to nominate chair to continue in the role.

I respectfully decline. Thank you very

much. I

would I would nominate the current vice chair who is Usha Narayan.

I second You need a second? You're ridiculous.

I second last No second for that nomination? Oh, wait. Are there any other nominations for chair? I would I would nominate Lida. Do I hear a second?

No. For chair or for

Nominations for a a check.

Say

again? No.

Was chair.

I was saying.

Did you say you were seconding?

No. No.

I said that he's abstain.

Oh, he's abstain. Okay. So we're not hearing a second, then we will move on, and we will hold the the elections for the chair.

We're gonna

get, And like we need to have little talk.

Yeah. We'll give, like, like, a brief, like, minute to Yeah. Give a little about why you wanna

Yeah. Now we will open it to Lucian Narayan to make a little presentation.

Well, my first thought was I would like Cher Cunningham to continue in the role Because she has experience and she's been in the role for long time and she knows the process. And so I would still like Chair Cunningham to consider continuing in the role. So

that's my first. So Well, I I do respectfully decline, and I will put it like this, which is that, yes, I have served on on many occasions, and that is good. It's great for me. It really has a lot of benefits to being in a chair as opposed to being on the top of the chair. That being said, it's important for all of us to learn all the rules of the commission. It's actually become more deeply knowledgeable about how things are and what we're talking about as you are the chair. So it's something that will stand you in good stead in the future as well if you want to have any other roles, say, in

Understood. Thank you. Thank you. So

does do we ask about

Do we so, currently, it sounds like we don't have a motion. Right? On the Yeah.

We did have a motion and then we asked and and Anna second, and then we asked her to speak and she did. And so we can just we can just elect a very unwilling Is it a good idea?

I mean, I mean, 04:00. 04:00.

So we need

to take

it to a vote. Yeah. Thank you.

Bring her right in for Cher. Okay. Commissioner Joe's? Aye. Commissioner Shrippati is absent. Commissioner Jamey? No. Sitting.

Came in. He's here. He's here. He just got here.

Oh, sorry. He came in very quietly. Commissioner Shrippati?

Yes. Commissioner Judy? Aye. Vice chair Narayan?

I I abstain. Okay.

Sheriff Cunningham?

Uh-huh. Most

of my carries with vice chair Narayan. I'm staying.

We'll help them. Don't worry. We'll help them. So what

ex excuse me. I think right now, this what we do is that we turn the meeting over to Usha, and she will proceed with the election of the vice chair, or do I just do that while we're on

this role?

So it was open at this time.

So for the for the remaining of the meeting, she would be stepping into the chair.

K. Do you wanna sit where you are? Do you wanna

come from here until I'm good here. False. The vice chair.

Okay. All to opening nomination for vice chair. I would Nomination. Did we get nomination? Yeah.

For vice chair.

Yeah. For vice chair.

Do we

have Do we have to motion that, though? Yeah. I motion that we do the

vice chair. Yeah. Anybody to second? Second. Second.

Thank you. I I have a vote. No. Lida Jindi, I would like to nominate her for question. I would like to second the nomination. Thank you.

Thank you so much. But I am successfully declined for personal reasons. How is that happening today? Thank you so much, though, for the consideration. I appreciate it.

Hello. I'd like to

nominate adjustment commissioner.

Just Yes. I second it. Okay. Alright. So now we take a vote?

We have two nominations. Right?

So we

we would call, like, the motion as if it were a vote. And like Evelyn said, if there's two candidates from position, vote in the affirmative for only one. So that only one person gets elected to the scene.

But not ceded.

That's I mean

So we have the motion

Do you still have the motion? Yeah. We still

have the Oh, I see.

So do we have any other nominations for the vice chair?

So so I'm sorry. So you have a motion and a nomination for for commissioner Cindy. Right? And I believe commissioner Cindy declined.

Yes.

Is that a substitute motion now Uh-huh. Or a different nomination? So I believe you can vote on a substitute motion.

Okay. Okay.

Yes. Got it. Got it. So but but we do need to ask for if there are any other nominations for the vice chair?

For the

No. Your honor. There's a substitute motion for the nomination.

That's it. Okay.

Those commissioner's entity declined.

Yep.

Right? So now you have a substitute motion for Commissioner Joe's to be vice chair. So you can vote for that substitute motion.

Okay. So this is your Okay. A motion to for vote for holding.

Second. I second. Okay. So we're gonna

go to vote. Commissioner Joos? I abstain. Commissioner Shupathi? Yeah.

Yes.

Commissioner Jundee? Aye. Commissioner Cunningham?

Aye.

Sharon O'Ryan? Aye. The motion carries with Commissioner Joe abstaining.

Okay. Done.

Congratulations. Congratulations.

That's just to both.

So you you want some item? Or

Okay. The second agenda item is the housing commission annual work plan for calendar twenty twenty six.

So You asked, do we have staff in

Do we have what?

Do have a staff presentation?

Oh, do we have a staff presentation?

Yes, ma'am. Okay. We do. Okay. Great. So our second item for today is the housing commission 2026 work plan. So this is a new item on the this is the new city council initiative. That's why this is you're saying this. Equity commission is required to adopt a work plan, and this is to ensure that the housing commission's efforts are aligned with the city council's broader goals, including their work plan and our housing element. And this tentative work plan accounts for commissioner agenda items that you've requested before and that fall within the purview of your role within the housing commission.

Back in December, staff reached out to the housing commissioners and requested that you send over any activities or policies and general items that you wanted to see agendized for the next year. And we also took into account items that discussed during previous meetings in 2025. So some of these items included prioritizing time sensitive housing element items, tenant protection, anti displacement, and homeless prevention policies, as well as more transparency within the MR program. So I'll briefly go over our tentative work plan. So starting with today, we have the election of officers.

We're adopting a work plan. We'll also be providing an update on the below market rate administrator request for proposal as well as making recommendations for our housing funding NOFA. In May, we'll be requesting approval to submit the fiscal year twenty six twenty seven community development block grant annual action plan as well as discussing potential rezoning and or annexations to ensure compliance with housing element no net loss provisions. And then in September, we'll return to request approval to submit the fiscal year twenty five twenty six consolidated annual performance evaluation for the paper as well as, seeking recommendation for an approval of an amendment to the housing mitigation manual for a citywide fee update and study. And finally, in October, we'll have the announcement of fiscal year twenty seven, twenty eight housing funding NOFA, as well as we'll be providing an update on draft ordinance related to tenant protections and programs for anti displacement.

And just a quick disclaimer that the work plan items proposed are not fully inclusive or final. They are subject to change or being rescheduled. And, of course, we can add additional items just depending on any emerging priorities or direction that we receive. That concludes my presentation. But once the Housing Commission concludes their discussion, we do have a motion on the table to adopt the proposed Housing Commission work plan for the upcoming year. And I'm open for any questions.

Do you want the questions now or the motion first? I forget.

Questions first. Questions first. I

have questions. Through the chair, may I my questions? I noted in the written document that there were a couple of other things that were being added. May, there is refoning and or annexations to ensure compliance with the housing element in no not lost provisions. And also in the written report, there was an amendment to the housing mitigation manual for citywide update and nexus study.

So I note that those are in there as well. And I also wanted that if we're since we're gonna be having that nexus in September, I think it's really important for those who have excuse me. Before that, training on the existing below market rate manual to include data on how many below market rate homes have been received to date during that process, which has been eight years since the last nexus, and how how how many new BMR homes have been built, at Manuel and how many have been lost. So that's what I would hope that we could have for this group before we head into doing that nexus. I was here for the last nexus, and so I know how it goes.

And it's really important that we all be knowledgeable about what the where we are in that regard. I would also suggest that and then, oh, in July that would probably be a special meeting. But then I would suggest another special meeting in July to consider the change to the Housing Commission Charter. But I would go over that another time. Thank you. Any

other questions, comments on the world plan?

How is

this from

the plan for 2025, and what's improved upon from prior year? Can defer to Nikki on that.

That size is all 2020.

So we we incorporated a lot of new items that were not there before, and that has to do a lot with the emerging kind of housing on that deadlines that we're coming up upon. Right? We we we committed to, like, upwards of 60 policies and programs, each of them with a date that we should have some sort of action study or implementation by. And so this year, there are two things that are that are housing element related. Right?

The first is now that we're somewhere in the middle of the cycle making sure that we have enough sites to meet our arena. So that's gonna be something that comes to this body for study and the which right? Because they handle land use decisions. And then the other being our fee update, making sure that our fees that we're collecting, right, on developments are adequately getting a commensurate amount of funds to build affordable housing with. Right? And so that means looking it's a nexus. Right? So that means looking at other cities, how much they're charging, and then looking how much we're charging right now and seeing if what's working, what's not. Right? And that ultimately gets may means we have to amend the housing mitigation manual if we were to do that.

So that's why it's gotta be seen by this council. So those are two new things, right, that that are not there before. And then and that's so that's trying to basically be responsive of, like, our, like, housing element needs, our state required, like, mandates. And then also the other is being responsive, you know, to commissioner feedback on what they'd like to see. We heard a lot that we wanted more transparency with the BMR program. That's why today, we have a new item that was not there before, right, which was we're getting an of a public update on how we did evaluations for our next BMR administrator. Yeah. So just try to, you know, fit in as much as we can, be wary of, you know, our state, you know, mandated work, but also trying to be, you know, responding to you guys or any of requests.

So any other questions on the work plan? I have one. The

other question I have is, are we going I maybe we should suggest a special meeting time to in advance of this because it sounds like we have a full schedule on each meeting that is already indicated here. And I think, again, that that training is really important. And so if it's going I think we should add a meeting now in all plans for it to be here.

If if that's what the commission decides they want.

What is the what is the additional reading for? To go over the work plan?

No. To go over the below market rate manual. The manual. Because I'm recently sir, I mean, I haven't read it over and over again either, but I read it once recently. And it occurs to me we're all new. It wouldn't hurt to have somebody to to over it, to actually go through it and understand what what the policies are Uh-huh. And all that in it. Because it's not it's not as as it may appear. So that's so that's why Okay. Yeah. And I know I'm asking a lot of my fellow commissioners too

Yeah.

To go to come together.

Maybe it's a add on to that if we can include in the work plan is, you know, Nikki shared the two studies that were done. We got the two studies. So Santa Clara anti dystrophin survey, and then the West Valley converse.

Sure.

So we never really had a chance to discuss Okay. The studies. So I did spend couple of days starting off as writing up questions, which I think is out of the scope of this meeting. So whether we could add that to our work plan for this year to go over those things in detail, because I think it was just released to the public just

Just very recently. Couple of

weeks ago, I believe. Right? Mhmm. So maybe if we have a chance to discuss those studies that could be added to the workflow.

Right. So for how we do this administratively, I mean, I think that's that's definitely in your purview, right, as the commission. So if you want to schedule an additional special meeting, it a substitute motion to adopt this with the, like, the amendment that you wanna also add a special meeting. That's essentially like a study session, right, for the studies and then also the BMR, housing mitigation manual. But let's leave the actual date, for us to go to facilities and figure out what day we have this room. Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, okay. Good. Question would be, Like, these things, the study sessions. Basically, it's educating our group. Right? Yeah. Whether it needs to be done as a meeting or a special meeting, or could it be done, like, via email? Like, just between the commissioners, like, the five office with you include, like, like, a virtual session, you know, and just just a question. It's possible without in involving, you know, getting the facility and the room and all that stuff. Can I add something? Can

I respond before you respond? Because you're I would like to say that I think it's important for everybody in the city Mhmm. To understand the So therefore, I personally Okay. I personally don't think Uh-huh. With all due respect. I don't think it should be internal to just us. I think it should be out to other people in the city who are interested in this little market rate event.

If I may add, if you're gonna schedule the commission chooses to schedule for a study session, that is open to everybody, just like commissioner

Right. That's what

she's And if

you wanna if you wanna keep it, I don't know what you wanna call it, a smaller group and sort of study within yourselves, Two of you, we can schedule special meetings for two at a time, so it's not a brown act issue. Or if you wanna individually study up on these things and and view questions to us, we can do that. Think he also I'll get us to our team has also issued a info memo to the city council on this particular item. So I would encourage you to take a look at that first. Oh. We wanna see what direction the council will take on these studies are

Oh.

Not final final yet. So I hesitate in in sort of having a very public discussion on documents that have not been deemed final. So to on Vicky's point, if you if that's what you wanna do, we can do that, just not date specific. Mhmm. But we can see where things fall and see where cancel schedule is like, and then so we can kinda plan these things accordingly. Yep. Just something to think about.

Okay. Are there any any any questions? Because I always have a question. Because the study the studies then Mhmm. You're saying that that goes to city council for them to do something about

Oh, I

say It's not something that we're going to be weighing in on, I guess, is

the point.

I'm not saying it's going to CityPods. All I'm saying is that we've done an inform their information memo

Oh. To see if there's

couple of these studies that have issued. I think Memos has more to do with this overall outhouse issue at the top end. Okay. And these were some of these documents were attached to it.

I see.

All I'm saying is that I don't know what direction the city is potentially gonna take based on these studies. I see. But we can certainly work with the commission if you have questions, you wanna understand more.

Okay.

After they had a chance to digest these studies, we can certainly work with them on that. I don't know necessarily at this point. It needs to be a public study session, but that's something that you feel like the commission needs to have, then we can certainly plan for that.

The the two studies that that was done completely right completed recently. Right? That's on the Citi website.

Currently.

And it is for public viewing. So I'm assuming that those are the final reports. Yes. Correct? No modifications gonna be done? Because I don't

The West Valley study is complete. Right. And the entity displacement survey is also complete. The community plans and homelessness, which is what the county is currently working on, that's still a draft. Right. But all that is on the website, and you guys are you guys are welcome to actually email us, and we we can answer questions.

Okay. Alright.

And the link is on our

You know, I'll send you guys an email. Have to Yeah. Get

Okay. Yeah.

Thank you. Yeah. I don't know if you are considering then withdrawing that as a special topic. That's separate to me from the

From the BMR manual. Correct. So, yeah, we we can withdraw. I mean, I I mean, I will send my questions to Nikki Sure. On those things.

So I'm gonna agree.

Okay. Does he have any motion?

Michael, before we have a motion,

can we go to public comment?

Oh, yeah. Thank you.

Oh, can we go for a public comment?

Yes. We have no speaker.

Alright. Okay. So then it's the next agenda, by the way? No. No.

Your motion.

Oh, no. We need to ask the

The original motion.

Okay. So

And I would recommend that we have the just as we're recommending, since we have a regular scheduled meeting, that we use one of those regularly scheduled times for this special meeting, and that could be in any intervening time, like April, June, July.

We'll see which one fits. Okay. Yeah. We'll see which

one But there's three right

now Yeah.

Open for that possibility. As long as it's before Yeah. Okay. Okay. Then I'm finished with my question.

Okay. So no more questions. So would we pass a motion to

You would you would motion to adopt the proposed housing commission plan for 2026 with an amendment.

Okay.

Want to add a special meeting date sometime in the summer to study the housing mitigation manual.

I shall move. Got it. I shall move what was just said.

Yeah. And is there a second? I can second that.

Just want to remind No.

As for work.

You're always

welcome to email us with questions. You don't have to wait for a meeting like that. Yes. If you have a question, whether it's all, like, or documents or anything, pretty well. So you don't have to wait for a meeting.

Yes. A little bit fine.

Okay. Thank you. I mean, I'm I'm very hesitant to send my emails because I'm really scared of this drone act. So I sent only to Nikki's phone. That's perfect. That's

perfect. Thank you.

Okay. So a motion to call for vote

K.

To pass the work plan.

Commissioner Shripathi?

Aye.

Commissioner Jahi?

Aye.

Commissioner Cunningham?

Aye.

Vice chair Jones? Chair Narayan? Aye. Motion carries unanimously.

Okay. So we move on to the next agenda items.

So our agenda item tonight is the below market rate housing program administrator evaluation update. This is a new item, right, that is responded to request for more transparency in our process with the BMR program. And this year is unique. Right? So let me give a little bit of background that the city currently provides has a program that requires housing developers to provide a percentage of their units to be affordable within their market rate developments. Right? This is the inclusionary of this program, meaning a market rate developer coming off their proposal for, say, a 100 units. Right? 50% of those, they would need to keep restricted, right, to low and very low key people. Now these units are all jointly administered by a single entity.

Right? This is to ensure compliance, number one, and number two, to centralize the program into a single wait instead of having people apply, right, to all the 50 different developers for their unit. Rise Housing has been the city's BMR administrator since 2017. In their contract, their multiyear contract expires this June in 2026. So this year, we had an RFP process for the selection of the city's next, BMR administrator. Let's talk about the process for that. So November 3, we opened it up for responses. It was posted to the website. You know, postings were done in the newspaper and all that. Then one month later, December 3, we closed it.

Right? At that time, we received three proposals for three qualified consultants throughout December. Staff evaluations, there's a panel of staff kind of scoring these applications. We narrowed it down to a top two. Then in January, we invited those top two to come to us with interviews so we can discuss further based on the criteria, right, and the and the RFP.

We narrowed it down further to basically a front runner, a top one. So now in the process, we are here in March 2026. We wanted to bring this item to the housing commission to describe everything that kinda went into our decision making. And then afterwards, it will take in, you know, any of the comments you guys make to today to further do kind of, like, final sort of negotiations with them, and we'll be taking an agreement to city council May 2026 to authorize execution of an agreement. So the three applicants we had were Rise Housing, Housing Inc, and Heart of San Mateo County.

The evaluation criteria in our RFP, there were four categories. The first, firm and project team qualifications. Second, work plan approach. Third, California slash Bay Area integration. And fourth, pricing slash cost. We're gonna get into what each of those mean. Don't worry. So first, project and project firm and project team qualifications. This is for the applicant to demonstrate their relevant experience to running Cupertino's BMR program. Right? And so in this category, RISE scored the highest. They are our current VMR administrator, but it only makes sense. Second, Housing Inc placed in the middle. They have Santa Clara County experience. They are the current VMR administrators for the city of Campbell.

So but not Right? And then third heart of San Mateo County, they have a lot of various use administering for a lot of different cities just in San Mateo County. Right? So their their their programs, they're a little bit different than ours, and there would be some adjustments. Right? That being said, when it comes to just team qualifications, all of them are very, very highly qualified to run a BMR program. Right. Next, work plan approach. Demonstrate the knowledge of the BMR portfolio, that is the city's BMR portfolio, and then work necessary to administer the program as well as any process improvements that they would like to suggest. Right?

So at the application stage, both Housing Inc. And RISE scored very, very highly in this category. Right? They understood the size of the portfolio and the changes that we expect to see in the next coming years. Right? That means that comes from any new projects being completed that adds to the portfolio that comes from units expiring, right, where we lose units in the portfolio. Art, give a very strong assumptions, but for a single year. Right? And it's important for us right now. And then I'll explain why why we need a system, like, the assumptions of, like, you know, next year's.

Right? Because during the interview stage, it became very apparent that Rise was actually, we we flipped and we put Rise on top above housing because they were very aware of kind of the workload that is to be expected with the expiring units, actually, in our rental program. Because on paper, you would think that's a work reduction. Right? You're losing units.

But in reality, there's a lot of case management and a lot of support has to go towards basically, like, helping these tenants negotiate their final leases, navigating basically their their exit from the BMR program, and working with the developers, right, who are going through all these different noticing timelines. This is there's a lot. It does the workload does not go down, and they really demonstrated that during their interview. So during the application stage, housing, inc. Scored highest, rise in middle, part third.

But on the other after the interview, rise rose to the top, housing, inc. In the middle, and then part third. Alright. The third category was California slash barrier integration. This was where applicants could demonstrate their knowledge of state law that would affect, BMR administration and as well as any regional best practices to implement into the program. Right? And this category part actually scored the highest. They they they suggested a number of process improvements that are really interesting. One was, using the county sorry, the the Bay Area doorways portal for centralized listing of, like like, basically, the cities and all other cities that use it, as well as remove the MR resale cost as a cost of the program to set charge it as a fee for the sellers in the BMR program. So that will remove some admin costs from the city.

Housing Inc scored second highest. They also suggested using the Buffalo Doorways Countywide via MARPO portal. And then RISE, they they demonstrated that they have a lot of participation in state conferences and regional organizations, not as much, you know, like, borrowing from, you know, regional best practices. So they scored third in this category. Alright. The final category was pricing size cost. This was an objective score. Very, very simple. It was just based on who provided the most cost efficient proposal. Right?

And this one, HEART scored the highest because they had the lowest overall proposal, followed by RISE and then followed by Housing Inc. We want to know, Housing Inc, they they gave an estimate for their general admin costs, but they kinda left it open on the kind of per rate ownership and rentable actions, meaning each unit. And so, really, their their cost proposal was not as complete as we wanted it to be. So analysis. All three applicants were very highly qualified and competent.

Right? And they would be worthy of consideration, not just in this procurement, but in future. Because right now, how RISE showed the strongest understanding and preparation of work expectations considering rental unit expirations, right, and and just the workload that would be needed to accommodate that. Housing Inc and FERT, they proposed several innovative process improvements, and they showed deep commitments to providing affordable housing. So we thank them for taking the time to participate in this and also applying.

But, currently, RISE is our current front runner in this process with Housing Inc as a runner-up, and then HEART should also be considered for any future procurements for BMR administrator. So we can't get into super nitty gritty of, like, exact scoring and exact pricing things right now because number one is final negotiations have not been done. But just for this commission's knowledge. Right? Rise proposal right now is for another three year contract, and it'll be at approximately $160,000 per year as actually a significant cost savings as for what we are currently paying right now.

And final negotiations are to commence soon. So for next steps, we commence those final negotiations after this meeting, city council meeting in May to authorize city manager to execute a contract, and then execution of that next contract, we hope to have in June set up right as their last one expires. Oh, right. So do we have any I'm gonna open up the commission now for any clarifying questions on-site.

What is the cost difference between the sales proposal by Rice? Because since they are the current admin Right

now, it's about $300,000.

300,000 per year. So they'll literally have that amount. And why? Yeah.

They were they changed their cost assumptions for a lot of, like, the per rate items and then also, like, their general admin items. Right? Because as an incumbent administrator, right, there's no, like, onboarding cost that we have to consider. Right? So it's just kinda like yes. It's it's much more cost effective now, right, to continue an existing contract.

Why do we have to pay for the?

The the workload associated with BMR administration is enough for an entire division, I would say. And so the cities that you see doing it in house are typically your city of San Jose, your Let me see. San Francisco is much much more cost efficient for the smaller cities is that we'll typically pay a consultant. And with each of our contracts kind of making up a share of their kind of revenue stream, they can do administration for multiple city. So that's how it makes it work for us, basically.

Yeah. So, I mean, most of the thing is paperwork, but the county and I mean, what do they Sorry? As an administrator, what is it that they do really? I think I'm gonna ask this question before. Yeah. I'm sorry.

They they they take in applicants for the wait list. They run the lottery. And then throughout the year, as different units come available, they will kinda reach in through the wait list and kinda match them with, like, the the property managers of all these different rental units. And then when it's in the case of ownership, they actually coordinate the resale of that program through the BMR program to another qualified buyer. Yeah.

And then so that also has to do with, like, all, like, the kind of background sort of support work when they're, like, talking to each of the different property managers, negotiating things like when there's issues with the, you know, like, the tenancy and things like that, getting a new tenant in. Mhmm. Yeah. This yeah. International is what they do.

Yeah. I was wanting to just ask. You did mention that the work world is gonna grow because of our new priority list where people that are displaced then are having a are on a high priority high priority. And so that has to be managed as well. And how many of those units are expected to have displaced people from?

Within this three year timeline Mhmm. About 95. Actually, exactly 95. I don't know why said about. Right.

And I and at and at issue, something that will be need to be worked on when just sort of speaking to the whole is that there may not be that many homes available that are below market rate. So there's a little bit more up trying to get displaced people, homes.

Yeah.

Oh. That's something that's concerning. Very concerning. So, anyway, I I was just kind of talking about what that workload is going to be like for for our, BMR administrator going forward. So this is you

said 95. This is the existing apartment units? Yeah.

Yeah. The the short explanation of what's going on is these were built in the nineteen nineties. Then back then, the the terms of the BMR mitigation sort of housing program manual was that they would be restricted for term of thirty years. Now it's '99, but thirty years back then. So thirty years from the nineties is now. Right. So they're they're being released from the program.

In that one study, they had talked about 114 units Sorry. For our seven Yes. So the this is the same?

It's the same. It's the same? Yeah. The remaining What? '19? They those expire in, like, 2038 and 2039.

Okay. Okay.

So do they also find do we negotiate with the partner complexes or or, like, since these come out of the BMR Yeah. We need to find new homes so they

Yeah. Well so so that's kind of where we have to, like, let them go essentially from the program. But up until that point, we found that it's not so simple as just it expiring over. There is a workload involved with, like, negotiating that final lease and then supporting that tenant as they try to go out and look for other housing resources. Because as they qualify for this program, they they they they cannot afford, basically, to go out into into the market.

Right? So, like, kind of helping them sort of navigate that end of term lease and then also talking to the property managers as they have to there there's there's certain things they have to do, right, as it as it expires. There's certain things they have to know they they have to do noticing, and we have to check to make sure all the tenants are getting that noticing, and they have, you know, offer to to see all that stuff like that. So there's there's there's work with the expiration.

Yeah. But my question was, like, you said some of these are expiring on a thirty year basis. Right?

Yeah.

So do they continue to get the ninety nine year old visas, or do they there's a property owner out of choice of not putting it on a BMR. Yeah.

And they

will can they can they somebody has to go and find new homes or new apartments for leasing?

I I I I kinda missed it.

Well, you know I think what I understand you to mean, commissioner Shapati, is that is it possible for a maturing apartment complex maturing out? Could they decide to, oh, no. We'll just stay in, and we will continue with And the low market my understanding is that often, what those apartment owners wanna do is sell, make the money, and they have their own things that they wanna do.

So We have to we have

to with them. They're they have other plans. Yeah.

So But Yeah.

Then we lose funds, right, from the BMR. Then what's our plan? Do we need to find other homeowners? We'll find them.

The the the best thing that we can do, honestly, is to make replacement. So I build more low income housing so there's a place for these people to know. Right? Your your only other option, right, is to try to preserve the existing units, and that only works if those people wanna negotiate. So so yeah.

So just to add to that, every development has a low market rate requirement, blue generic requirement. So every new developer project, talks to who gets approved, that gets built, will also include percentage of BMR units. And that's when to see if we found out, try to replenish best stuff. Beyond that, it's really up to the we try our best to kind of negotiate and talk to the copy owners, but it's very rare that the property owner will wanna say, yeah, let's give these units BMR. Most almost all of them, my experience, will, like, kinda trade it to market, sell it, or rent to the market rate.

But but there is no rule to say for existing properties. Right? It's only for new development, the required BMR units. Right? So For existing, there's no goal to say, oh, you need to meet the current percentage of pre BMR units?

It it was it was always

a requirement and for what

those in the past and in the present. The thing that's changed now is the term of affordability. So in the past, it was thirty years. Now it's ninety nine years.

I have one question on the administrators, the three. You said 160 k. Do you have the number for the other two? We do. Part and any what is the big what's the difference? Can you say delta, do you know?

So this is where we kinda run into, like, some with, like I was talking to our procurement, like, team in finance about it, but we're allowed to disclose, basically. It's there's certain things that we don't want to talk about in public because, like, these people, they they make, you know, these proposals to us to and, you know you know, kinda awkward when they go and make proposals to other cities and it's the Cooper team. Right? So we'll have a contract for our parent, Louis Vedder, and our winner that we move forward with. And That's the only we thank them for, you know, applying, and we wish them good luck as they probably go back and and look and try to look for other cities too. But yeah.

But I'll I'll add up for for Ryan's the reason Artem's fault reason. We're recommending based on the price. Also, it was that there's more certainty Yes. Through the price proposal than we anticipate from others.

Correct. Right. Because theirs was the most complete. It was multiyear and accounted for all the work items. Right? Part was one year, and then Housing Inc, they gave us a general administration cost, but they kinda left the per rate cost up. So Rise gave us the most complete.

So it's really part of pinpoint the exact difference of price for the price that are primary reason why we select a particular company. To answer your question, this particular category, there's more certainty what we can expect as a city

Understood.

To that project for them.

But the the only reason I was asking is because in one of the criteria for selection, rice ranked the lowest. This is for more innovative approaches California Burial. Yeah. Yeah. The portals and stuff like that. So it's just a question. Would that be actually So that's advantageous for for Cupertino to have that, and if that can be negotiated with the rise to adopt this? Sure.

So in the final negotiation

Oh, I

think so. In the final negotiation.

Under final negotiation. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I think also Oh, and is that

like, in any interview process

Yeah. It

depends on how you disclose, how you portray your abilities. Right. But it doesn't limit your abilities to do something that you haven't disclosed. Yeah. So it depends on how you interview, what that comes across. What's been disclosed by a different organization, it's not unique. Yeah. It's not copyrighted. Right. Right. It's something you can be incorporated. Does that work best for Tito? Mhmm. I I'm not sure. But I think what Nikki is outlining is that on paper, the interview review process, that's what's came across. Not necessarily mean that that particular response or preparation works best for

May I make a comment? The only other comment that I wanted to make is on page four of the the fiscal impact. A question had come up before in our meetings, I believe, was talking about how this contract is funded and where it was funded out of. And and the last paragraph talks about how it is going to be in the future taken from the general fund as opposed to from the the low market rate housing fund. And that there there's even a ledger code that says that where it comes out of the general fund instead of the ledger code for the BMR affordable housing. So is that That's better? That's It depends on

It's just based on our city council's direction.

Council wants it to be that way. Yeah. I mean, that's why.

Yeah.

I forgot to say that part. Yeah. It says in accordance with Yeah. What the city council would prefer, they would rather take it out of the general fund than and I I I took that as good that they would like to use the BMR affordable home for Florida. For what it's for. Right? To build homes and provide services for people who are so, anyway, I took that as kinda good news, but there you go.

There you go.

That was That's what I wanted to know. Okay.

And what's that cost savings going to be contributed to as an what will we do with about that $450,000? Right? What will we allocate that to from the

question for the city council and their many competing priorities. I Yeah. Was that question again? She wants to know what they're gonna spend the money that they don't spend on admin on. And I said, that's a great question for the city council and their many competing priorities.

What do mean, in terms of VMware fund itself?

No. No. She's talking about because this command basically, like, what they're saving money on this contract, what are they gonna spend it also on? I said, it's gonna be a general fund. So what

are the options? Right. So so Citi can can prioritize a number of different kind of different things. I think what we heard from city council that kinda made more sense. That a BMO fund focused on the development, the creation of BMO units Absolutely. Versus administrative type of costs. So there, for various type of costs, it could also be better be valuable greater than the impact of if it's coming from a general fund. Just like, you know, staff salaries, those kind of things come on a general fund as well. So that's what we're gonna in terms of what other monies will come from that or saving what you spend on, it is why it depends on the city priorities. But the city's priorities always been runs them first.

So we'll be focusing on continuing, you know, our environment, our living standards for the community first. As usual, that's the priority for the city council for the city.

That being said, as for the money savings to the BMR program, that's actually up to this commission. Right? You guys weigh in the funding recommendations for the BMR AHF fund. So

If they the line item is coming from the general funds Yeah. Cost savings for the BMR line then. Right?

Well, it would be because we would no longer be charging it to the Right. Our fund. And then

So Nikki should keep an eye out for the

It's perfect.

150 k per year.

Yeah. Right? Maybe maybe I'll come back with a request. Right? We'll see. We'll see. Okay. Do we have any further question questions?

Any further questions? Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

You clearly indicated that all three applicants were highly qualified.

Yes.

However, the final stage, it seems like the rice housing kind of pulled behind the Housing Inc. I'm just curious. There was a 100 evaluation. How close were they at the end? We don't have specific how much do they score for each category. And I understand each category was given more weight than others, like the cost. Their proposal cost and fees was scored. Apparently, we did the last 10% 20% And I'm experienced with the with the BMR in Bay Area was only 10%.

Yeah.

So I'm just curious, like, talking on this, how close did they rank at the very end?

So I I did talk to our purchasing manager about how much we should be discussing in the specifics of scoring and who scored what, and this is where we got I can say they were close. They were all very, very close.

They were close, but there's a clear a clear number one.

Yep. Yep.

K. So my other question is, obviously, they submitted their application. They went through the in the first round, seems like the housing seems to be more superior. During the interview, the rise performed much better knowing that it's very familiar with that process being the current administrator. I was more interested to know any past successes or failures. Specifically, how did we hear that? On paper, everybody looks good. During interview, everybody. But then, like, the actual actual performance, do we have an indication, especially with Verizon? We know we work with them so long.

What were the top priority that will give us the confidence Verizon is going to do so well? Therefore, yes, let's give them keep them around for another three years. What I understood, the two other companies, they seem to have more innovative ideas. But seems like they were somehow trumped by the experience and understanding that your eyes had. So is there any indication there that they did have successes?

They had some failures, and how do we put all this in the balance? And how did the references that we collected spoke for each of the applicants in writing or any verbal communication. So there's tons of question I put there. Yeah. Thanks, Nikki.

Sure. I mean, it is kinda getting into, like, how sausage is muted, but, I mean, we do we did check references, right, for all three. I called other cities who they they service and not talked about, you know, like, what's your experience with them? And pretty much everyone said that they had great experiences with each of the three, you know, service providers. The way the weights of, like and the scoring was done was basically really kinda tailored to what is the most pressing and emerging needs of the BMR program that we're seeing.

And very clearly, it's the 95 expiring rental units. So that is the biggest issue being faced. And so that is why maybe, like, new process improvements, they got maybe, like, a 10 weight, whereas, like, understanding the portfolio and understanding the work needed for the portfolio got a much higher rate. Right? Because if we didn't have that issue, then I think I would agree that, like, yes, having process improvements check out for a lot more. Right? We just have to work within the context that we are in right now. It's not it's yeah.

And and like a yeah. I think that that depends on the jurisdiction when we start talking about the topic right now. Just what what was then disclosed in the interview process for one company versus another. Doesn't necessarily mean that works best for that jurisdiction at that very moment. I think they can just outline what Cupertino is facing for the next few years. And so what we're looking at during the interview process is which company, which firm best address and help the city through those those those years that we're looking at and also be within that contributors as well, very helpful contributors.

Does any of those applicants have any actual experience with the place with displacement in their previous work? Do they have that experience, and how do they handle that?

In when it comes to BMR administration specifically, this is kind of like an emerging right? Because we're not the only ones who are alone in this. There's other cities that, like, started off with the thirty year restriction around the same time frame. And so I know that, like, there are other cities that are also kinda looking down this issue and trying to grapple with how to address it. And so we're all kind of, like, trying to figure out how how to address this.

I'm sure they're working in displacement in some form. Right? Because displacement happens everywhere and, like, you know, there's, you know, spies and there's evictions. There's redevelopments. For specifically a BMR covenant expiring, this is kinda like the time where it's starting to happen, and it was quite new. So not quite, I would say. Right? It's like yes and no. Yes. Probably they all had experience with displacement. With this specific kind of displacement, this is on them.

So none of them has a prior experience.

With this specific Of

this scale.

Yeah. Of this scale and of this specific kind. Right? 95 units in the program of 100 and

So it sucks to me that both are on the same level of field and no prior experience with displacement. That's our present issue given 95 units expire. The rights have better understanding, has done work. I still didn't get an answer as far as how was their performance. Do we have any surveys from the tenants they serve surveyed the the presentations, how quickly they responded, how they communicated.

I just feel like, you know, you provided a lot of information, but I'm pretty much like to hear from both top candidates. Either present and allow the commission commissioners to ask questions or the city council to ask questions.

I feel like

I need to be both for a chance, not simply just following a routine. It's familiar. It's comfortable. Let's stick to it. That's my my feedback.

Okay. You wanna open it to Open

it to

The public for any call? Oh,

has any questions, comments. We have no speakers here.

Okay. So a motion to I move to discussion. Agenda item?

Yeah. Close discussion, I guess.

Is that close discussion? I move

to close discussion and set and receive the presentation. Not a bad.

Anybody to second?

I can second. So Patrick, you're second.

Wait a minute. I just propose something how to deal with that. I propose so we somehow interview or get in contact and hear directly from the top two candidates. How do we move forward with that? What I propose?

I don't know. Then

Is that time is time does not Well, that should help

administrators technically within the housing commission's charter. So we're bringing this item forward to keep you updated on the process, just all the transparency of your what the staff is working on. Plus, the licensing, the visitor is is technically not open to charter. Similarly, like, if I were if I were to select the next candidate for the senior housing coordinator, I would bring that process to the housing. Right?

That's interesting. I'm I'm thinking about the whatever we call this, to to receive the presentation. That's the recommended action for this one, which usually is you just received it. Yes. Thank you.

However, I was just wondering what the prep process would be to have an idea like commissioner Jin Yi has just talked about being incorporated perhaps into the procurement process for things this sensitive to the livelihoods of the below market rate people who are going through a lot already. So that's just something to be I think that an answer probably would be useful to for future process.

Is

that question if that falls under the responsibility of the housing commissioner. Mhmm.

It well, it certainly does. This is below market rate. That's No. I know. We do.

So selection the selection of yeah. And Oh, yeah. It's the selection. The selection of the administrator. I know we are getting we are receiving the presentations, but I I don't know what the

Maybe we can add a interview with the candidates for the next contract.

It's Nikki, maybe well, just the way we are recommending, you know, the the funding. We are reviewing. I mean, they're not making the decisions we are recommending. So could we do that in the same line? We received the present receiving presentation, but can we also see or present an interview and make our recommendation? May not be taken, but it's a it's a possibility. I think that's where we're coming from.

I I think the commission will only go

in that direction. You'll have to look at your charter in the code and and make

it Yeah.

Under your duties and powers and responsibilities and make that make that suggested change. And we can certainly bring up the city council and see if that's something that a council won't wish to either qualify or include in your duties and responsibilities. It is not typical for commissions to regulate the Yeah. Consultant selection process. Doesn't matter as housing commission, whichever con convention we have. That is administrative process for the staff. Like I said, the example will be if you were at the same process we're through to hire Nikki, senior housing coordinator.

Yes.

That is how the process that will bring her for for you guys either. Right.

That's true. That's yeah.

It's true. It is and I will say Nikki's turned out pretty well.

Well, we

have professional staff that that do this for letting other thing.

That's

We'll bring this to you. So if you are apprised of of of what the department is doing in terms of housing related items, we don't technically have to bring this here, but we feel like it's necessary for you to at least know what's been done, especially if this will be a change. Right. If this is gonna be changed in the industry.

Yeah. I appreciate the presentation, and I think we were also presented before the RFP went out Right. Getting our input as what all we would like to see. So I think that that's really good. At least we were able to wise our concerns and issues. So thank

you. So

motion to close the discussion?

Yeah. We have a motion and a second. Let's go

to a vote. Commissioner Cunningham?

Aye.

Commissioner Shukhafi? Mhmm. Commissioner Jindi? I'm sorry. Vice Chair Drove? Aye. Chair Narayan? Aye. The motion carries with Commissioner Jindi abstaining.

We move on to the last item.

The last agenda item, number five, is for the fiscal year twenty six, twenty seven community development block grant program, BMR affordable housing fund allocations. Yes.

Thank you, madam chair. So for our final item tonight, we have the funding recommendations in response to our 2627 NOFA. It's for the below market rate affordable housing fund and as well as the community development block grant specifically for capital housing projects. This means capital infrastructure, public infrastructure, public facilities, and, of course, affordable housing. So right now on the screen, we have the two amount listed on the NOFA as what we had available in the balance at the time of the NOFA, which was November.

Just as a reminder for everyone here, public services are awarded on a two year cycle. So last year in 2025 when we met, those funding recommendations are still in effect, and they will be for the next upcoming year. So if you are a public service who receives CDBG, HSG, DOHA, the county funding, any of those, you're good. Right? You do not need to apply again.

Right now, it's just for the capital housing projects. And then one more thing to take note. With our upcoming BMR administrative agreement, we had direction from city council 04/15/2025 to budget our next BMR admin contract from the general fund rather than the BMR fund. And so you use the BMR fund for affordable housing. So one less cost to think about as we budget.

Okay.

Right? So what does that mean for our reserve? Right? Our balance at the time of November was 1,100,000. In addition to that, we have to consider we're doing this for transparency so you guys understand our budgeting process. There's the final year, right, of our administration of the BMR portfolio, which is thousand. And after that, no more. And then our current and next year of fair housing services, this goes to Project Sentinel. They they they investigate cases of housing discrimination, basically. And so for the current and next year of that, 100,000 then.

So to budget for these encumbered services, we highly recommend that the thunk keeper reserve $400,000, meaning we have $700,000, basically, to load out. So let's get into our staff recommendations. We took into account your commission evaluations at the time, that they would do, and then we also weighed into kind of what was available and the pressing needs that are outlined, in our comp plan as well as in our housing loan and, you know, direction from CSF, things like that. So, first, we did receive an application from project center for fair housing activities for another year. Technically, they were not required to do this, but we want to show that in response to their application, we are recommending that they be awarded another contract of $50,000 fair housing enforcement, to investigate cases of housing discrimination.

Alright. Next, the CDBG Capital Housing Awards. We had two applicants this year within this category, The first being rebuilding together Silicon Valley for low income rehabilitation, right, and and, and homeowners. They were previously awarded $107,000 $101,107,500 dollars. Sorry.

And so we are recommending that they get awarded the same amount again for their request. And then, additionally, they received a second application from West Valley Community Services for rehabilitation at the Vista Village Apartments for the rehabilitation of three units in their bathrooms and their kitchens. They requested $160,000 for this request. And as you can see, we had $288,042 in this category, so just enough. Mhmm.

We are recommending fully awarding both of these contracts for their requested awards. Alright. The last category we have is for the BMR, affordable housing fund. We had one application this year from Eden Housing for the Wolf Road project. They were here last year. Let me go ahead and read out their proposal for this benefit of this clinician. It is 249 units built across two phases. The first will contain 101 units of mixed income housing for school district employees. Mhmm. Will contain also approximately 34 low income units and 67 moderate income units.

The second phase will contain 148 units with 60 very low income units, 86 low income units, two manager units. So 249 in total. Last year, when they came to the House of Commission, we recommended that they be awarded $1,083,200. We have about 700,000 till we're out this year. We are recommending that we fund them $666,880 to make it a total of 1 and 3 quarter million in total.

This would be pretty much the priority oh, sorry, of what we have remaining in the DMR fund. And so we we we choose to support this project. So recommendation contingency, just for this commission to know, this is not preempt, right, them getting planning entitlement. Right? These are these projects are recommended for commitment of funds, which will become awards contingent upon planning a title.

And second, this is not the end if if they need to come back again. Right? And if there are additional funds in the future that receive this application process or sometime in the future, we may award additional funds at a future causing commission. So at this point, we have some people in attendance who applied to the NOFA. We like to open it up for them to give just a short three minute presentation describing, you know, their service, the need that they fill, to the housing commission.

Don't want me to do it. That's my microphone.

I'm screening right now. First

of all, raise hands. How many people do we have who wanna do a presentation? Four? Okay. Yeah. Four. Yeah. We can do three minutes each. That's fine.

You know who's down there? I I don't know how it works. I'll have to I'll have to defer. Yeah. She's she's asking if it comes down here.

At the end or something?

You can

just stand and and talk.

Oh, you don't need the blue card. Is that what you Because you're on the agenda item. Oh, you wanna just turn

it off?

I can all turn it off. Turn

it off.

Okay. Let's start over here. We've got the timer on screen. You've got three minutes. Yeah.

Great. Good afternoon or good evening. I'm Dionne Everton, Winfrey Building Together, Silicon Valley. And I just wanna thank you all for your support for funding our critical home repair and safety modifications really for the last twenty years. Our community is most vulnerable who are in need of home repair.

You all have collectively served about a 175 households over that time, and those clients are at 80% of median income or below, but most are around 30%. Right now, it's about $40,000 a year. Those are people who are choosing between medicine and food and overdue home repairs and saving modifications. We know that the condition of our home has a direct impact on the health of the residents. Health is so greatly impacted by the condition of a home that every dollar spent on urgent home repairs can save $19 in Medicare and Medicaid.

So not only do the repairs we make at no cost to the recipient make those tough daily choices a little easier, but they also generate a social value to the homeowners, their families, the caregivers, the health care system, and taxpayers more generally to far surpass the cost of the repair. It's also proven that home preservation is the best and most affordable housing option for many low income households, costing about 26 times more to build a new affordable housing unit than to repair and sustain. Rebuilding Together has committed the last thirty five years to preserving and preserving our current housing stock. Our work of stabilizing homes supports generational wealth while reducing the risk

of displacement.

In fact, 11% of our clients would likely face homelessness without our services. Our work strengthens neighborhoods, fosters connection, and preserves the cultural and economic diversity of our region, all for a relatively low investment, while at the same time saving our community costs that far surpass the cost of the repairs. Your support of Rebuilding Together directly addresses Cupertino's quality of land's number one priority of preserving affordable housing through owner occupied rehabilitation. We, along with our neighbors and we, are grateful for your consent.

Let's leave questions for commissioner questions at the end. Go ahead.

Thank you, commissioners. Thank you, staff, for your recommendation. My name is Sujanthar Venkatraman, and I'm the executive director of West Valley Community Services. We are a local nonprofit serving low income families in Cupertino and other West Valley cities for fifty three years. We partnered with people doing together. Many of our families qualify for services. It's low income, extremely people who are seniors on face and families who are barely making enough in this valley because of housing burden and cost of living. We applied for funding for our Vista Deluge project. This is a 24 unit. It is a BMR unit.

It is part of the city's inventory. We are the property manager. The residents who live in these units are extremely low, very low, and low income individuals who are living and working in Cupertino, seniors who are aging in place in Cupertino. We applied for the repairs of three units. We have applied for the funding in the past, and we have done all all other units through different funding.

But these three units have residents living. And in the last ten years, the bathrooms and the kitchen needed more of attention, and that is the funding we applied for to repair the bathrooms, make it more age friendly for our residents and also the kitchen. We applied for a $160,000, but we're leveraging funds. We have other providers we work with for appliances, like bringing in more green energy electrical appliances. And hence, this funding will really help us with construction, repair cost, and also relocation of the residents because they are living there.

And we have we have experience running a CDBG contract. We've done it for many years, and we appreciate the support and the situation between us and the long term partner. So thank you.

Hi. Good evening. I'm Carol Collin. I'm the

executive director of Project Sentinel.

We just crossed our fifty year anniversary and have been in the community for many years. Thank you again for the continuing support and staff recommendation of thousand dollars. We also leverage our funds through federal and state funding as well, taking us closer to about 60,000 in services. Brought it sentinel by way of reminder around the nature of

their housing work, which has in

fact been getting some pushback and so on from the federal government on the new guidelines through HUD. But we're persevering under other means to continue to do the complete work of fair housing, and that includes investigating housing complaints just as Nikki had said, administering audits and surveys to probe for discriminatory practices that may be happening in the application process for units. We conduct community outreach and education, and then we subdue those redress for victims of discrimination. The community outreach is both to inform the public about fair housing itself, to inform residents about the very protections in place for them, and then also to educate providers about fair housing to ensure compliance so that they don't get into the route of an enforcement action. These services very much help to stabilize housing, stabilize communities, and will assist in meeting the goals of the housing element as well as for further housing.

And just to round it out, on average, we process or investigate about 350 cases a year.

About 30 to 40% of

those investigations come to be resolved, and the tenancy is preserved. Sometimes about 10 to 15% of the time, those cases go through enforcement, and that's when, usually, we haven't been able to get the property provider to acknowledge that they're out of compliance and resolve noncompliance. So these projects fair housing really is one of the very many elemental pieces to solving for the housing crisis and affordable housing overall. We help to prevent illegal evictions, homelessness, and of our most vulnerable residents, which includes seniors, veterans, people of different faiths, people with disabilities, survivors of domestic violence, and other protective classes. So I just wanna, in closing, thank again

the

city of Cupertino for its support for this continued work. It's ever more important as we go forward.

I'm gonna take thirty seconds. Good evening, commissioners and staff members of the city of Cupertino. My name is Dixie Baus. I'm the senior director of real estate development for Eaton House, and I'm here representing the Wolf Road Project. It's a six unit, 100% affordable housing, family development in.

This is phase two of a larger mixed use development that's sponsored by the county of Santa Clara. Phase one, which will house teachers and staff from nearby school districts, will be funded separately from this project. We've made a lot of progress on the project since the city made its initial award last year, you remember the negotiations we had at this table. I'm hoping that our, out there are having some success out there. We submitted our formal planning application and have gone through three rounds of planning review.

We had city council study session, just last week, where the community and the council was very supportive, and we're targeting planning commission hearing in late April or early May to secure entitlements. We encourage all of you to attend, remotely or in person, and all community members as well. Once we have our entitlements, we'll start applying for other local, state, federal sources to leverage the city's contribution and support. This project will be highly competitive since it's a large family project in the highest resource area, opportunity area in the state. We plan to start construction by the end of next year.

It's ambitious, but why not? Right? We're excited about the project, and we appreciate the commission's continued support. Jared Nolan's online. He's been the one who's been spearheading this effort for us and can answer any detailed questions you might ask. If you want fake answers, I can provide those. Thanks so

much.

Open the floor for questions.

Yes. So with that, we're gonna close the kind of community presentations portion of this meeting, and we're gonna move to clarifying questions from the commission.

Commissioners have questions for any of the presenters?

Oh, not for the presenters. Sorry.

We have any But

yeah.

Questions from anyone.

My question was gonna be for the recommendations that we were making for well, maybe one is for this. Okay. Anyway, my question is this. My question is this that for Sentinel housing, Project Sentinel, I know you do outreach on that, and I was wondering how much more you would require in order to do, say, a monthly training at the library or something so that there's regular information out there for everyone so that they're more likely to know where to go. And I was asking that question because, you know, I saw that your proposal was 52,000 and that we're recommending 50,000.

And I was thinking because of the below market rate affordable housing fund having perhaps a little more funding available that we could provide that. And so, yes, it was both to you as a what might that be, what might that cost be, and then, of course, to the city as to considering on that.

Yeah. Well, thank you so much for that question. We'd be more than happy to do a monthly regular workshop session. That's usually what we need style needs to be. We're already in contract with these proposed funds for four presentations a year Mhmm. Workshops, so that's one supporter. So we we would add on another eight, you know, from here. And it's generally around $800 for consider material stuff time, visitation, travel, mileage.

So

but it's it's fairly modest. Yeah. We're well oiled machine in that way and piece together in coordination of learning. Thank

you. Thank you.

Have a couple of questions for Project Sentinel.

Yes.

Do you collaborate with apartment landlords and so forth? How do you identify that there are people within the complex needing your service?

Yeah. So a few different ways that we handle the outreach. One is the brochure drops in different ways. Often and and we're neutral in the sense that a landlord or attend call us and receive counseling on their rights and responsibilities. From there, educating landlords is is actually a top priority, partly because there are so many mom and pop, like, what we call mom and pop landlords or small landlords that don't necessarily got the benefit the teams and all legacies of managing a property.

So we get the word out in in various numbers of ways for landlords. We've done everything from the ranch to landlords who use a property radar, which is a lot of. You know, rarely different. How many rentals there are in a given area and with some property management team, you know, or the landlord. We've also done workshops.

So common about

their information, their about engineers, and bureaucracy.

Those

seem to be fairly effective. What we also find is that when we're in property management, we still also have councils. We could council, but they may not charge. Okay. That's all. Our ratio is about two thirds tenants in

terms of who calls. Yep. Great.

Thank you. I have questions for Eden Housing. Mhmm. Your the there was a cost estimate in your application for the whole project. So when was that done? I'm sorry? There was a cost estimate included in your application for the whole project, the construction. It had a whole lot of line items. Mhmm. The question was when was that done, and did it account for inflation? Because I believe that was the same thing that was given to us last year. So is it I did not see a line item for inflation. So did that account for it?

Yeah. You know, typically, when projects are in entitlement stage, they're not in a advanced stage of design. They stick in a schematic design, and so there's not very much changing there. The numbers don't change because there's nothing to bid out at at at the thing. So right now, what we see in the market is we see a decrease in material price an increase in material, a decrease in labor. It just kinda evens out.

Same thing on

the equity. You see an increase in equity, an increase in there. It really is kinda like just throwing the dice up against the wall right now. And but it is in line with what we've got with our other projects that are being built right now and under construction it in line with that. So

Okay. Yep. I have a couple of questions. Let me finish with the presenters. For Silicon Valley, The seven households you said. Right? So this is in Cupertino. And is it different how seven households every year? How how are they chosen? And and why is there a cap at seven households?

Well, it's just an estimate of how many you think we could do with that that foundation. Sometimes we have six. Sometimes it's eight or nine. It just depends, you know, because it depends also on the that they need. But they they apply to us, and we qualify them on a first come first serve basis.

Sure that again, I you're tracking, like, which household you're doing repair and when you are in. So it's all different households every year?

Yes. Okay.

But, again, like, the cost was coming to, like, $15,000 per house. Yes. So what kind of repairs?

We do anything from roof replacements all the way down to putting in a grab bar or, you know, hand rails. So they're very. So it depends on on what that

needs. We go in and

we do an assessment based on a a 25 healthy housing priority list that we look at to make sure the home is safe, dry, pain, test spray, and everything. And so we use that to evaluate the home.

We're like

Identify the affairs of them. And then we try to be as judicial as we can about how much we send for

But these are all ownership owned homes. Right? Ownership. Single family homes.

Single family homes. This is

all single family homes in Goodpati and L. Okay.

Question, Trevor.

I have a question. I

I was finishing the presenters, the last one, and then we will move. Yeah. For West Valley, the building was built in 2002. Yeah. And they're asking for $50,000 per unit repair. That's pretty high for a recently built building.

Yeah. So it takes people to you go through CBG. You have to contract through CBG contractor, which which comes under what's daily stated, the price increases. So we can't just hire a general contractor to do the work. CPG has specific requirements to go to CDPH approved contractor. And and these units have been people have been living in it. So let's know the usage of that. And that's after that. Like, the kitchen and the bathroom are so it should be.

So it's more of a renovation than repair. It's not really repair. It's a new building. Yeah. That's yeah. Okay.

So for clarity, when you're doing a, like, a fully bidded out construction project with federal funds

Yeah.

There's a procurement process that, number one, requires you to use prevailing wage, which increases the cost. There's a there's a formal bidding that you have to do with advertising out to the unions and, like, you do section figure for workers and so it's it's a lot more expensive than if you were to use, you know, cash money. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, the agencies have done it. They've done it. They did a hard work.

Right. So this the 50,000 per unit is not just the construction work. It's also for you said those people will be displaced, so you have to provide Yeah.

There's There's money.

That that money is used for that total. Okay. I'm done with my questions. I'll give others a chance to ask questions. I'm sure.

And I

was wondering, do you have the workers who volunteer their their time to make those repairs, or you just hire regular professionals who do that for for a living?

We do both. So we it depends

on the

repair, but as a particular homeowner might have a roofing contractor come in and do the roof work, then we would have a group of volunteers come in and do a little more volunteer friendly type work like painting them home for doing yard cleaning of mine was.

But we're supposed to, like, Habitat for Humanity to collaborate with them? Or

We collaborate with them. Not maybe the way you think, but they they have they have access to funds for home repair, and they give they pass those funds to to us to do the work. But the those funds right now are specific to mobile homes. And so they are the first people to know that. I

just wanted to thank all of you for coming. Actually, you know already what you applied for is being recommended to be given to you. You still took the time to just educate the public, educate us. You've made yourself available to answer questions. So thank you for showing up

You're welcome. I second lost them. Thank you so much.