Community Development Block Grant (cdbg) Commission - Regular Meeting

All right, I will call the meeting to order. Thanks to everybody for being here on a sunny day where we should be at the pool. Are there any public comments on items not on the agenda? All right, then we'll go to the reports to committee. Cindy, how are you doing the RFP? Sure, I'll start. Process and scoring criteria.

Sure, and I'll go through this as these are just reminders about how our process operated this year. So Dane County receives approximately $1.6 million in CDBG and home funds from HUD each year, and those funds are distributed through a competitive RFP process each year. Earlier this year, the CDBG Commission reviewed and approved the 2027 RFP funding categories, which are in line with the Dane County five-year consolidated plan. The RFPs for each category were released in May and applications were due in June. The CDBG application review team reads and scores the written proposals or applications using the evaluation criteria that was approved by the commission. And preliminary funding recommendations are made by this committee to the full CDBG commission. So these are preliminary funding recommendations that we'll talk about today. Once these preliminary funding recommendations are approved, a public hearing will be scheduled to approve the final funding recommendations. Funding allocations to agencies that are determined by the application review team are based on not only the evaluations and scores, but also the Dane County five-year consolidated plan goals. And the application review team will develop contingencies on the funding recommendations and adjust subrecipient award levels as needed after Dane County receives the 2027 CDBG and home grant awards, which would be hopefully the first quarter of 2027. So any recommendations that we make today may be adjusted through our contingencies after we receive our 2027 award amount. And so no funding levels are final until we receive that grant award amount next year. And applications are listed by score and by ranking, and they're separated by each project area this year. So applicants in each project area will be scored amongst others in that same category. And the application review team will determine the preliminary funding recommendations based on rank as well as the consolidated plan goals. Funding contingencies, just in case the federal funding levels increase or decrease or there are ineligibility issues, will also be considered by the team. And the amount available shown today is projected funding level based on the 2026 CDBG in-home grant amounts and considering a possible decrease for 2027. So sometimes we like to award out on the lower end because we'd rather have awards increased later on than decreased. And as a reminder, this meeting is a public meeting and is being recorded.

All right. Thank you. Any questions about the process? Anyone? And the alignment with the five-year consolidated plan, you said, are you going to go over that or do you want questions about that now?

Um, either way, it was just information on what that looks like.

Okay. Because you have the table on the document you sent out yesterday with the funding allocation. And then the consolidated plan, the column at the end shows that we want to spend 15% over the five year period on housing rehabilitation. Is that the correct way to interpret?

That correct. So and I'll just back up a little bit since that document isn't on the. On this meeting or as an attachment, but it was a document that was shared last spring as we were determining what the funding amounts were. So the consolidated plan has the five year goals and. based upon the information in the consolidated plan and doing some projections and math on funding levels. We determined that a certain percentage would be allocated to different project areas like you mentioned. And that's why we try to stay So each year we do some projections and we have an average amount based upon what we're actually spending and then maybe what we can spend the next year. So as we developed the RFPs for 2027, we took into consideration where we're at in that five-year process and how we ultimately achieve what that percentage would look like in the end.

So I'm assuming that if you look at any of the categories where we're scoring, that's how the maximum amount of funding was set. Correct.

Okay.

All right. I just wanted to clarify that. I think that we all kind of, you know, it's like when you look it down, we'll look at it broken down into these individual categories. You know, the cap is a real constraint in terms of, you know, we got lots more applications than obviously in any category. So that's where the cap in each area came in.

But it keeps us in line with that five-year plan. Correct. It keeps that. It's more important the further along that five years we get. Yeah, I would think so. Year five is going to be very restrictive.

Correct. And as we'll discuss contingencies later, based upon what we received, if there are increases, we can determine, okay, do we need to fill any gaps or what does that look like? Because each year there might not be enough applicants to fulfill that percentage or vice versa, too many applicants and we just can't fund them all, right?

So, yeah. So I guess that I'm asking all this in saying that Today, we're not really going to consider changing those maximum funding amounts in each category. We're going to look at the applications that we have and consider those limitations and go from there to make our recommendations. Correct.

And then, as I said, once we... determine or once we find out what our 2027 awards will look like, those caps might change or may increase. And if we need to fulfill a certain area, then we can determine what those contingencies look like. But yes, we're staying within that project area this year.

All right. Sounds good. And those are the rules that were set out in the RFP, so people knew that. Correct.

Okay. All right. All right. So we need to have a consensus discussion. And from this discussion, we're hoping to come up with our preliminary funding recommendations. Correct. Okay. All right. That's the goal. And I think that... We can go through, I'm assuming we're going to go through each one of the subcategories and figure out what the scoring looks like. In some cases, it's going to be pretty straightforward. If it's the highest score and they ask for the maximum amount, pretty settled, huh? So it really is based on those, how we ranked the applications.

Correct. And... Several months ago, early spring, before we released the RFPs, we did create a document that had kind of these new processes, which I re-sent to you all yesterday, highlighting some key areas where, yes, if there is a top score, they would receive what they requested for allowability of those items and then go from there. One other thing about consensus, as we make preliminary funding recommendations, we will also, one thing I wanted to mention, and this came up recently, is that the staff and procurement had questions about, about several applications and because this year we're not doing those applicant interviews which has evolved over the years but then we determined that it wasn't super useful but because we have questions for certain applications that may determine eligibility or may determine allowability of certain budget items We will be doing a follow-up with all agencies so they'll all get the same information, depending on what the questions are, to... It gives them an opportunity to, like, cure their application or to fix it. And this is in conjunction with procurement. So this is what we did with Pro Housing, if you recall. The staff had questions about the eligibility of an applicant or two. And so we allowed the opportunity for the applicants to cure or fix whatever things in the application were just not right. Or maybe they misunderstood along the way in the RFP. So sometimes the RFPs could be confusing to some, and so we want to make sure we're ultra clear about what we're asking for. So during this round, we are going to, and this will be after this meeting, so any funding recommendations made today, we'll have to develop the contingencies in the event that there's an applicant who may be either ineligible or their budget may look different than what you've seen today. based on allowability items in their budget. So I don't have specific details yet because we're still drafting that email and what that looks like. We want to be clear and we want to be concise in what we're asking the applicants. But you will definitely know once we determine when those responses come in. So that's part of the consensus is so that you all understand that there are some follow-up questions that need to be done by procurement and that will follow up with certain agencies based upon what questions we have about their applications. And the other part of the consensus meeting is to see if any of you had questions about the RFP or the application or responses or the evaluation pieces that we need to discuss now in order for us to be on the same page.

Does anyone have questions?

On the process?

On the process.

Yeah, so, like, a couple things that came up, like, like, I think there's one like here, for Habitat and Operation Fresh Start, for example, where they're both applying for the same project, but through different, they do different things through different ways, right? But they're both applying for the same project. Now, I looked at every application in a vacuum without any consideration of that and everything else. So it looks like in that particular one, one group might get something and the other group might get nothing, but they're both going funds to the same project. Are we okay with basically double funding the same project through different organizations?

Yes, we've done that in the past.

Okay.

So we, like, for example, if there are two agencies doing minor home repair, and in the past we've funded two, and I don't know if this is the exact case, but if we've funded two different organizations that are both doing minor home repair, that's okay.

Okay, but I think on that particular one, I think they were both going for the exact same project. Same dollars were going to the same project through different means. So like Habitat for Humanity builds a house, they hire Operation Fresh Start to be one of the construction contractors for building those houses, right? So Habitat is basically providing affordable housing. Operation Fresh Start is providing job training and that sort. So I mean, they're both doing good things, which I think are valuable, but it's really the same dollars going to the same project.

Is it the same house though?

I believe so.

Okay. I, I guess I, I thought it was, there's a development and they're each doing like one of them's doing one lot.

Oh, well it's the same development. I I'm pretty sure. I'm not sure. It is the same development. I'm not sure if it's the exact same house or not, but it could be, but it just seemed. So there's that. And then there's some that were like kind of related entities. Like, um, I forget which one was like the, um, the hundred black men, I think. And, um, And there's some other ones that seem to be like they were separate entities, but somewhat related. And they're both requesting information or they're requesting funds. And again, they're separate entities and doing different things, but they're sort of related. And it seems like we're funding two things kind of the same group. But again, I just want to make sure that that's not a problem that we're doing that sort of thing.

Well, and those are questions to bring up, and that's why staff are here, too. I wish Caleb was here, but he's not. Pedro's here. He does public services. I know he missed kind of that conversation, but it's something that, like, if we're developing preliminary funding recommendations today, that's what it is. They're just preliminary, and you can say, I need more information about this, and that's why we come to a consensus, like, okay, so these funding recommendations might be contingent upon finding out if this is okay or if this makes sense or have the discussion in this meeting today with others and with staff that can provide more information on that. So was it the Black Men Coalition you said?

Yeah.

I think that might be Michelle's.

Well, these are like specific. I think maybe we can turn to the consensus within each one of the areas and discuss some of these issues as we're moving through them. Okay. So which one are we doing first?

Should we start with the easy one?

I'm sorry. Are there any other questions about the process? Otherwise, then we will move on to the consensus discussion and whatever your table is. Do you, or do we have one we want to do first? Do you have a question, Malteser?

No, I just wanted to maybe share a little bit about some of the stuff that is happening over at Town Hall.

Sorry, can you put the mic?

If I can just share a little bit of what's happening over at Town Hall crossing in St. Prairie, and I think that's probably what you were referring to, where Operation Fresh Start, they do have a number of projects there, and Habitat is working on a number of projects, so this is is the whole project, which is called the Town Hall Crossing. As you recall, we also have some pro-housing funds as part of that project with $600,000 going into infrastructure. So I think, you know, just to... So we, you know... It's not unusual. Two months ago, we went to an open house where there was an open house for Operation Free Start and then Habitat for Humanity next door. So I think they are trying to, I don't read those applications, but there are time to compliment some of the work that might be happening there. So I just wanted to bring that up so that hopefully it will be helpful.

Thank you. Okay, does that help?

Yeah, I just want to make sure that so it's it's fine that we're doing that. And I just want to make sure that that's, yeah, yep.

And I think when when staff do read the application, so again, Baltazar did not read those in particular, but they'll notice those things.

And point out eligibility issues, I'm assuming. Right.

How do you want to start?

Well, I'm assuming that you have, I can't pull it up on the computer, but the table that has the scoring recommendations. I'm not sure why it's not coming up on my phone either. All right. So the first one. that you're looking at is?

So the column C is the RFP category.

So public infrastructure is the first one. The maximum amount that we can award is $294,000. I'm correct. And

So this, obviously they were number one, but.

Yeah. Oh, there you've got right. Okay. Got it.

Okay. So this one, there's a maximum for this category is $294,000. They requested the full amount. So this is the village of Rockdale and they're utilizing a consultant to do their project.

And this is replacing sanitary sewer mains and laterals. For 20 houses, if I recall correctly, and they were the number one score, and they asked for the, the maximum amount. So it seems like. According to our process, they get 294,000 dollars. So, again, these are all what was their average score?

I'd have to pull that up.

That's okay.

Yeah. Sorry that that one's omitted.

I just wondered, I mean, was it an acceptable score? I'll look, just give me a second.

I felt they were all fairly well written.

Yeah. Yeah. I think this one for me had a couple of errors, but I think genuinely it was a pretty good application.

Okay. I'll put it up there.

All right.

Maybe 5.6.

Okay. But then it was like not 75 or something. So, okay. So I think then we can award them the full amount. The next category is economic development. The highest score was WBIC. The And we had six applications. There's $168,000 available. WBIC asked for $60,000. So since they were the number one scorer, they get that $60,000. Latino Academy was the next. Their requested amount was $60,000. So they would get that. And that leaves $48,000 for the Black Man Coalition.

It's above their minimum request, so then they get all of that, correct, following that procedure?

Mm-hmm. I didn't see that they had a minimum. Well, no, they did 60,000, 35,000. So- What was their minimum, Kathy? Did you see?

Oh, sorry. Did Black Man Coalition have a minimum request? Do you remember? They did not.

No, they just said 55 or 55. Oh, I have written down here 55,000, 40,000. Am I looking at the right one?

55 and 40.

Yeah, that's what I had.

Okay. That, yeah, some reason that didn't export.

So the $48,000 is in between their minimum and their maximum. So I think they would get the $48,000 to close out that category.

On the procedure, yes.

Okay. Were there any concerns about those top applications that people had? These are fairly well established groups. They've been doing this for a while.

Yeah. I don't I noted in the board minutes that the board authorized $100,000 request, and they submitted a request to 55. There's just I don't know if that's anything, but it seems like they probably voted for up to 100,000. Nothing from me.

Okay. Thanks, Jeremiah. All right. So are we good with that one? Yep. All right, home building. This is the Habitat for Humanity and Operation Fresh Start. We have $140,000 total to award. Habitat asked for all of that. So I think according to our process, they would get that $140,000.

That's correct. And I'll note that I think this category is one category in which we are following up with the agencies on some different things. Also, this category can be funded with CDBG or HOME. And so as we, you know, think ultimately when we think about the totals, We can potentially make adjustments in which agencies can be split-funded, CDBG and home. I just wanted to bring that part up, too. It's not super clear in this way we're doing it now, but if it's grayed out, that means that that category cannot be funded with that. So, like, economic development cannot be funded with home dollars. Okay, so for now... I'll put the amount here.

Yeah, this is one of those that, again, it's going towards the same project. Both great organizations. Even by their scoring, they're 1.4% away from each other. But that's the rules we set up.

Yep. And I'm going to highlight this one because, like I mentioned, I think this category is one that we are following up with agencies about specific things.

Okay.

Got it.

All right. Then moving on to fair housing. We had two applications this year. Metropolitan Milwaukee Fair Housing Council and Urban Triage. It looks like... Sorry, I have to find my cheat sheet here. Fair housing, we have $10,000 total. Milwaukee Fair Housing applied for $10,000 and they were the high scorer. So they would get the $10,000. And it looks like, oh, that can't be a home award. Okay.

Yeah, this one is a category that's funded through our administrative dollars too. Okay.

All right. TBRA. That is... $112,000 is the maximum amount. And WayForward scored the highest score and they asked for $112,000. So. That's it. And that is automatically a home award?

It is. Yeah, this is the tenant-based rental assistance.

Because it's not an allowable CDBG activity, correct? Correct. Okay. Mortgage reduction, Madison Area Community Land Trust, Habitat for Humanity. I must not have done these in the same order here. I've got... Look back and forth. We did that one. So the total that we can award is, keep moving around. Sorry, sorry.

I'm trying to. $448,000.

Does that help?

Is that right? Yes.

Okay.

Yes, this is a category that needed a higher percentage.

Okay. So Habitat requested, no, the Land Trust requested $160,000, so we can fund that one. at the full amount and Habitat requested $225,000 so we can fund that at the full amount.

Again, this is a category that can be funded by both CDBG and HOME. And this also might be a category we had follow-up on, but I'm just highlighting it so we know that this is a category that can be split.

Okay. All right, so what do we do with the excess funds?

So that would be a contingency, right, at the end. So if we have, and this might take some time by staff to kind of figure out math to determine how to allocate this extra funding, depending on what the application review team decides if we're falling short in an area. So the percentages, right, that we're looking at with the con plan right now, these are guides. And so, like I mentioned earlier, sometimes there might be a gap or sometimes there might be overspending in an area. So we can decide at the end after we go through these and say, okay, how much funds do we have left and how do we determine where this would go? We kind of expected this to happen, but we can talk about it at the end of the meeting.

And then, Cindy, for a question, as you guys are going through the eligibility processes for some of these, if one of the applications is determined not to be eligible, would that also add to the contingency as well?

Yeah.

All right. Minor home repair. This one, the total amount available is $168,000. We have requests of 141. So it seems to me that we can fund everybody at the requested amount. Although I guess I'm... Well, yeah, never mind.

I'll just note for this category that the $168,000 was actually... minor home repair plus major home rehabilitation those two categories combined it's all under the umbrella of rehabilitation but there were no applicants for major home rehabilitation so i put that money into minor home repair got it if you if you guys are okay with that the overall con plan percentage combines those two anyway okay okay so we had no applications correct

All right. Public services. This is the one I always feel bad about. Let's see. $165,000. We had $427,000 in applications. Literacy Network scored the highest. They requested $35,000, so they would get $35,000. Latino Academy requested $35,000. They would get $35,000. Stoughton Transportation requested $20,000. They would get $20,000. New Bridge requested $10,000 and they would get $10,000. Keeping score, that's 100,000 so far. Yep, I can see it. Good adding in your head, Ted. $35,000 they would get. And then Sondercove Wellness requested $35,000. Their minimum request was $25,000, so they would get $30,000.

I'll note that... Oh, go ahead, Jeremiah.

Oh, I said, and that's it.

And that's it. And I think... So I'll just say again, this might have been a Category 2 that we're checking on some eligibility items. So... I'll just save this, but we can... One, talk about contingencies of increases or decreases as well as the extra funding. Does staff have any... Additional information, not necessarily on eligibility, but just to add to the conversation.

Can I just ask one quick question about the average score? Does that include, I mean, there was a section of the application scoring that was just staff doing those. Does that score include that added to everybody else's scores?

Oh, so it's a combination of both staff and commissioners. Got it. Yes.

Yeah, there was one category that staff, yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, that was, it's under the category staff or past performance. And so applications are scored based upon spending of their grant funds in a timely manner, communications, following up with staff as needed, and then timely submission of their reports. So just the administrative things that we look at. And that was up to 10 points. New applicants receive 10 points automatically if they haven't received funding.

All right. So I think that unless people have questions or concerns about any of these applications, the regular awards are completed at this point. And do you want to go through the contingencies or is there no point doing that until you check on eligibility and other questions related to the applications?

I think we can start with contingencies with an increase or decrease of funding overall. I just put in some examples here as these are kind of what have been done in the past, but my other contingencies that could be recommended would be if there are extra funds in a certain category, do we go to the next applicant to see if they're able to accept those funds? Do we try to put it back into a category that that we see a gap in? And I'll just remind everybody that public services we can only fund 15% of our grant award. So there is potential of an increase based upon Our last year's award was a substantial increase from before, which was a surprise, but we always try to kind of be conservative in that amount. And so contingency could be, if there's an increase in funding from HUD, one option is, so that changes kind of the overall picture of the percentages. We could think about adding funds to each category. We could think about just focusing on one category. It's up to you.

I have to bring up that table again, but what's the category that in the consolidated plan has the highest percentage?

I'll see if I can pull that up in a minute.

It seems like it's like mortgage. Mortgage reduction. And that one we had, we were able to award both of them, right? And then the second category was maybe minor home repair.

Mortgage reduction is the highest. Looks like public infrastructure is next.

And we funded that, so.

Yeah, I mean, yeah, right now mortgage reduction is the highest at, and this is solely for 2027. So this is not the long-term con plan. But for this year, we were aiming for 32% mortgage reduction. And yeah, the others are, I mean, public infrastructure was 21%. And as a reminder, this kind of gets us to the five-year goals. The five-year goals are also based on outcomes. And so we'll know more in the next year, like if we're trying to meet our outcomes as well.

So we know that we're not likely to be able to fund any more public services. So where was the greatest, the area that we could fund the least percentage, I guess, is that would have been the economic development one.

Let me see if I can, there's a document that I want to pull up. Let me see if I can pull this one up.

Can you scroll up and just, I think the one that we're looking at for is, That one. If you look at the amount requested versus what we had available, that was one of the areas that, you know, it seems like would be a priority if there's a contingency to go to the next one on the list and see if we could fund it.

Are you talking about economic development?

Yeah.

Okay. Let me say something real quick.

Does anyone have another way of looking at it besides that?

Okay, so I think that This whole system is somewhat subjective and objective, right? And the subjective part was taking care of the scoring. And the objective part is being taken care of by the procedures that we have here and everything else. We can eliminate some categories. So for example, like you said, the public services, we're limited to 15%. So even if we have more dollars, we can't do anything. So you can like cross it off the spreadsheet. The public infrastructure, we've fully funded. There's no other applications, right? And then the same thing with the mortgage reduction, we fully funded that and everything else. So I think we take whatever dollars, if there's additional dollars, whatever dollars, and then go back to those areas where there is room for more funding.

And that's why I'm saying economic development is the one that had the most funded as a percentage of

The request, right? Yeah.

And that's not a category that's funded both by CBDG and home, right?

Right.

So that one would probably be probably priority because the other ones, like I was looking at home building, and correct me if I'm wrong, home building is funded by both CBDG and home. I know we haven't funded some of those at the full amount.

Have we awarded the home funds?

I think others are saying this, but it seems to me that if we have a contingency, we should look at areas that are historically funded vis-a-vis the five-year average and apply the contingency there. If areas have more applicants than we have dollars available this year, maybe they get overfunded this year and less funded in future years because we are you know, overshooting the average this year and then moving towards that five-year average. So, conceptually, that's what would make sense to me with any contingency.

Yeah, and I think that's where economic development falls.

So right now, economic development, our five-year goal is 17%. So you can see that here. Currently, we're at the 20%, which is why... Oh, I see. I mean, but again, wherever these gaps are, we can certainly do that and then make up for that in the next year. Because we have two more years after 2027. Mm-hmm. to kind of see where we're at with our consolidated plan. So that's a contingency, but also if there's an overall increase, I think what you'll need to decide is do we just kind of increase those caps just for certain categories or for everybody?

We wouldn't be able to increase the caps, you know, for all categories and still be able to disperse the funds because some have essentially maxed out the dollars available, right? So we would need to take that into account as well, probably.

I guess I'd like to propose as a contingency that if we get more funds, more CDBG funds, then We have already allocated that those all get allocated to economic development and fund fully fund the next application and then whatever the next application is would get. The additional funding as long as it was their minimum request. Did I say that right?

I'm trying to work off this laptop with everything in the way. So you're saying, Kathy, that I'll just write it down. If there's an increase in funding, then award it to the next applicant?

I think you're saying...

In the economic development.

For the economic development, but then follow the same procedures.

Right. Following our same allocation procedure, but that's where the funds would get added. I mean, we're not going to get so much more that we're going to be able to fully fund $140,000 project probably. So that's the one area that the requests are of an amount that we might be able to fund. That didn't make any sense probably, but it did in my brain. Somewhere in there.

Right. So you're saying that like under the home building, that the next one down would be their minimum request is $140,000. We're probably not going to have $140,000. So you're saying, well, then that one's just out. Now the one underneath that, fair housing, though, the next one is $10,000 and their minimum request is $9,000. So we could fund that if we wanted to.

So one thing I wanted to put in here, too, is if we say the home award we're funding out, I should put $375,000, then we can look at where we can move some over to So we've already got $112,000. So there would be next. I mean, we can work that out, but it might open up some CDBG money.

So if you go up to the top, it could be. How much more do we have to award at home?

Let's see. So I'd have to do $75,000.

See. Yep. So 112. So about.

250, 60.

We can't do anything in public services.

But just to kind of stay on track, I'm sorry, I went on a little tangent, but with the categories that have the extra funding now, So there is minor home repair, which is CDBG only, and then mortgage reduction, which could be both. But these extra funds, were you saying to put into economic development? Now, again, this could go into either home or CDBG, whereas this one could only go to economic development.

So we could award Madison Area Community Land Trust $160,000 in home funds, but it's not going to really help us because we have extra there.

Right. I think ultimately, you know, we're still looking at the total amount. And maybe this is something that staff can work on is how these are funded. But you know, if we, like, obviously we couldn't fund all of this under home. So I think what we would do is allocate some agencies to home dollars first. So this might not be a decision by the application review team. I'm just pointing that out because if we, if you decide to put any remaining dollars into another category, we can be mindful of which dollars we do that with.

and public services can't be extra CDBG funds, putting them to economic development makes sense. And then if we can switch some that are eligible for home to home, the only way that that's gonna be helpful is if we change the percentages that we're allocating to each category.

Right. So just as a hypothetical, if we receive an increase in CDBG dollars, public services is going up anyway, because 15% of that award is 15%. So public services will go up. And maybe that's the first contingency is that if we receive an increase in CDBG funds, then we start funding.

We fund an additional public service project up to the amount allowed. Correct.

Mm-hmm.

So that one's kind of taken care of, right? And then the second part of the contingency is to put it to public service.

No.

Economic development. Okay.

Sorry. But you only funded co-wellness 30%. So I don't know if the contingency needs to say.

I said we would fully fund that one and then move on to the next application.

So fully fund public services up to the cap of 15% and then distribute the CBDG funds to the economic development section.

According to our allocation process, because we have that process in place.

So I'll just put fund applicants at full requested amount. Because again, I think we all decided we're not necessarily naming agencies. We're talking about rankings, and we're talking about categories. So funding applicants at full request until funds run out. And that's assuming, right, that Sondra Cove would be funded at their requested amount. Again, overall, we're still looking at some eligibility things for a couple of different categories. And so that's why I don't like to name agencies because I don't know who these are. I don't know anything about it, but I just know that procurement is working on some stuff.

All right. So we have talked about the contingency. I don't think we need a motion or approval for that. It's just consensus, correct?

I think we would need to vote on contingencies. But if you want to get through a couple more, then like decreases.

So, okay, so the first one. Well, it seems like the decreases are easy. Well, not easy, but if we get a decrease, we have an amount left over in a couple categories. So we wouldn't have to, we don't have to think about taking money away from someone. We can just take the money away from where we have extra funds.

But we won't know that until 2027. So what we're doing now is saying this is a preliminary funding recommendation.

I know. But if we if you find out in 2027 that we're going to get less money, let's say we're going to get 50,000 less in funding. It seems like the remaining amount that's in the mortgage reduction could. You could take $50,000 and you'd still have $13,000 remaining and not defund anybody.

I see what you're saying. But if it's more than that, just...

If it's more than that, we have another category where we have $26,000 remaining. So those could be both used for the contingency for decreases. And then if there's more than that, we know something has to come out of public services because... That is automatic because it's a percentage. Yeah.

Well, I think the process is fairly straightforward. I mean, we just whipped through this here fairly quickly. I think if it's a decrease, you basically reset and do the process all over again.

Yeah.

Right? Define process.

Do you mean... Well, can you expand on that?

This is all just a big formula, right? Right. And so you're allocating certain percentages to different categories, and then within those categories, we're starting fully funding number one, fully funding number two, you know, all the way down. I mean, so that process is fairly straightforward and very objective here. And so if, you know, we're budgeted right now for, I forget what the amount was, a million one or something like that, I mean, if it's less than that, then we just change that number, all the percentages change, and then You know, what might hand up is that the second or third, whosoever the lowest ranking one might get a little bit less. Right. That's really what's...

So then the contingency would be if those percentage... So the percentage of a lesser amount would mean that there's less available for that category, right? Whatever category it is. So then the contingency could go two ways. Do you decrease everybody or do you decrease from the bottom up? From the bottom up. Okay.

Yeah, I think we stick with the same procedure to be fair about it. So my question is though, like we've got like 90... thousand excess right now, are we going to reallocate that now? Or are we just leaving that as a contingency?

I would leave it for a contingency. And then if we can reallocate it to a project, we can do that. But that seems like a safe thing to do in the current environment.

So do you mean the, did you say, if I heard you correctly,

Gosh, I hate working on a laptop sometimes.

The amount that's left over just to leave it there for now until we know what our award amounts will be.

Yeah, because we're also still waiting on eligibility things too. And so that might also play a factor in even if we have a decrease.

So that would be the $63,000 here. And the $29,000. And the $26,950 in minor home repair. Is that right?

Yep.

Sorry, I'm scrolling, but I have to write this down.

but ultimately they're not used and they basically go to the contingency above and that will then direct that then towards economic development.

Right. And then I'm assuming if we do have a decrease, the public services one, because it is a percentage, I'm assuming one would get either cut funds or not funded altogether.

Right. The lowest one on the list would be impacted.

Okay. Were there any other contingencies?

I just have a general, like, question or maybe just a comment. So I came in last year, you know, this process was already done and we came in and then we had this, because there'll be a public meeting here too, right, where these groups can come and everything else. And I thought that, like, my impression was I wasn't part of all this last year, but I know that there's a lot of work that happens behind the scenes. This year I have seen a lot of work because I spent, you know, multiple hour, you know, quite a bit of time going through all these reviews and gave it due consideration. I just didn't willy-nilly score them. I read them and those sorts of things and everything else. I think we kind of have to stick to our guns, though, because we have a very objective process here. We have to stick to our guns. And it's hard to like then say, you know, when we have the whole meeting and say, well, you know, I really like the Boys and Girls Club. Can't we give them $10,000? I think we have to be very wary of that and not just do that. And then I think sometimes the people who came in public, they all make good cases and all the applications were good too. And then I think there was a very sympathetic ear to those people who came in public and then, okay, well, we'll give them some more money and everything else, even though they might not have been as high as scoped. I mean, is that kind of a feeling we should have here?

I mean as a staff person and who works closely with procurement I think that kind of following county processes and rules and procurement guidelines I think this is and we're getting closer to that right I think we've been fortunate enough in the past to where we've been able to fund many agencies, but funding them kind of lower at the, that they've requested. So there's two pieces to that argument. It's like, well, you know, I scored in the top three, but I'm not getting what I asked for versus, you know, somebody scoring the top and, you know, getting everything. But I think the way that we're doing it this year is moving closer to a way that's done in many different governmental settings with kind of more, I don't want to say stricter, but adhering more to kind of what the guidelines of the county are. Because, yes, I think we have a lot of good programs out there that do amazing work, and we are always going to have a commission member or somebody from the public who's very sympathetic to the causes. And that's totally okay to be that way, but we have to figure out, is that the way that we want to move forward?

Right. Because I think that we chose like, and again, I'm just using them as an example because I knew they do good work, but the Boys and Girls Club, they're, you know, they're probably not going to get monies or whatever, or they might not even with contingencies. And if, you know, They come to the meeting and several commissioners are empathetic to that. And I say, well, let's just give them $20,000. Well, then we've kind of gone against the RFP and the whole procedures and everything that we've outlined before. And we've just made it kind of a subjective choice.

And in my opinion, I think that's kind of the good thing about us being commissioners because we're, I think, well, especially ones on art is we have two kind of dual roles. One, we're supposed to follow the RFP process. And then as commissioners, Commissioners were all citizens who have kind of stakes and knowledge of our community. And so that's the great thing. We blend both of those two kind of aspects together. And then it's also good to have staff with us because whatever the commissioners have in terms of their kind of beliefs, ideas, opinions, we can bounce those off ideas to the staff and see if the staff feel like that's compliant or not. So I think, I think we're still kind of following guidelines, even though, and also art and the commission aren't coming to separate entities, right? In a way, because we determine the applications, but the commission is the commission as a whole.

Well, the commission voted on the process. They voted on the RFP. They've approved the process that we use to allocate these funds. And so to that extent, I think that we have to say, this is a process that was approved. This is what it resulted in. You know, when it comes to next year, if you want to, you know, do something in the process to change it because you find fault in it, great. But for right now, this is what it resulted in. And I think you're, I mean, I think what you're saying is that as a committee, we have to present it as, you know, we read the applications, we scored people. This is what we came up with using the process you approved.

And I think it's more... how can I say this, is doing it like this or what you guys have done it, it's more defendable, if I can use that word. If somebody comes and says, well, what last, you know, sometimes when you go by what Cindy, by what you mentioned, well, we really like, how do you defend that against our criteria and our guidelines? We can get actually kind of in trouble if somebody comes back and says, well, but you don't, Here, we're being straightforward. We're being, you know, according to what we approved and what it is, and by the scores. I mean, it is what it is. I mean, whether we like it, and I see a few in the public service that I like, but, you know, it's what they score, you know, and the justification is, well, you know, this is what. I think one of the things that some agencies might ask, or it might be good for you guys as commissioners, if this stands when it goes to the full commission, to give feedback to the agencies that maybe score lower they might ask, so what can we do better? What did we do bad that you consider that we might be able to do better next time so we score higher? So those might be some of the talking points that might be, I don't know, to the advantage of the agencies and maybe as a gesture from the commissioners to kind of give the agencies just to not let them go empty handed. At least we know what we did wrong so we can improve for next time or what wasn't viewed as good in our application that we can do better next time. But I think it's justifiable is we can, you know, really respond to them if anybody comes to us. Well, we follow the procedure. We have the scores. This is how it's been. So I, you know, I think it's it's, you know, we're going to move in the right direction. Yeah.

Jeremiah has his hand up.

Yeah, I think at this point I might be a broken record here, but I wanted to bring us back here about four years ago when many of these, the things that we're talking about today on what we want to see out of this process and what we don't want. were happening back then. So a lot of the changes and the new iterations, the new criterias and formats and methodologies that staff has built into the process, creating new steps, creating more of an incremental step and being very purposeful in our approach because of exactly what each one of you are talking about is we have to eliminate the ambiguity or the unknowns.

Oh, shoot.

Yes. Hello. Hello.

Oh, sorry. Yeah, I think everything froze for a second. It wasn't just you.

Oh, okay. The ambiguity of the process and then exactly what we were hearing today, the loud voices get into the room or emails start coming from... people in positions of power and around the city and people coming to meetings trying to influence what should be a process that eliminates the loud outside voices, allows for an inclusive environment that allows where we want people to be able to apply and access these funds, but we wanna do it in a very fair system where if you're going to enter into the system in one way, you're not going to all of a sudden get treated differently downstream because of some outside force. So I guess at this point, I really wanted to say congratulations and thank you to staff for listening to our recommendations, listening to what some of those challenges that we've experienced over the last several years. And I think this process this year is doing exactly what we need it to do. And I think I've heard it from 90% of us in this meeting where We have these very valid concerns. Let's not create contingencies or create roadblocks that impede all of that judgment that we've already used in our benefit. So I guess that's it.

Thanks Jeremiah. Good summary of everybody's comments. So we just need to make sure that everyone understands what the process was that we all reviewed the application. All of us have organizations that we love that didn't get funded and some that maybe we didn't like that got funded. It was because we use this kind of objective process. And I think that's really important. And I do think as Jeremiah said, the staff has done a lot in the last couple of years to tighten this process up and we appreciate that.

And going back to Pedro's point about feedback, when I was doing like, and this is the first time I've ever done an application for Dane County in general, I feel like a big thing that I kind of saw was obviously their projects are there, they're doing a lot of great work for the community, but I felt like a lot of the times when I was doing my scoring, Particularly, I think it was the scope, not the scope, it was the project approach. On the applications, it outlined like eight or nine different checkpoints, right? And so I would go through each application and be like, got it, got it, got it. And the applications that were scored lower didn't meet all those nine points. And so I feel like that was kind of where I kind of thought, why applications were scored less while applications were scored more. So if I get asked from an organization, that's kind of it, right? I mean, I think it was all budgets were good, most of the things, but it really was that kind of section where applications started to kind of dwindle, scores were starting to dwindle.

Yeah, and we would develop a way to do those responses, right? So if somebody does reach out to you, maybe just send them our way because there is a public records process that we'd have to go through.

Yeah, I was going to say, if any organization reaches out to any individual evaluator, you shouldn't respond. You should forward it to Cindy. We shouldn't be entertaining those questions.

That's a good point, too, because maybe we have a debrief after all this is done, because like for me, like the need was a big issue for me. And some people just said, you know, you know, housing is expensive or whatever. And it is. But like other people put very specific statistics and this is in Dane County and this or minority populations and everything else. And so maybe we could have a debrief as to like what we as evaluators like and didn't like on on those sorts of things.

So, yeah.

But we can do that after the fact.

Yeah, that's a good point. All right. Anything else on this topic? Otherwise, we will move on to our action items. I think that we need to approve the addition of the alternate members' application scores. I think we based everything on that, if I'm correct. So this is kind of a formality. We had to replace a regular member with the alternate. I think that we need a motion to do that.

I move. Am I able to second it? Because I am the alternate. I was going to say.

I'll second. Jeremy, second. Thanks, Jeremy. We'll second. All in favor? Aye. With our thanks.

Yes, thank you.

I do have a quick question about that. So is procurement going to give me access to OpenGov to start putting those, like my evaluations in? Okay, got it. And Cindy, when do you, do you guys need that by?

I will check in with procurement to make sure that they were supposed to give you access this week, but then as soon as you're able to, because... Because I just checked.

Can you just manually add his scores?

He sent me his scores, and I manually entered them into a spreadsheet.

Okay, great. Thank you. Awesome. And then I believe that as part of our action items, we need a specific... Motion to approve the preliminary funding recommendations that we just made.

Motion to approve the funding recommendations that the CDBG ARC Committee has put forth today.

I'll second. Thank you.

Any questions or comments, concerns beyond what we've already addressed?

Can I just add a clarifier? Would that include the contingencies then?

Jeremiah, are you okay with amending your motion to add the contingencies?

Are we waiting on contingencies or are we moving forward with... We have proposed contingencies and I think we need to...

include those in the motion that goes to the to the full board.

Okay, so yeah, let's include with with contingencies.

All right. Okay. Are you okay with this change? All right, then with that change in the motion all in favor. Any opposed? Great, thank you. I think we have a regular CDBG committee meeting or commission meeting on September 8th. And I would ask for a motion to adjourn.

Motion to adjourn. Second.

All in favor? Aye.

Aye. Aye.

Any opposed? And then just on behalf of everybody, thank you for all the care and consideration that you took moving through these applications. It's a lot of work to get through them all. And I know that it's appreciated. So thank you. Thank you.

I think I'm still tired.

All right. Thank you, everybody. Take care. The meeting is adjourned. Take care.