Housing Authority Board of Commissioners - Regular Meeting

The time is 4.03 p.m. Item two is roll call of commissioners. President Doug Shoemaker. Here. Vice President Alvarez is absent. Commissioner Marianne Pikes. Present. Commissioner Juan Carlos Cancino. Commissioner Sharon Lai.

Present.

Commissioner LaWanna Kim is absent. And Commissioner Cynthia Alvarez. I'm sorry. Commissioner Falafuta-Satili is absent. So we have three commissioners absent. Item three is acknowledgment of the Ramaytush Ohlone community.

Thanks, Bennett. The housing authority of the city and county of San Francisco acknowledges that we are on the unceded ancestral homeland of the Ramatushaloni, who are the original inhabitants of the San Francisco Peninsula. As the indigenous stewards of this land and in accordance with their traditions, the Ramatushaloni have never ceded, lost, nor forgotten their responsibilities as the caretakers of this place, as well as for all peoples who reside in their traditional territory. As guests, we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland. We wish to pay our respects by acknowledging the ancestors, elders, and relatives of the Ramatushaloni community and by affirming their sovereign rights as First Peoples.

Thank you. Item four, President's report. None. Thank you. Great. Item 5 is general public comments. Noting this portion of the agenda is not intended for debate or discussion with the commissioner's staff, please simply state your business or the matter you wish the commissioner's staff to be aware of. It is not appropriate for commissioners to engage in a debate or respond on issues not properly set in a publicly noticed meeting agenda. If you have questions or would like to bring a matter to the commission's attention, please send your communication via email to sfhapubliccomment at sfha.org.

Bennett, just one second. If I might interject, could you announce that the annual plan is not being heard, just so if folks are here or on screen that they know where to go, if you wouldn't mind making that announcement before January?

Yeah, as Dan is alluding to, the Housing Authority's annual plan public meeting is scheduled for today at 4 PM. And it is being conducted at the Housing Authority Eidbert office. There is also a separate Zoom meeting link for that meeting. So those of you that are either attending online or in person that would like to give public comment regarding the Housing Authority's annual plan, which would include the administrative plan, that is conducted via a different meeting link. And in addition to today's annual planned public meeting, we're having two additional meetings for the same purpose on Friday, June 12th at 10 a.m., as well as Wednesday, June 17th at 2 p.m. And that will have the same setup as today's meeting. We'll have it in person at 1815 Egbert, the Housing Authority's office, as well as via Zoom.

And all that information is available on our website?

Yes, sfha.org under the news and updates webpage. All that information will be there.

Thank you so much.

For item five, general public comments, we can start with the speaker cards. Mark and McNulty, if you'd like to come up, you'll have two minutes.

Hi, good afternoon, everyone. I'm Margaret McNulty, the president of Resident Council Advisors. And I'm speaking on behalf of, sorry to say, Michael Zorns has died. He was the president of CCSD, Citywide Council for Senior and Disabled. And we were working closely with them. But since then, I've taken on two new clients, two buildings that are saying they're being forced into conservatorship. when they should have their own financing. And so I'm trying to sort out a couple of elections and a couple of problems that has been left behind. Hopefully we can get them back on track. Thank you.

Thank you.

Next we have Michelle Donovan.

Hi. As member of this community, we placed trust in CCSD elected officials to manage association funds responsibly, honestly, transparently. That trust was broken. It has come to light that Michael, former member of CCSD, was involved. in the misuse and theft of TA funds. In addition to this, financial concerns and repeated requests for monthly financial reports and copies of records were not honored. As a TA member, we have a right to transparency and accountability regarding our money and funds and how it's collected, managed, spent. There are important parts of maintaining trust within any organization. Records were withheld. This caused frustration and disappointment among our residents. Trying to hurry. Due to the concerns surrounding missing funds, lack of financial transparency, and the failure to provide monthly financial reports when requested, I respectfully request an independent audit of the tenant association. An audit will provide clarity how funds were handled. This is not a personal attack. It's about accountability, transparency, and ensuring all financial matters have been managed properly and the best interests of our tenants. I'm here with 2698 California. Yeah. Mercy Housing.

Thank you.

Any additional general public comment in the room or online? Okay, item six is the tenant representative report. Any representatives from CCSD or PHDA in person or online that would like to give a report out to the board? If not, we can ask for public comment. Any public comment? Item six. All right. Item seven is the acting executive director's report, including item 7A for the acting executive director's general communications.

Thank you, Bennett. Just a few notes from me to kick us off. First of all, I'm excited for a few of the agenda items today, shared services agreements that are up for your approval. Just a little context setting before we get into the items themselves. Again, the shared services agreement are intended to be part of our work to integrate the functions of the Housing Authority with the Mayor's Office of Housing and Community Development. a long-planned goal that these are going to be concrete steps toward. As part of that, there are three components that are being considered for your approval today. First is extending and expanding our agreement with the city attorney's office to include more general counsel role. Speaking personally, it's been such a boon for me to be able to rely on a consistent set of legal advisors as I attend to needs across two organizations. So that's going to be a real advance. Secondly, Department of Technology will be providing our IT services. And having the strength of the IT backbone that the city offers, I think, is going to be incredibly important for the housing authority. And third, included in the shared services agreement is an agreement to reimburse the city for costs associated with senior leadership. So the city has been paying senior leadership since 2020. And as of last budget cycle, it was agreed that the housing authority would reimburse those costs back to the city. No changes in staffing at that time, but the reimbursement would come from the housing authority. approving those reimbursements will happen through this shared services agreement. I continue to be a freebie for the Housing Authority, so it's not intended to reimburse my salary, but I am excited to announce that we have just posted a new position, a deputy for Housing Authority operations. This is a person who will report to me and who will oversee the day-to-day and week-to-week operations of the Housing Authority, as well as advance our integration work and continue our process improvement work. So I just wanted to call those out. We'll have a more full presentation from staff on those items, but wanted to contextualize those requests. Very briefly, budget update, and we'll be providing more complete and fuller budget updates as part of our agenda in both June and July. But we got good news yesterday. We were out of shortfall officially, and so that's wonderful. Congratulations, and thank you again to staff who've worked so hard to make that happen. We are projecting to have reserves sufficient to be able to issue vouchers this year, and so we'll be prioritizing issuing tenant-based vouchers that can assist with our emergency housing voucher transition plan. It will mean that fewer folks will need to move from units where they are residing with an emergency housing voucher because we can issue a tenant-based voucher. HCV, Housing Choice Voucher, and just swap it out. So that's really positive. We also are requesting to HUD funds sufficient to pay for the Emergency Housing Voucher Program through the end of the year. As I've reported previously, the voucher program is slated under the current federal administration to end nationally at the end of this fiscal year, which federally is the end of September. But there are funds available at a national level to extend the program's funding through the end of the year. So we'll be, it just pushes off our need to access EHV transition reserves and we're optimistic that we will receive those funds. We are still waiting to get notice about tenant protection vouchers that should be also available at a national level, again, to offset the need to rehouse folks who are currently housed successfully under our EHV program. I'm very hopeful by the time we have our next meeting in a month, we'll be able to report out on that notice, but we don't have an estimate from HUD. We talked to HUD staff yesterday of when that notice is going to be released. Our EHV planning continues. But as I mentioned, there are some still outstanding questions, but positive ones. I just referenced the tenant protection vouchers that we're waiting to hear back on. It is also likely that given an unexpected abundance of what we call prop C our city our home funds these are funds that come to the city to support homelessness prevention and address homelessness broadly speaking there are more of those funds available at for the city's budget. And some portion of those funds will likely be made available to also assist with this emergency housing voucher transition plan. So in addition to the $27 million reserve that we have, we are projecting that we may have additional funds to help with that transition. The longer we can extend out the program's funding through attrition, we just have fewer moves that we have to make. So I don't have any specifics. The mayor will be introducing his budget on June 1st, but we'll have more detail on that likely for the next meeting or the subsequent meeting once the budget is finalized. So good news on the EHV housing front, but it does mean that our modeling of the transition plan itself is pending these other inputs to be specific about how long and on what schedule we'll be coordinating the transition itself. Finally, we have the request for qualifications to lead the RAD conversion and investment in rehabilitation at Plaza East had closed as of a couple weeks ago. We are reviewing the The submissions for minimal scoring, we're assembling a panel, and we will be bringing a recommended selection to you all for your approval at the June meeting. So very excited to move that effort forward. And those are my updates.

OK. Questions from? We got a public comment first, right? Or questions from commissioners?

Commissioner feedback is welcome before public comment.

Any questions from commissioners?

Thank you for that report. It's super exciting to know and have the certainty to know that we're not in a budget deficit. I am a question, but also just maybe a request for the next budget hearing, I guess, in June. I understand, and please correct me if I'm wrong, but I understand that last year payment standards were lowered in anticipation for some of the shortfalls, I believe was the context. I'm curious, given that we're no longer in a deficit position, will we be revisiting those payment standards?

Great question. The payment standards we had, and I'll defer to staff if I say anything erroneous here, but we had received prior waiver to actually set our payment standard at a higher rate, at 120% of FMRs. And so that waiver status expired, and we did not extend it. So I believe the current payment standard is down to a more typical 110% FMR. That, in effect, did not lower the payments because rents rose, the standard, the FMR metric itself rose. So there were very, very minor reductions for certain unit types. But in general, it held constant, the payment to the operators and providers. So while there was a percentage reduction based on the expiration of this sort of exceptional waiver situation, the actual payments to operators wasn't impacted or it was a very de minimis impact. And that was good and by design. I think we'd want to be very careful about seeking a waiver to increase the payment standard back to its previous 120% rate. Not to say that there aren't operating expenses and costs that owners would welcome such an increase. But despite this year's relative good news, the president's proposed HUD budget is another catastrophe. And so we need to be very careful as we think one year, two years, three years out. to balance a desire to fund to the greatest extent possible our voucher program and to be conservative as we're looking at future uncertainty. So very long-winded way of saying that we currently don't have any plans to increase those payment standards above the 120% AMI, though those payments should increase as FMRs increase over time.

Appreciate that. Um, I think then maybe my request is just to see the Certainly sounds like staff has already done the analysis and know that it is de minimis impact Would love to see a little bit more information about that I know in the affordable housing operation side of things costs have just continued to suck skyrocket and I'm hearing that that's a big tension and So would love more information next month. And then just curious about, if you could remind us, what is the anticipated absorption rate of our current projection of the emergency housing voucher tenants transferring into a permanent voucher? Sorry, where's the fire truck? I think it was something like two years, if I'm not mistaken. It's of that scale.

The complexity in the projections, I think, are a couple. We have a general attrition in the project-based voucher program, 30 to 35 slots open up. What I think as we've gotten deeper into the planning, those slots don't necessarily match with tenant needs. For instance, as we presented previously, A majority of our EHV households are single-family households, and so they need studios or one-bedrooms. And so if a two-bedroom or a three-bedroom opens up, we don't have those matches. I think under – and maybe, Mamadou, you might step in and just – in terms of an aggressive relocation projection, I think, was probably a year. But I think given the matching, maybe you can –

Yeah, I think as Dr. Dan mentioned, this year we're planning to use part of our reserve, HDV reserve, to issue tenant-based voucher program, tenant-based voucher to the EHV participant. So that's going to lower the number of people we need to move potentially. So because of that and potential TPV allocation from HUD, once we get all that information, we'll have a better idea how long we'll need to tranche the remaining participant of EHV.

And Mamadou, before we had both confirmation of our reserves and some of the other positive news, the initial modeling that you were doing, thinking we were going to have to move all 900 households, we were looking at a... We're looking at a year and a half. Year and a half.

This certainly improves it. Thank you. Yes.

Okay, great. Carlos, do you have any questions? No. I was really sorry to hear the passing of the chair of the citywide senior and disabled association and I gather from the comments that there's also some concerns about the funding and I just wanted to make sure that was something we were working on. I don't know how that process works in terms of elections and so forth, and I noted that there was some concern. I gathered that maybe it was the same person we were talking about when there was some public comment on that. It was a little unclear.

I'm unclear. We'll be following up. This is the first time I'm hearing about this. Me too.

We'll have staff follow up for sure. Great. Thank you very much.

Can I ask a quick question? When these items come up in general public comment, I think last time around there was an older gentleman who was having trouble with his housing and staff was going to go back and try to make sure. I think by virtue of his not being here with his representative, he probably got the help he needed. But is there a way to sort of like a natural way to bring those items back just so we sort of have a little bit of closure on some of the items that come up?

You can definitely request that. I will say that we receive inquiries of this nature on an ongoing basis, not just in public hearing. And so we're continuously attending to individual cases that come up either through email or through our contractors. So happy to provide whatever report outs that you request, but know that the function of attending to these individual inquiries is happening all the time. Of course. And it would, could be burdensome to report out on all the disparate inquiries received about all the different matters of all the voucher holders in their various cases. Right.

No, and that wouldn't be, I mean, I think just, for my part, just some of the sort of continuity, like, feels like it's missing and, you know, rather than getting surprised or hearing three meetings down the road.

Very fair, yes. Let me connect with staff on that and we'll see what we can do to provide continuity.

If there's no additional commissioners' feedback on item 7, we can open for public comment. We do have some hand raised online. You'll just have to unmute yourself, and you'll have two minutes. And we'll start with someone listed as COT Zoom. If you'd like to introduce yourself, unmute yourself, and you'll have two minutes.

Hi, my name is Nancy. I am with some EHV families from Chinatown, and we weren't given a chance earlier to raise our hand or unmute. They are here to contribute to the general public comment that was skipped earlier. Do you think if we could still let the families speak on that agenda item?

I think it's fine, and also you're responding to the comments made by the acting executive director on this topic, so I think it's great either way. Thank you for calling.

Okay. Yeah, perfect. Okay, so we have a few families. Is it okay if we are doing this one by one?

Of course. Just, you know, hopefully you can keep each individual comment to three minutes or two minutes. What are we up to? We're two minutes, Bennett, so we'll just rely on you to rotate people through, okay?

Okay, perfect. So they will be speaking in Chinese, and I will be interpreting for them. Is that okay?

Of course. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Hello.

Hello. Okay. So it's been pointed out.

My name is Yan Jingxiao.

Okay.

Now let me tell you about my family situation. First of all, I would like to thank the Ministry of Housing and Housing. We hope that you will continue to support our family. Because we are waiting for TPV, HCV, and PBV. We really need your help. We will continue to stay in our unit.

Hi, my name is Yanjing Xiao. I would like to first thank you for your time and also thank you SFHA for prioritizing EHRE families in this preference slash point system. We hope that you will continue to support EHRE families during this transition as we are waiting for permanent housing resources such as TPV, HCV, and PBV. And we really need your help in order for us to continue to stay our unit while we are waiting for these permanent housing resources.

現在我就想你們聽一下 我為什麼這麼需要這張緊急置屋 搬去其他那三個情況那裡。 因為我已經置了超過20年的散房了。 因為我先生做了兩次的大手術。 After that, he couldn't work. And now he needs support from the government. And I need to take care of him. And all kinds of situations caused me to lose my income. Without your help, I really can't continue to support him. Because I've been holding it in for a very long time. To this day, I don't dare to tell him about this situation. Because he can't handle this pressure. Because now I have to work alone. I have to take care of my family and my children. I have to go out. Now I can only work part-time. I can't work full-time. Now that I've received this notice, I've been thinking about this every day. I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do with my family. I don't know what to do with my family. I don't know what to do with my family. Thank you.

I would like to tell you why we need these permanent housing resources such as like when I mentioned before TPV, HCV and PPV, like why we need to be able to stay in a unit and not get displaced. I would like to tell you a little bit about my story. So before I received this emergency housing voucher, I have lived in an SRO unit with my family for more than 20 years. My husband, he had two major surgeries, and I am the only person who is currently working and taking care of everyone in my household. For this reason, I am unable to work full time. Ever since I was notified that my EHV assistant is ending in October, I couldn't sleep or eat thinking about this problem. And therefore, I really hope to ask for your support in recommending that the mayor to allocate $39 million from the $400 million federal housing and medical reduction reserve set aside by Budget Chair Connie Chan to bridge EH3 tenants for an additional two years, extending the total support timeline for all the EH3 families. Thank you.

Okay, we have another speaker come in.

Yes, we're ready.

Okay.

Hello, my name is Xiao Xia Long. We hope you can help us to follow our plans and support us to get $39 million out of the $4 billion in federal funds so that we can have a two-year-old home. Anything else?

Hi, my name is Xiao Xia Long. I hope that you can recommend our budget request to the mayor. We are asking for $39 million from the $400 million federal reserve fund to bridge EHV tenants for an additional two years in their unit.

I had a heart attack last year. I am still not fully recovered. My husband has a kidney problem. He has been taking oxygen for a long time. He needs to go back to work. My daughter wants to bring me home. I hope you can help me.

Because we don't speak English.

I hope you can help our families.

Okay, thank you.

My family really needs this housing assistance. Last year, I had a surgery and I am still not recovered from the surgery. My husband is also not doing well. He has mental health issues and he is also not doing well physically. He relies on medication long-term. I also have a daughter in college because we don't know English and our income is really low. And our only... our only choice is really to rely on this EHV assistance to be able to afford the rent. According to our current income and our health conditions, we are unable to find any other type of housing. We have been working really hard every day, but we are just really needing, we are hoping to get your help and we really need your help for a low income and vulnerable family like us. Your support means a lot to us. Thank you.

Thank you.

All right. We have another speaker.

Hello, everyone. I'm Lue Wing-Yu. I'd like to share my family's situation with you. I haven't received any information about the EHV program yet. I hope that there will be more information about it. There are more communication channels. I have three children. One of my five children is from an HIV-positive family. In the past 18 years, my family has been living in a nursing home. When I was a child, I had children with developmental disabilities. He had a child from a special education family. After I got HIV, I had the opportunity to move out of a normal family. In the process, my child's body... But my family is still in a very difficult situation. My husband used to have gastroenteritis. His health has not been very good for a long time. He has not been able to work for more than five years. He needs to take medicine for a long time, but there is no result. I was the only worker in my family. I now work two jobs and maintain a family of five. I also suffer from three types of diseases. Recently, the pressure is too high. I had to exercise a few times and fell. Now, our income and expenses are barely balanced. If we lose this EHV, I don't have to worry about the rent. The rent is too expensive. If this plan fails, it will change my life. Hi, my name is Yongyu Lei. I haven't received anything from SF Housing Authority regarding my housing options or a clear timeline.

I am a mother of three children. We are a family of five and we are receiving emergency housing vouchers. For the past 18 years, our family live in a single room occupancy unit. My youngest son, he has developmental delays and is a student in special education. It was only after we received the EH3 assistance that we had the chance to move into a standard housing unit. Since then, my children's health and development have improved a lot, and my youngest son's language skills have clearly gotten better. However, my family still faces a lot of challenge. My husband has surgery on his nose and throat in the past, and his health has been poor for a long time. He has not been able to work for over five years and needs to take medication regularly. He has no income. I'm the only one working, and now I have two part-time jobs to support a family of five. I also have heart... and recently because of stress, I have fainted and fallen several times. Right now, our income and expenses are just barely balanced. If we lose the EHRE assistance, we will not be able to afford our current rent. Housing outside is simply too expensive. The EHRE program has truly changed my family's life. It has given my children a better environment to grow up in and has given us basic stability and dignity. If we don't have this system, I just can't imagine what we are going to lose. I sincerely ask for your support to help us to stay housed and hope that you can help more families like mine. Thank you.

We have one more. Thank you.

We're ready for the fourth speaker.

I'd like to talk about my current situation. I'm the only one working at home. My wife has depression. It's more difficult for her to have a miscarriage. I have a son who is studying at a university. I have a daughter who is in the 7th grade. For example, if we don't have the rent this year, I can't afford to pay for the rent and living expenses alone. So I hope you can help us in other aspects. to think of a way to get the rent back to meet the rent we have now. That's it for today.

Hi, my name is Jun Chang Tan. I wanted to tell you a little bit about my family. I'm the only one working. My wife has depression. My daughter is in seventh grade. My son is in college. If we no longer have this EHV assistance, we will not be able to afford rent. I hope you can help us figure out how we can stay in our unit so we can afford to continue to live. Thank you.

Okay, that's all the speaker we have. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Would you have additional speakers online wanting to give public comments? CCDC, I will unmute. If you can unmute yourself, you'll have two minutes, and if you need translation, four minutes for your public comment. CCDC that you're attending online, just unmute yourself. Would you like to give a public comment?

No, thank you.

I don't see any additional hands raised for public comments. We can close item seven. Item eight is the regular business consent items for the commission regular meeting minutes of our last meeting on April 23rd. Would commissioners like to pull this item for further discussion? We can ask for public comment on item eight.

Maybe just in response to the public comment we just received, I think it's worth reinforcing that no one is at risk of imminent loss of their voucher. We've gotten some really good news. We have endeavored to provide information in a timely way to all of our EHV voucher holders, and it's been a very dynamic environment. We haven't known exactly what kind of resources we're going to have available, and there's still some uncertainty there but again the news is largely positive so just want to emphasize here and for the folks online that there's no risk of losing your voucher subsidy in the near term we're very optimistic about preserving that subsidy likely through a tenant based voucher so you don't have to move but there could still be some folks who will need to relocate but we're we're doing everything we can to to limit the number of those folks. And as we have new information, we'll provide it. So I do want to take some of the anxiety out of the room, if I can. Thank you.

Thank you, Dan. We are asking for public comment on item 8, the consent item. Not seeing any. We can ask for a motion for approval. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

Public comment on our consent agenda? Yes, you did. Sorry about that. All right.

Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda? Second. And a second. Thank you. Roll call vote. Commissioner Bikes? Aye. Commissioner Cancino? Aye. Commissioner Lai? Aye. Commissioner Alvarez is absent. Commissioner Kim is absent. And Commissioner Satili is absent. President Shoemaker? Aye. So moved. Thank you. Item 9 is the regular business action items. Item 9A is the resolution approving and authorizing the acting executive director of the Housing Authority of the City and County of San Francisco to enter into a First Amendment to the agreement between the authority and the San Francisco City Attorney's Office for Legal Services, increasing the total contract amount by $252,000 for a new total contract amount not to exceed $452,000. Thank you, Matt.

Good afternoon, commissioners. Chief Financial Officer. I'm here today to request the board approval of a resolution authorizing the acting executive director to execute the first amendment to our legal service agreement with the San Francisco City Attorney Office. So SFHA originally entered into this agreement in October 2025 to obtain legal advice and, when necessary, litigation support related to federal actions affecting the authority. Since then, our legal needs have expanded. This first amendment adds general counsel services, allowing the city attorney office to advise the board, senior leadership, staff on day-to-day legal matters and strategic issues. So the office will provide approximately 40 hours per month for general counsel support. And to support this expanded scope, the amendment increased the contract amount by $252,000. bringing the new not-to-exceed total to $452,000. Funding for this will come from our COCC central cost office center revenue and reserve. So the city attorney office is authorized to provide these services and has extensive experience addressing SFHA legal needs. So we are respectfully recommending approval of this resolution. Is the kit online?

Not seeing any.

Any question? Any questions?

OK, thanks, Mamoudou. Is there any public comment for item 9A? Not seeing any, we can close with a comment. Is there a motion to approve?

Motion to approve.

And a second. Thank you. We'll call vote. Commissioner Bikes. Aye. Commissioner Cancino. Aye. Commissioner Lai. Aye. Commissioner Satili is absent. Commissioner Kim is absent. Vice President Alvarez is absent. President Shoemaker. Aye. So moved. Thank you. Item 9B is the resolution approving and authorizing the acting executive director of the Housing Authority of the City and County of San Francisco to enter into a shared services agreement with the City and County of San Francisco effective July 1st, 2026. for an estimated cost of $1,227,775 for city staffing services and $1,026,985 for Department of Technology enterprise-level information technology services for a cumulative not-to-exceed amount of $2,254,760. And this will also be presented by Obama Duning, our CFO, and for SFGovTV, we do have some slides for this item as well. Thank you.

Thank you. Good afternoon again. So I'm here today also to present the staff report and resolution requesting authorization for the acting executive director to enter into a shared service agreement with the city and county of San Francisco effective July 1st, 2026. So this agreement is essential to ensuring the authority can continue providing stable, safe, and reliable housing support to thousands of San Francisco residents. Over the past six years, the city has been helping the housing authority rebuild critical function, everything from program oversight, procurement, and financial management. This agreement continues that support so we can maintain strong controls, stay compliant with federal requirements, and ensure residents receive the services they depend on. So this argument covers two main areas. First is staffing, staffing support from the city and the Mayor's Office of Housing and Community Development, MOCD, which provides leadership which provide leadership and operational expertise.

A lot of people have been looking forward to this presentation, Diane especially. So it's just, you know.

I was trying to see the slides. So MOCD is going to provide some leadership and operational expertise. necessary to manage our housing program effectively. Sorry for the program noise. We have one slide that shows the current organization chart for SFHA organizational chart. So the first one is a high level that shows the different positions that are funded through this agreement. That's basically the city position. You have the deputy director position, the chief financial officer position, and the director of program excellence. And you have the acting executive director, Dan Adams. That position is not, we don't have to reimburse the city. So there's no cost for that. And the rest, there's some color coding, actually. The green are the city, the position currently that we're going to reimburse the city for. And the purple are the SFHA position. That is part of the operational budget. Any question on the chart? And the next slide has a little more detailed view of our current count of staff. This also was presented during the budget, operating budget request back in September. So we have around 30 approved budget position. This just showed a breakdown by division.

Very helpful. Thank you.

Keep going. And the second portion of the agreement is really for the enterprise-level technology support that's going to come from the Department of Technology, DT, which include modernizing our system, strengthening cybersecurity, and improving how our staff and partner deliver services. So the combined cost for these two services next year is $2,250,000. And that's fully funded through the federal program we have. And this is going to be part of our operating budget. So on an annual basis, when we present the budget, we'll also share this updated estimate, any costs we have projected for the following year. So I have here today my colleague from DT, and they will provide a brief presentation on the IT modernization progress and timeline. Thank you.

Hi. Thank you all for your time. I'm here on behalf of the Department of Technology, and I just want to provide you all a brief overview of the technology...

Hold the mic down, would you?

Oh.

Sorry about that. Mamadou is shorter than you are, so just...

I should have worn my big girl heels. All right. Well, I'm here on behalf of the Department of Technology. I just wanted to provide an overview of the technology modernization work. that we currently have underway, and also the proposed next phase for fiscal year 26-27 for the Housing Authority. So in this slide, you will see a high-level roadmap of the Housing Authority's multi-year IT modernization effort. This work is going to be broken down into three phases. The phase one is just focused on the foundational infrastructure modernization and enterprise integration. Now for phase two, which is what we'll be discussing today, focuses on the development and the operational services such as virtual desktop infrastructure, wireless modernization, cloud migration, and communication modernization. For the future phase, it will focus on the cloud expansion and the long-term operational enablement. Next slide, please. So over the past year, the Department of Technology has been working with the Housing Authority on the foundational infrastructure. So what we've done so far is completed the fiber connectivity work and the deployment of the new firewall, which is integrated with the city's network and internet infrastructure. The current work that we have in progress includes land remediation, which is to improve and standardize the network infrastructure. The virtual desktop infrastructure proof of concept is to test out Azure Virtual Desktop. And that is to replace the current legacy Citrix and also to move away from the aging on-prem servers. So we just want to get away from hardware. Then we also have cybersecurity assessment to help identify operational risk, cloud migration planning, which is to prepare for the cloud and the infrastructure modernization effort. All of this effort is to provide a more secure, reliable, and scalable technology foundation for the housing authority. Now for this slide.

Before you move off the slide, can I just ask a quick question about Citrix? It says for 250 users. 250 users.

And we have 34 staff. Well, it includes the contractors.

I see. They're all working on the same technology. Correct. Thank you.

A great question. Now for the fiscal year 26-27, this phase, we're focused on the core technology services. So with this, VDI, which is the virtual desktop infrastructure, once the proof of concept is approved, we're going to be rolling it out. to replace Citrix. And with that, it provides a more secure, central, managed, and scalable desktop environment. So whenever there is an increase of staff, we'll be able to support that. Wireless installation. So we want to modernize the Wi-Fi connectivity within the Housing Authority. With that, it will include the assessment to ensure optimal positioning of the access points, replacing the aging access points. And all this will be integrated with the city standard security policies and monitoring tools. And then for the SF Cloud migration, this will actually begin our phased migration approach with the SF Cloud. This will also include the backup and disaster recovery capabilities, and also to get away from the current on-prem servers that is aging as we speak. And then the final deliverable that we're looking at is supporting Microsoft Teams and the migration of the city standard contact center. So this is to support the housing authority's communication environment. So this includes supporting the Microsoft Teams and also evaluating the current communication environment We want to see where we can make improvements, consolidate voice services, hopefully find more cost savings, and also possibly migrate them to our city standard contact center. Of course, we have demos scheduled with the housing authority to see if the solution is viable. If it is, then we'll move forward with it. If not, then we'll just not include that with the scope. Then, finally, our last slide, which is just the high-level summary of the projected implementation and operational cost for fiscal year 26-27. These figures are being presented for planning and reference purposes to support the overall project. The focus of the Department of Technology is to modernize the aging infrastructure and improve operational reliability and supporting long-term sustainability for the Housing Authority. And of course, we're going to be leveraging whatever we have within the city's platforms, standards, and operational models to help make the Housing Authority more scalable and supportable. But yeah, that's it. Thank you for your time. If you have any questions.

Mamadou, do you have more? Or should we ask our questions of TT at this point?

Yeah, you can ask questions. Great.

Commissioners, questions?

Okay, not about that.

Questions specifically about the Department of Technology presentation. Questions about the overall budget, should we wait for those for you, Mamadou? Yes, okay. Thank you so much.

And I wanted to thank our colleague from DT for the presentation and for being very collaborative through the whole process. So this is the phase two. Phase one has been going on since end of 2025. So the first phase was involved like some fiber connection, like as she mentioned, some of the land remediation. So the whole cost for the first phase was covered by MOCD. So that was almost over $1 million that was all fully paid by MOCD. So SFHA is only going to start paying starting July 1st for the next fiscal year. So that's been a big saving on our budget. Any questions?

Is that the end of your presentation? Yes. Great. Go ahead. Not that you shouldn't keep going. I just meant that thank you for the presentation. I didn't mean to suggest any enthusiasm for the end.

I think he could go longer if you want.

No, no, no. We have quality time. Go ahead.

Thank you, Chair. First question is just curious. What is the current in-person work policy for the authority staff?

We align with the city. We were doing three days in the office, two days telework. But I know the city is moving to a four days. But right now, there's some work going on at the city at 1815 Egbert. So that was the HVAC modernization project and the elevator that the board approved. So that's ongoing. Because of that, we need to provide more flexibility to staff. But once we resume the operation, we'll just align with the city.

Great. Makes a lot of sense that we absolutely need the cloud computing and then also all the infrastructure to make sure that people can have that flexibility. Thank you. I am curious about the rationale between why we have some key employees that are paid, essentially hired through MOCD, reimbursed by Housing Authority, and some that are direct hire from Housing Authority. If either one of you could just speak to that.

I think I can start, and maybe Mamadou, you can chime in. I think it's primarily a function of the role that the city played when we stepped in to cure the default with HUD and assumed responsibility for the functions of the housing authority. And at that time, the city brought in key senior leadership staff including our CFO and other key roles in order to stabilize the operations of the housing authority and it was an embodiment of the integration plan at that stage where certainly for the executive director to be a city employee was emblematic of the city's taking responsibility and an expression of the city's commitment to overseeing the housing authority. I do think it has also been a function of the fact that to move folks who were previously city employees into a new bargaining unit, a new retirement system, would have been complicated and unfair to the employees. Leaving aside the new deputy that we're going to be hiring, I think all the employees that are currently city paid employees were city employees at the time or have? Yes.

Yeah. Yeah. We all... City employee, we were a city employee, and then through this transition, we were assigned to SFHA. So there was only one staff through the city that was hired during this transition, but even that staff was also a city fellow. So they're all from, there's four of us right now that all came from the city.

Got it. And then my follow-up to that is, given that the authority is now in a much better standing, is there any intention to recalibrate the direct versus the reimbursement hire? And does that mean that you will permanently remain as the interim or should just transition to, like...

permanent I guess I'm curious about what this means that's a great question I do it is our intention to make my role a permanent role at the Housing Authority and so the director of that of the mayor's Office of Housing would continue to serve as the would serve as the director of the Housing Authority and so that would be and slightly something will bring for your consideration for next month just to make official the kind of dual function that this role will have moving forward. So that is the plan. And a key part of that plan is hiring this key deputy to lead kind of, as I mentioned, the day-to-day operations. Given the formalization of my role as a dual role, I think it makes sense for the deputy hire to be under the city and MOCD's aegis, and that's what we're proposing here today. Yeah. Great questions, though.

Any other comments on that line?

Just a quick question to sort of follow on that line, and I understand we're supposed to speak into the mics. I'm curious, sort of down the road, do you see the other position, and it makes total sense what you were sort of describing about sort of the deputy director following kind of... executive director in sort of being paid for under the city but you know the CFO and these sort of other positions also made sense sort of what you were describing as to the kind of logic for why they were reimbursed as opposed to kind of under SFHA but in the longer term do you imagine that those would sort of ultimately be filled you know as SFHA positions or

Also a great question. I anticipate that the senior leadership would continue to be funded primarily as city department roles, and with turnover, be recruited to city roles, is what I would guess. Though I think these are good questions. I mean, I think the part of the color coding on the org chart is a vestige of how we sort of arrived at this place with the city's involvement and getting key and talented staff assigned to the housing authority. And frankly, they've really thrived and done a great work. And so it's sort of a... It's more historical than it is planful, necessarily. So I think as turnover happens and as we formalize through additional shared services agreements, should those come about, I think looking at the org chart and what the long-term plan in terms of who's hiring whom, I think is a reasonable question. But I think for the foreseeable future, that kind of senior staff will be a city.

Yeah, exactly. Thanks.

Mr. Pikes, any other questions on this? No?

OK. So just to recap that then, you'll be bringing this back in June. it sounded like with information about the deputy director or did I misunderstand that?

I'm sorry, yeah. No, I think the – I mean, we hope to hire a deputy director by June. I see. Okay. So what's before you today is just approving the reimbursement, but the hiring process is happening in parallel. But to Commissioner Lai's question about at some point in the near future, I think we will be proposing to formalize. It's been, I think, nine or ten months now as acting, and so at some point the acting will – I'll stop acting. I mean, you'll all be pleased that I'll stop acting. So we'll formalize that dual role, I think, in the relatively near term.

Great. And I think, you know, as you and I have discussed, Dan, I think that at that time also demonstrating or showing or whatever the right verb is sort of the benefits of the dual role that you play are pretty clear to some of us. And it would be helpful to sort of maybe just explain that a little bit more at that time, because I think we're gaining a lot from your dual role. But for folks that may be unfamiliar with your role at the Mayor's Office of Housing, or sort of the benefits of having you sitting over the whole of the housing world, as opposed to just this narrow little piece of it, it may be helpful to explain that more when you bring that back.

I think that's a great suggestion. We'll be sure to do that.

OK, great. um did you have other questions commissioner no um mama do just uh you mentioned savings and there were some other things noted here and i guess i just feel like i need to ask just a very basic question i assume all of the things that are in this proposal are in budget

Yes. So just to put some context, last year, around June 2025, there was a request for the board to approve a standalone contract. We were outside vendor to modernize the IT. So that contract was to be not the amount of $3 million. But since then, we actually decided with the leadership of MOCD and Dr. Adams, we decided to go with DT. Because for the long term, it makes more sense to just go with DT. But as part of the budget, we already had, it was part of our budget. We had a budgeted line for that monetization.

So we approved a larger amount than we're currently spending. Is that what I'm hearing? Yes.

Because even on the CAPEX that she was showing, that's just an upfront investment, is much lower than what we had budgeted.

That is great. That is great. Worth repeating. And on a go-forward basis, is the annual run rate expected? I mean, I know it's hard, because if you disinvest or don't invest in your technology, it's hard to understand the comparison. But the run rate is also within our means.

Yes, yes. So we've been working closely with DT and MOCD looking at the long term. We've done a return on investment analysis over seven years, 10 years. It still makes sense. Because by moving through DT, we're able to leverage the city size. Like a lot of the software, DT is able to negotiate better pricing. So there's a lot of saving through those by migrating to the city. Just to give a quick number, we used to spend around $1.8 million a year on IT software. That includes Microsoft, the business application we use, all the tools. So we are seeing savings. So maybe next month, in July, when we present a budget, actually, we can show you some of the detail. But there's substantial savings.

Okay. That's great. And just it sounds like we're seeing both cost savings and a pretty significant increase What's that? Enhancements, and also significant security upgrades of what we had before, it sounds like.

Yeah, that was part of the current phase right now. We are migrating to the city cybersecurity. So we're going to be part of the city umbrella, having DT monitor the cybersecurity, all our tools. So yeah, we do see a lot of advantage. Great.

All right. I think that's all the questions from commissioners. Mr. Hodgson?

Is there any public comments on item 9B? Not seeing any. We can ask for a motion for approval.

Motion to approve.

And a second. Thank you. Roll call vote. Commissioner Pikes.

Aye.

Commissioner Gansino. Aye. Commissioner Lai.

Aye.

Commissioner Satili is absent. Commissioner Kim is absent. Vice President Alvarez is absent. And President Shoemaker. Aye. Thank you. So moved. Item 9C is the resolution approving and authorizing the Acting Executive Director of the Housing Authority of the City and County of San Francisco to enter into individual three-year contracts for legal services with Cornerstone, Corfalb, and Lippman, LLP, Hawkins, Delfield and Wood, LLP, Chronix, Miskovitz, Tiedemann and Gerard McDowell, Hetherington, LLP, Renee Public Law Group, Renault and Kavanaugh, PLLC, Serving them by Wright LLP and Sloan, Sakai, Young, and Wong for a cumulative not to exceed amount of $1,500,000. And this will be presented by Karina Suarez, our procurement analyst.

Good afternoon, commissioners. Karina Suarez, procurement analyst at the San Francisco Housing Authority. I'm here to ask for the approval of a three-year contract for legal services for the authority. The authority requires the support of specialized legal counsel to conduct its daily operations. The authority plans to maintain a legal service agreement with the San Francisco City Attorney's Office, which provides legal representation. However, certain specialized areas of law related to the authority's ongoing activities require expertise beyond the scope of the current agreement with the office. So the authority has done a legal services request for proposals, and the RFP sought proposals from legal services in seven areas. The RFP was issued on April 1, 2026, with a scope that describes specialized legal expertise beyond city attorney scope, operational support on complex legal matters, guidance on risk compliance and protection in authorities' interest, and assistance with project and program specified legal issues. In this slide, there's a chronological order of the solicitation. We posted the RFP on our SFHA website and email blast to advertise the current RFP that was submitted out. The pre-proposal conference, around 10 people

I don't think you need to read us through this. Yeah, OK.

Cool. Just letting you know that the pre-proposal conference, around 10 firms attended. So the deadline was extended twice. And we received 13 proposals for the legal assistance RFP. And we held the three-person panel to evaluate and grade the 13 proposals. And nine firms were determined that its legal needs could be covered.

Great.

Each firm had the opportunity to submit proposals up to three areas of the law. And in the table shown are nine firms chosen for various areas of law that the authority currently needs support on. The firms were chosen based on the combination of factors which includes, but not limited to, industry knowledge, pricing, project management and approach, experience, knowledge, and key personnel. So you see on the table there are different, those are the nine law firms that were considered we hope to work with. And next slide. Based on the results of the evaluation, staff recommends that task orders contracts be awarded to the following firms in the areas of practices identified. This is a three-year max contract and a cumulative not-to-exceed amount of $1,500,000. Thank you. Are there any questions?

None from the commissioners.

Great. Is there any public comments on item 9C? And we can ask for a motion for approval.

Motion to approve.

And a second. Second. Roll call vote. Commissioner Pikes. Aye. Commissioner Cancino. Aye. Commissioner Lai. Aye. Commissioner Satili is absent. Commissioner Kim is absent. Vice President Alvarez is absent. President Shoemaker. Aye. So moved. Thank you. Our final action item is item 9D. Resolution approving and authorizing the acting executive director to enter into a project-based voucher housing assistant payments contract with 1035 Vets LLC for 1035 Van Ness Avenue for a total not to exceed amount 66 project-based vouchers. And this will be presented by the authorities director of program excellence, Lena Yu.

Good evening, commissioners. I'm Lina Yu. I'm the Director of Program Excellence at the Housing Authority. I'm presenting this item on behalf of the Housing Operations Director to request approval to enter into a HAP contract for 66 project-based HUD-VASH vouchers at the project located at 1035 Van Ness. This action supports permanent supportive housing for veterans experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness while leveraging resources we already administer. The 66 vouchers in this request are already included within our existing allocation of 1,093 HUD-VASH vouchers. HUD-VASH is a partnership between the Housing Authority and the Department of Veteran Affairs. Housing Authority administers the rental assistance, while the VA provides the case management and supportive services to participating veterans. And it's roughly a 50-50 balance right now between tenant-based and project-based HUD-VASH assistance. And so this project is at Van Ness and Geary, and it's a rehabilitation of a former vacant senior nursing home. The project will include 124 units, and 66 of those are studio units designated for the HUD-VASH participants.

Sorry to interrupt. Is there a PowerPoint presentation with this, or is this just this one slide? No, it's just a staff report. It's a great slide. I mean, I don't want to take anything away from that. Yeah, go ahead. All right.

OK. And then so the other 58 are SRO units available for veterans experiencing homelessness. And that's going to be through coordinated entry or additional VASH referrals. Construction began in March 2026 and is expected to complete in November 2026, with move-ins anticipated in November and December. So this project improves housing quality and long-term stability for veterans and supports the transition from the existing site at 250 Kearney, which will close. Residents do have choice. They can move to the 1035 Van Ness building. They can seek housing elsewhere with their tenant-based voucher or a comparable unit in another PBV site. Preliminary surveys indicate that about 65% of the residents are expected to relocate to 1035 Venice. And the other 35% are interested in seeking housing elsewhere with their tenant-based voucher. So veterans participating in HUD-VACH will continue to receive supportive services through the VA. The action before the board is approval to enter into a HAP contract for 66 project-based vouchers at 1035 Venice. And staff recommends approval. If you have any questions, I'm happy to answer them.

Commissioners, any questions? No.

I might just add just a couple of quick points. I don't want to elongate the conversation unnecessarily. But I'm very excited about this project. I think this new facility at 1035 Ennis is going to be a real upgrade for folks. 250 Kearney is a classic SRO, very few amenities. high vacancies, shared facilities, and this will allow for much more independent living. The floor plates include a lot of common areas. So I appreciate the survey results. What we've seen in other cases is that initial interest in maybe taking a voucher and moving somewhere else, once folks try and find housing options out in the private market, those percentages are likely to shift. And just one final note, because it's likely to come up in future conversations, one of the One of the ideas we'll often contemplate in planning our voucher allocations or new development is wouldn't it be great if we could move this voucher contract from this building where it's not so great over to this building where it would be much better. It turns out HUD rules don't allow you just to transfer or move voucher contracts. You have to terminate a contract and approve a new contract. And this is what you're doing today. You will be approving a new contract. And that termination action on the first contract prompts tenant protection vouchers. People have a choice to move. And so we do a little bit of a dance. We think this is going to be a great option for people, but it's not a forced option. And the VASH program is more, I think, robustly funded over recent years than our other voucher programs. And so that attrition can often represent a budget increase that can be in times of attrition, meaning the portion of residents who take a voucher and move somewhere else. So if somebody takes their tenant protection voucher from 250 Kearney and moves into a project-based voucher unit at 1035 Van Ness, there's no net increase in the overall budget for the housing authority. But if somebody takes it, you've duplicated that voucher allocation if somebody takes it and moves offsite. So there's a little bit of an additional budget requirement. In this case, it's completely within the voucher pool that we have. There was no real budget impacts. But I mention all of this, and just as we think about flexibility in our voucher program, especially around the project-based voucher, this issue of not being able to move voucher contracts is something that we grapple with. But in this case, it's an easy one. So context for future conversations.

Questions on that? tenant of Kearney moves to 250, if they do, and if that unit turns over or that person leaves the program, does that voucher then remain a tenant protection voucher, or does it become project-based, or how does that work?

It becomes project-based, I think is the correct answer. If a tenant takes their tenant protection voucher and moves into a project-based voucher unit, it basically stays with the building.

And is 250 Kearney owned by Swords? No, it's just a rented house.

It's a master lease, which is another advantage of this transition.

Great. Fantastic. Okay. Questions? Seeing none.

Public comment for item 90? Not seeing any, then we can ask for a motion for approval.

Moved. Thank you. Oh, man. Commissioner Pikes, he got you.

Second.

Yeah, thank you. Roll call vote, Commissioner Pikes. Aye. Commissioner Cancino. Aye. Commissioner Lai. Aye. Commissioner Satili is absent. Commissioner Kim is absent. Vice President Alvarez is absent. President Shoemaker. Aye. Thank you. So moved.

That was a pretty long unbeaten streak right there, Commissioner Pikes. I don't know.

Just additional commenters' comment report for item number 10.

Nope. Move to adjourn.

Thank you so much. The time is 5.20. Thank you.