Housing Commission

MINUTES HOUSING COMMISSION PURPOSE OF MEETING: The five-member Commission is appointed by the City Council for three-year terms. The Housing Commission maintains awareness of housing needs and opportunities, including affordable housing; proposes housing policy initiatives and changes; investigates fair housing complaints and conciliates these complaints; mediates conflicts relating to the Virginia Residential Landlord & Tenant Act and offers reconciliatory services in conflicts relating to other housing laws. DATE OF MEETING: October 14, 2014 PLACE OF MEETING: The Oak Room, City Hall MEETING CALLED TO ORDER BY:___Julio Idrobo AT: 6:40 p.m. THOSE PRESENT: Commission Members Staff Julio Idrobo, Vice-Chair ____X___ Dana Lewis: ______X______ Donald Brobst ___X____ Sue Richter ____X_____ Tori McKinney___X____ M.T. Gutmanis __X__ Guest: Tommy Goodwin Call to Order: The meeting was called to order at 6:40 p.m. by Chairman Idrobo. Approval of Minutes: No minutes to approve New Business: • A motion was made by M.T. Gutmanis to give permission to the guest to speak at tonight’s meeting if he would like. • Chair Idrobo will recuse himself from the discussion that would occur on Casa De Maryland since he is associated with the organization. • Staff Lewis discussed with the commission the need to plan two community forums for the Consolidated Plan Five year plan 2016-2020. It was suggested the first forum take place on Wednesday, November 12 beginning at 6:30 p.m. • An update was presented on the Miller House: City Council has given the approval for staff to begin the issuance of a RFP for the project. • Funding amounts for FY2016 CDBG/HOME process were discussed. Public Service available $7,946, Non Public Service available $85,296, HOME funds $26,081. Presentation of two CDBG applications and one HOME application: 1. Homestretch – Request 26,000 HOME funds Presenter: Christopher Fay, Executive Director, Homestretch HOME funding is requested to provide housing rental assistance and services to five homeless families. Self-sufficiency, financial stability and permanent affordable housing will be achieved in 24 months. The clients of Homestretch are victims of domestic violence and need a lot of attention. The object is to move the families from crisis to self-sufficiency. It has been a good year for Homestretch, 90% of the clients that left the program have been successful in obtaining their goals. There was an average of a 137% increase in the income average, the highest since the program began. Some of the other accomplishments include: the average adult worked part time while attending school to learn a skill or acquire certifications or degrees; the average family comes into the program with large debt and leave the program having paid off all or a majority of the debt and greatly improved credit. Since the founding of Homestretch they have helped over 1,000 families with over 3,000 children escape homelessness for good. The program has received numerous awards such as the 2014 Human Rights Award from Fairfax County Human Rights Commission, Leadership in Fairfax award and the Washington Post selected them for the Helping Hand Program. Questions from Commissioners: Kids stretch and Teen stretch, how are they working out? Kids Stretch program they have full enrollment, it took two years for this; they receive great comments from the parents. In Teen Stretch there are 18 teens in the program at least one day a week. The goal is to increase this to four days a week. The children in the program have seen their grades increase and have better attendance at school. How many kids, in the program, have access to the internet? The children have this. Do you continue to use graduate students at Mason for their surveys and what about using the high school students? No they are trying to use students in the Master program. One Commissioner expressed a concern using High School students like suggested since there is a confidentiality issue. What percent of participants increase their salaries in the program? On average the hourly wage leaving the program is $21.00. Last year over 50% of the clients paid off all their debt in the first year. Reading about the Life Skills course I feel all should attend this program. They discuss with the families the importance of renting, noise in an apartments, and basic maintenance such as changing a light bulb. $26,000 request is for what? Funding is used for rent. This program is unique and special. Has it been modeled elsewhere in the country? No, not at this time but they are working on building a matrix and manuals for the program to showcase how it works.  Is there a sign of changes in the population? Yes, there is now a centralized intake from the shelters for homeless. 90% are single mothers – Kid Stretch and Teen Stretch how do they work together and how successful? The children seem to be socially isolated when they come to Homestretch. The program offer them more access and they participate in the program. The families all participate and receive all the services that are offered. Homestretch insures there are no barriers. A suggestion was made that the Commission should visit Homestretch. 2. Falls Church Community Services Council – Request $4,000 CDBG (public service) Presenter: Linda Rice Johnson The goal of the program is to keep families from becoming homeless. A group of churches in the Falls Church area come to together to try and provide needed services. FCCSC provides emergency one time assistance, this is not ongoing assistance. They take referrals only from social works for the assistance. The workers have already screened and provided an assessment of the clients so staff do not have to do this. They only provide a total of $500 in a calendar year for assistance per person. Questions from Commissioners: Do you still have the truck? They have a new truck, which they purchased a couple of years ago. They still use it for furniture deliveries. They also use the truck for food deliveries and when they have their food drives. In terms of the number of request you receive, have they changed? The request from the City is the same each year with half the request for rent and the other half for utilities. You receive referrals from social workers do you receive any from other churches? It is very rare this happens. They suggest them going thru social services since many times there are other issues or services that need to be addressed. They receive request from the Office of Aging and Woodburn also. The services you provided are essential. 3. CASA de Maryland – Request $11,000 CDBG (Public Service) Presenter: Adwoa Spencer, Sr. Manager for Development Casa De Maryland has been in operation in Maryland for over 30 years. The goal of the program is to ensure residents, in particular LEP and immigrant residents have access to decent housing in safe and stable communities. The have a community advocacy model to help address these issues and they did a needs assessment to see if they would expand the services to this area. Currently they have an office based in Arlington. They have done outreach to spread the word about their services. They did about 75 door knocks and held two clinics. At the door knocks they disseminated educational material on housing rights and responsibilities, and conducted community engagement meetings in homes. The legal clinics workshops are held at their headquarters in Arlington. They are currently seeking a permanent location in the City. Questions from Commissioners: What constitutes a door knock? Going from door to door. Page two of the chart shows 15 Falls Church residents attended each meeting for a total of 120? The math is wrong. You started this in March here? The headquarters are in Arlington and they are working on a major center in Virginia. Up until this time what has been done in Falls Church? We have 12 leaders based in Falls Church in the City. Their success is word of mouth and few offer their services. Outreach is interesting, the door knocking, how effective has this been in reaching clients? They have a model they use. They do in depth interviews and develop a relationship with the clients. The door knocks end up becoming a visit and getting information is a challenge. It sometimes takes time to build trust. The clients are not likely to go to government offices and seek services. How does this differ from Legal Services? They refer to them with some of the issues raised. Name implies Spanish only but are their other nationalities? Yes we have French speaking clients also. They have Spanish and French staff and use the language line to use and refer to other legal services for other languages. Mentioned Richmond area, are they going to expand there? That will depend on the need. The space in the City you are looking fo,r how is that going? She will need to get back to us on that. You requested $11,000 if this is not all funded, what will the level of service you can provide to be successful? They could do the outreach successfully bit there would be limited legal service. What is the number of employees in Maryland and Virginia? In Maryland we have 100 full time employees and in Virginia two full time.  Are there clinics in the City? No How do you propose to get clients to other locations for the clinic? Outreach work. Transportation is not an issue as the clients themselves are resourceful. END OF PUBLIC HEARING Staff Report: None Reminder to attend the meeting on Tuesday 10/21, it begins at 6:30. Adjournment: The meeting adjourned at 8:30 pm. M.T. Gutmanis made the motion to adjourn and Don Brobst seconded. The City of Falls Church is committed to the letter and spirit of the Americans with Disabilities Act. To request a reasonable accommodation for any type of disability, call 703 248-5005, (TTY 711).