City of Fort Pierce Minutes of a Regular Meeting

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Regular Postponed Meeting February 22, 2011 Commissioner Perona said he is glad it is Mr. Ward's problem. He did read his memorandum (dated February 14, 2011) which says he is researching the federal regulations. Has he come to any conclusion? Mr. Ward said as always with these things, there is a legal answer and then there is a practical real world political answer. He will give an example. Their new grant writer is from Texarkana, Texas, which had a 42 person waiting list, and they couldn't get to it either, they had about the same or less money than he has and they were fixing one or two houses a year. So they said they were going to throw the list out and start over, just act like it didn't exist. People were storming the doors, it was a terrible thing to do. So he is scratching his head about it. They have very real rules that say he is limited in rehabs. The regulations say they are limited to $35,000 a house for a rehab. But they have the ability to combine with other resources and put money together if it goes over $35,000. Everybody knows he cannot rebuild a house for $35,000, so that is just not a practical solution. So the rules are one thing, they tell him what his limits are; but practicality tells him, it just doesn't work. So he is stuck. No, he doesn't have a good answer. Mayor Benton said watching what is going on in Washington... The City used to get over $1 million a year in CDBG funds. Several of their trips to Washington was fighting for that funding to continue. But each year, it comes down a little more. Now, with the national deficit, it is one of the big things at the head of the chopping block. His suggestion is, any time someone comes into Mr. Ward's office to check on that, let them know that the Commissioners are going to be fighting for that when they go to Washington; but maybe they need to contact their Senators and Representatives and the President, if they want this. It has really helped them turn this community around. But it could dry up by the end of the year and it might not be back for a long time. Mr. Ward said he had a conversation with their regional representative from HUD the other day. He was very straight with him, the CDBG program is a vital program for this community and the rebuilding of it, it does a lot of good things. He gave the gentleman the examples he just gave to the Commission, these three desperate folks in particular right now looking down the gun barrel, and he doesn't know what he is going to do for them. In conversation with the Secretary of HUD, they have already been talking about the 2012 budget. They haven't given him his 2011 number yet. But the 2012 budget, he has already been assured is coming down at least 7% to 10%. The funding is backing off, that is if it continues to exist. So they are going to lose funding, it is going to be that much more challenging. His purpose for getting everybody on the dias involved in this discussion is that he wants everyone crystal clear on where they are with this thing. When they start having consequences as a result of the inability to do everything they need to do, he wants them ahead of time to know what the reasons are. He does not want to be explaining to them on the backside and them not knowing in advance why he is going to tell these 22 _________________________________________________________________________ Page 22 of 45 City of Fort Pierce Minutes of a Regular Meeting held on February 22, 2011 Copyright © 2011 City of Fort Pierce Florida
Regular Postponed Meeting February 22, 2011 little old ladies and folks that really need help that the money is gone and he doesn't have the ability to do anything about it. Mayor Benton said knowing this information, they should ask the County Commissioners to... He believes they are going to Washington in March. They could ask them to put this on the list. He can remember many years ago when they were fighting for this, if the Federal Government would fine tune CDBG. One thing that irked him years ago was cities like Port St. Lucie, which are relatively new, versus a city like Fort Pierce which is 110 years old and has housing stock that needs to be rebuilt, Port St. Lucie was using their CDBG funds to literally draw businesses out of Fort Pierce to relocate in Port St. Lucie, when it should have been used for other purposes. Mr. Ward said he didn't come before the Commission for an answer tonight, he is not asking them for an answer. He does not think there is a good answer out there. This is just an appraisal so they will know what they are dealing with. He will get back to them if things change. But he does not know how this is going to substantively change. Commissioner Becht said he does not know how it is going to change either. Even if they doubled the subsidy, they are still 100 years out. His concern is, there may be some placeholder applications from people that won't qualify due to income or the project won't qualify; but unless they go through the whole process, they are not going to be able to knock them out of line. Does he currently have a requirement that they reapply annually? Or once in line, they are in? Mr. Ward said no, there hasn't been that process. The day he took over the department, he heard that they had a waiting list. This is a pretty long waiting list. Commissioner Becht said to put a burden on the people that need the money to reapply annually means also that there is a burden on staff to reevaluate all those 360 applications. But Mr. Ward might want to consider creating a more complex application now so that as he builds on this 360, that the information is there, so it is a little more difficult for someone who just wants to put a placeholder in there and they will figure out how to qualify for it later. But if it costs them a little time and effort to put an application together, maybe there is a better chance of knowing their potential for qualifying. Mr. Ward said there is a percentage of folks in here that are borderline illiterate, where Staff had to fill out some of these forms. There are folks that needed help, some were seniors. Just getting down to City Hall to fill this thing out is a major trip for them. He doesn't want to make it sound worse than it is, but he doesn't want to sugarcoat it either. Staff is going to start looking at this, throwing out duplications, the fringe stuff. Some of it has taken care of itself, some may have been condemned and may be on the ground. But that is why conservatively he told them, if 2/3rds of these applications go away, he has 120 left. 23 _________________________________________________________________________ Page 23 of 45 City of Fort Pierce Minutes of a Regular Meeting held on February 22, 2011 Copyright © 2011 City of Fort Pierce Florida
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City of Fort Pierce Minutes of a Regular Meeting

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