Good afternoon, everyone.

We are now back for our PM public hearings, excuse me, budget hearings for today, March 26, 2026.

Mr.

Clerk, good afternoon.

Please call the move here.

Councilmember Scott Benton.

Scott Bentonai.

Councilmember Letitia Johnson.

Present.

Councilmember Daniel McCampbell.

Present.

Council Member Renegade Miller.

Member Miller did indicate she's dealing with a uh addressing a family issue at this moment and will not be present for today.

And our absence is excused.

Clerk will so note.

Councilmember Gabriela Santiago Romero.

Present.

Councilmember Mary Waters.

President.

Councilmember Angela Whitfield Callaway.

Council President Pro Tem Coman Young II.

Council President James Tate.

Here.

Mr.

President, there is a corn.

Thank you.

And if you can note that we've been joined by Member Callaway.

Clark was a note.

Thank you.

And we are now about to jump into the budget hearing for housing and revitalization department.

Will Julie Snyder, the director and team, come on down.

Good afternoon.

Oh, there it is, everything's working.

And once you all do that, you are now free to begin your presentation.

Julie Schneider, Director of the City of Detroit's housing and revitalization department.

David Bowser, Chief of Staff for the Mayor's Office.

Good afternoon to the honorable Detroit City Council.

We are pleased to be here today to present the proposed 2026-2027 fiscal year budget for the housing and revitalization department.

We'll go through proposed changes, look of the department going forward, what we'll focus on, priorities of this administration, and how the 2627 budget will help us to implement that, as well as greater budget details.

I'm joined by my my colleague Chief of Staff Bowser, who's going to provide some brief remarks from the Sheffield Administration.

Just to open up, uh Mayor Sheffield has significant um plans and sort of high hopes for the housing and revitalization department moving forward.

Housing uh has been a number one need that's been expressed over the years and a number one concern being expressed over the years by Detroit residents.

Uh and so one of the things that you'll see, as you all have already seen the EOP is sort of a separation of the housing development functions of the city from more of the uh the service-related functions of the city.

And what this is meant to do is to be able is to allow the housing director to have a laser focus on the primary initiatives around housing development that the administration has.

One being uh in field housing development, making sure that there are more houses being built so that Detroiters can become homeowners.

Um, another is affordable housing development.

So for renters, uh ensuring that affordability actually matches incomes and that we are expanding our ability to build affordable housing all throughout the city.

Um and improving housing stock as well through coordination with BC, but also working with HRD around best practices.

Um, and so the difference between this year's um HRD uh presentation is going to be mostly seen in sort of the org chart and the primary directives of the housing department moving into fiscal year 27.

Uh in the past, there would have been information around homelessness, housing services, the helpline, home repair, even.

Um you will see that information in tomorrow's human homeless and family services presentation.

Today, it is really going to be centered and laser focused on housing development and how HRD will move forward to operationalize a really robust strategy for this administration and for residents of Detroit.

Thank you, David.

So to clarify what our focus will be going forward.

Uh so we are really going to be focusing on facilitation the development of affordable housing.

This is something that we've we've done through the department, but this will allow a singular focus within the department coming from myself as well as the entire staff of the department.

We do that through providing pre-development services.

We through the public private partnerships team provides services to developers or would be developers from marketing property, property acquisition, navigating the entitlement processes, and closing on that land sale.

Financing.

A large portion of our organizational function is providing financing for development and then making sure that our investments are managed over time, seeing that the properties are occupied by the low-income households that housing is targeted for, and that the property is performing over time so that our investment is secure and we're going to be able to continue to offer affordable housing.

We'll continue to preserve existing affordable housing.

If you are going to add affordable housing, you have to start with preserving the existing stock, and that will remain a priority.

Catalyze infill housing development.

We'll go into further detail as I go on in the presentation, but that is one of our one of our focuses now and going forward.

We'll continue to manage the commercial real estate sales and tax incentive processes for the city of Detroit, and identify programs and policies to encourage the type of housing that I described in earlier in the presentation.

So this is a look at the new HRD org chart.

It's much more streamlined than it was in the past.

Again, trying to make sure that we are focusing on the singular focus of developing housing, especially affordable housing.

The development and investment division is where we provide those pre-development services, where we invest in housing, where we provide asset management.

Strategy and innovation is where we are doing program evaluation, we're doing policy research, we're incubating new programs.

So this is where for the the time being, as we're incubating our infill housing initiatives will be within this division, but also working closely with the development and investment division as well.

And of course, it's necessary to make sure that we're supporting all of the functions, all of the employees, and operating well through a strong operations and and finance division.

So this is the proposed future org chart of the department.

Again, much more focused on housing investment and development.

Did you want to add a so to kind of start off as we go through the content of what HRD does, I wanted to talk about what some of the past highlights are, especially focused on more or less the housing and development side of things.

That work is all underway.

Launched the new payment and move taxes program in June of 2025, received the pro housing grant, which is the first for Detroit Pro in this acronym Pathway to Removing Obstacles.

We have a number of programs that I'll talk about that's really also going to help us with our infill housing development work.

564 new affordable housing units were completed, and over 1,400 units of existing affordable housing was preserved.

Going back over time, so thinking about again if we're building housing, it's critical, but we also have to preserve this is a look since 2015.

We've preserved over 12,000 units of housing and created over 3,000.

You see the the breakdown of the area median income.

We're really trying to across all of our work to make sure that we're serving residents of of all incomes that are seeking affordable housing.

So I mentioned development investment, and just want to kind of go into a little bit more detail on what that work is.

So through our public private partnerships team, this is a team that you might see out in your community meetings probably the most of this group.

So they're working with the planning department to identify opportunity sites, putting those sites out for advanced marketing or sometimes RFP, identifying development partners that are likely to be able to complete that work, helping them through the entitlement process, getting zoning secure, making sure that whatever we can do to help support and funding, we're doing that.

We are underwriting deals that come in through us to make sure that the when we're making an investment, we know that affordable housing is going to be delivered, that it's of quality, and that it's going to be able to provide that resource for the 10, 20, mostly 30 years is what we are typically entering into contracts for.

Providing real estate management and tax incentive.

So we are shepherding tax incentive applications through the city process, working through other departments, also doing so with the real estate functions where we're coordinating with departments and agencies and divisions, not only within the city government, but in our our other key partners as well, providing asset management.

I know it's it's not the most exciting topic naturally, but asset management is really key to make sure that our that our properties are performing for decades and that we're getting the quality and the results of the investment that we intended.

And then our choice neighborhoods work where we have a uh both the choice neighborhoods implementation grant in Greater Corktown as well as a planning grant in the centered on the Doug Diggs homes in near the north of the Eastern Market area.

And so this is kind of what will ground our work and where our supporting depart supporting divisions with strategy and innovation as well as operations will really work together to support this this larger score scope of work.

So I mentioned the strategy and innovation division.

We're doing there is doing strategy development.

Uh one of the key things that of making sure that housing is being constructed is you know what's happening in the market, you know where things are progressing in terms of which deals are kind of in the pipeline, how they're progressing, what their affordability is, ownership, and so that's it's a key thing that we started to do about 10 10, 12 years ago, and it's grown since then, and it really kind of under is a backbone of a lot of our work.

That's within this group, and then infill housing and special initiatives as well.

And then again, I mentioned that you have to make sure that we're supporting this by having our proper policies and procedures as we will still be utilizing federal funds, having appropriate policies and procedures managing them are also key and critical components as well as managing our finances.

So, what does this look like from a budgetary perspective?

So the total budget proposed for FY2627 is about 42.5 million dollars.

That's inclusive of all grant and general fund towers that are made available for the fiscal year.

It doesn't include any one-time grants that we're managing.

The JET budget is also within HRD.

The EDC and EDA budget are within HRD as well.

They remain that remains within HRD.

The real estate management budget through the DBA, that is often through a DBA contract with the DBA is also in our budget, and the DESC administration and general fund funded workforce program are in HRD's budget.

GDYT funded by CDBG is not but the administration portion of DESC work remains within the department.

You see the breakdown of how that works with home funding, 6.1 million, that is inclusive of program income, CDBG 8.4, and general fund of 27 million dollars.

When I talked about the EDC budget, DESC, that is within the general fund portion of the budget.

So we're focused again on housing production, so how do we do that within the budget and resources that we have?

So we have 5.1 million dollars of good that'll that is projected to go into program activities.

So the overall budget for home is 6.1, but five there is admin costs that that come out of that to make sure for fund our underwriting staff, and so 5.1 million of that is expected to go into projects.

4 million is proposed to go into the Affordable Housing Trust Fund and Development Preservation and Development Fund.

Um it's an increase over last year, and it reflects Mayor Sheffield's commitment to put 100% of city revenue from land sales into the budget.

4.2 million is projected to is from CDBG will go into affordable housing development.

500,000 will go into public facility rehabilitation programs, and 250,000 is proposed to go to scattered site asset preservation on top of the funding that we're still working through from this year of 450,000.

So in addition to that, we have several one-time grants that we're that we're managing and working through and putting into projects.

We have 28 million of CDBG disaster recovery that is uncommitted is yet to be awarded to projects.

We have 361,000 of home ARP.

So that will go into probably our next supportive housing deal that is looking to progress and close.

And 1.6 million for pro housing, and this is going to be focused on small buildings.

So generally speaking, two to eight unit size buildings.

So what are our points of emphasis in 2627?

We're expecting to preserve 2,000 units of existing affordable housing.

That is an increase of about 600 units from this year, and we expect that increase to be largely driven by success that we're having in the pilot program, our payment and lose taxes program.

We're restarting the Section 108 loan program based on a challenge that was issued in the the previous administration to use Section 108 funding to promote and provide and construct affordable housing.

We received that grant agreement from HUD recently.

We're set to see 600 affordable housing units set to start construction this year.

We've had a couple of groundbreakings already just in the first couple of months of this year.

And we're expecting 2,000 units of housing that is currently affordable housing that's currently under constructed to begin and to be completed within the next 18 months.

So including the end of this fiscal year, but through that through the the following fiscal year, um, which would likely which would be one of the highest totals that we've had.

We have about that many that are currently under construction, or a little bit over that many that are under construction now.

So I mentioned INFIL a couple of times, and so I wanted to talk about things that we'll be doing this year to fulfill that in furtherance of that goal.

So we expect a an RFP for pre-permitted designs to be released along with the DEGC to help design what pre-permitted housing that is able that where the designs are available for use by people that are looking to develop housing.

That could be an individual, that could be a CDO, that could be a small developer, it could be a large developer.

Um looking at how to not only have those designs available, but the key is making sure that the process is there to support uh quick turnaround of those applications, and we're working closely with BCED on that work.

I mentioned the small buildings RFP, so this is through the pro housing work where we're expecting to put on an RFP for buildings of about two to eight units per building, um, so really supporting a lot of the the infill work and completion of an infill strategy.

So in 2018, we released a strategy called the multifamily affordable housing strategy, and we did that because in order to make sure that affordable housing was a part of the growth of the city.

We felt we needed to organize and collaborate with private sector partners, lenders, fill philanthropy, uh, developers, develop incubate a development pipeline, make sure that we were organized to make sure that we were facilitating that development as well.

Uh well, we now have a very robust pipeline of multifamily affordable housing, and the same strategy will be used to make sure that we reach that infill goal and go far beyond that in the future by organizing all of the actors that need to be involved in this work from city agencies such as BCED, PDD, DWSD, our private actors such as DTE, philanthropy, um, contractors.

The list the list is long, but um we haven't seen INFIL at scale in decades in Detroit, and it's gonna require a great deal of coordination and collaboration to get us there, but we've done it, we've done it before and see the success of it now, and I believe that it will deliver results when it comes to in-pill housing as well.

That concludes my formal presentation, and I understand there will be uh some questions, so I will hand over to Council President.

Yes, ma'am.

Yes, there shall be questions.

And thank you for your presentation.

We're gonna start off with questions with uh Member Santiago Romero.

Thank you, Mr.

Presidents.

Good afternoon.

Thank you for your presentation, and thank you for your work and for your partnership uh with all of us, especially our office.

Um I I have a uh a statement and a question that I I actually want to ask here in preparation for tomorrow, um, but it does follow in line with HRD.

Um, and just a note um and a thank you.

We all know of the flooding that happened last year in Southwest Detroit.

Um, and HRD was a huge leader in that work.

Um, so just wondering if HHFS is prepared to do emergency response in the way that HRD did last term.

I will save that question for for tomorrow, but just wanted to to to name that was a a huge lift of HRD um last term in our last administration.

Really want to focus questions for housing here.

Um so my first question that I'll ask to HRD um director, there is a churn peak a churn key program in California, which turns vacant hotels, motels, and commercial properties into um interim or permanent housing.

Wondering, do we know of such processes?

Have we considered this here?

I believe even Dearborn is looking at um a fairly mall and trying to convert it to convert some of that space into housing.

I might be wrong.

Um, or they might have even asked the potentially um during it their their process of bringing in a different use of their space.

I think housing was a uh a part of um that question.

Uh so wondering if we have considered a program like this, it's also known as a home key program, um, and if we have any barriers here to to to doing that kind of work um through the chair to council member Santiago Romero.

A few years ago, we did do an analysis to try to identify vacant apartment or I'm sorry, vacant motels that could be transformed and turned into housing that were in a condition that would allow for um such a transformation to take place as well as kind of located in um in non-industrial areas.

We did that I think in like 2020, 2021 as we were um looking for more options for uh especially with pressures that we're seeing as a result of of the pandemic.

I don't at that point we found I think a very limited number of options, unfortunately.

Um of course markets change, right?

And things that were once not available might be available again.

Uh it's it's uh often can be a very solid source for um for housing.

I can think of a conversion of uh a larger uh hotel uh over right on the Dearborn Detroit border, but it's in Detroit that that did take place um it's probably completed, I think, in 2023 or so, and was something that we did use for some temporary placement of people through the the DHS program.

But um, of course, I think it's probably a good time to for us to revisit and do that data analysis to see if um there's something available that wasn't available the last time we did that analysis.

Through the chair, okay, thank you.

Um and not just hotels or motels.

Um I'm I we have a lot of abandoned schools.

I know they also have their work to do, and I I also understand we need to invest money and use what we have.

Um, but just looking at the properties that we have now and and wondering if if we can convert that into housing.

Um we will continue this conversation.

Yes.

Well, um, through the chair to Councilmember Santiago Romero, we are always looking at our existing portfolio that we own.

Okay.

All the time all the time we are we are doing that.

We also look very closely at the right of first refusal process to identify if there are properties that might work for housing that we that are that are vacant that we can take, and we did do we did exercise that authority um in in the last in the last round uh to acquire uh an apartment building that we thought could be uh revitalized and and um be made available again for housing.

I think we've done that a couple couple of times.

So, yes, we I mean it's it's the public-private partnership it's their job, and and you see that through the RFPs and advanced marketings that that they're doing pretty frequently.

Through the chair, thank you.

That actually goes into my next question, um, talking about private public partnerships.

Um, I believe last year you shared um that the public private partnership team was working with our Detroit Housing Commission to look at our portfolio uh to uh look at our public housing sites and to develop a strategy on how to redevelop these sites.

I'm wondering um what the outcomes have been so far.

Um I know that I saw I've seen in the news that the housing commission, I believe, is um supporting with other properties uh going from them to to people for home ownership.

So if you could share a little bit more about that partnership and um the results that that have come from from that work through the chair to council member Santiago Romero.

So shortly after that the budget hearing at that time, we the in coordination with the Detroit Housing Commission, they they shifted a little bit in the way that they were looking for for our support, and that is that they had a a vendor team that was doing uh an assessment of their portfolio and then recommending a plan going forward for recapitalization to reinvest in those properties and bring them uh make them more modern and um bring up the conditions of those properties.

So our work shifted to has shifted to and we also um have the the funding for C D B G DR which we put uh about I think 23 or 24 million into investing in DHC properties, which at the time of the budget hearing I think was an idea, but I don't think was finalized yet.

So our work has really shifted to supporting them through the through the early phases of that reinvestment strategy.

So starting with uh with um uh Parkside um and and Sheridan are the first ones that that we'll be IB um investing in, and so we're kind of we've shifted a little bit as that funding actually helped them to move ahead their plan and be able to activate and and rehab buildings more quickly.

Understood.

Okay, thank you.

Um I have a few more questions that we will send out uh via memo and more questions that I'll ask tomorrow.

But that is it for me right now.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Thank you.

Member Johnson Thank you, Mr.

Chair, and good afternoon.

Um thank you for the presentation.

I have a couple of questions.

Um when I first brought community land trust to the discussion last year, my thought was really around identifying ways for um access to home ownership opportunities for lower income households.

Um and so it seems as though the conversation around CLTs is kind of slowed down quite a bit.

Um I know we have some dollars, I think that are about to be um provided to organizations to stand-up CLTs, but can you talk about because I only get two questions, so I'll send the CLT question uh via email.

But can you talk about the in-field housing that the administration is looking to do um and talk about if there's any consideration, any thoughts around providing support with setting up infrastructure so that it's with the pre-permitted um plans with um infrastructure in place so that someone wouldn't have to cut into the street to tap the water line?

Um DTE is now pushing people to do underground um lines for electricity.

So if we're talking about a thousand in-field housing units, are there ways that the city can provide some support to reduce the cost as it relates to infrastructure?

Perhaps and I don't want to say instead of, but to provide that support.

I know a lot of times developers are looking for dollars to help close gaps, but if we addressed infrastructure, would that help?

Would that give them the ability to move quicker with the pre-permitted plans, um infrastructure in place so they can just kind of identify where they want to select plan B and go through the permitting process quickly.

Oh, I'm thinking the the um Lord my mind is drawing a blank, but the layout, the layout of the units that I that the uh HRD I thought was also going to approve of maybe eight different types, housing types.

Yeah.

Um through the chair to Councilmember Johnson, I think you're you're hitting on like why the need for the strategy is so important, right?

And the the number of things that you have to to coordinate.

Um so I will take the pre-permitted design first and then go into the the infrastructure question.

So we are we have funding both from the pro housing grant as well as some philanthropic funding to develop, I think about as you said, eight different designs.

And that's a that's a starting point, right?

We're also looking at ways to where if you are a developer and you say, I think I'm gonna build 20 of these, but I want to put forward my design.

Is there a way that we can pre-permit designs coming from developers too, so that we have variety, but it's also not just our our designs alone.

So it's kind of a a two-way flow to create more housing design.

So uh we'll start with the eight, but to kind of get back to our RFP and dollars.

We'll start with the eight.

Um if if as we see success, as we see demand, um, we might look to grow grow that, but that would include not just um one type of single family design, but probably multiple types fitted to different neighborhood configurations, parcel size, um, thinking about the exterior so that these houses fit within our our neighborhood structure as well, but also um duplexes, triplexes.

We probably won't do a whole lot of larger designs, but we are also working with the land bank to identify some some parcels of land they own and also do preliminary site work.

Um of the things you talked about would be kind of ideal in the in the kind of uh most advanced version of that.

But I think there are things that we as a city of Detroit can do to help reduce the costs.

Just if you just think about like the last time we really had this work at scale, it was decades and decades ago.

So just internally thinking as a city, we are going to have to look at how do we support this work.

How are we kind of organized as departments to speed residential permits through?

I know BCEd has been making changes in that respect uh to to speed the the permitting process, but um the answer to your your kind of question at the most basic level is yes, there are things that we can we can do at different levels of infrastructure.

Of course, those things have have costs, but we need to we need to look at them.

We need to look at where we fit within the region in terms of competitiveness and what's um how much it costs to do uh the work that you were describing in in other places where developers could choose to to develop housing and how do we how are we kind of competing in a way in terms of attracting developers and making it um easy to to do this type of work in the city of Detroit?

So it's it's a it's a big topic, but like it's one that I'm I think is um pretty exciting and creates a lot of opportunities for us to think think differently, think creatively, and also think about how we uh align ourselves to support a big initiative that I think a lot of people are really interested in want.

Thank you for that.

And and just as a follow-up, what does affordability look like within the the conversations around in field housing?

Um through the chair to council member Johnson.

So you brought up community land trusts, and I believe that those are a part of this part of this infill strategy and supporting that work.

Um I believe we will look at uh a range of affordability, including market rate options as well.

We've talked before about and I've meant I've talked before about the cost of new construction.

It is it is high, and we have to identify ways to bring that cost down.

That includes the pre-permitted designs, that includes things that we might do to um reduce barriers on on infrastructure or processes, but it also includes looking at new construction technologies as well.

So I would say affordability is um we will look at affordable homeownership opportunities, um below 60 percent, below 80 percent will look at mid uh moderate income housing opportunities as well, and then um market rate.

We won't be uh investing in the market rate, but I think you have to have a range of options and we'll invest our dollars in the of course the the affordable homeownership options.

Through the chair to council member um Jonathan.

So the uh just to put a finer point.

I mean, the administration has been uh laser focused on making sure that housing is affordable for Detroit residents.

Um and uh to the points that Julie was making, there's a variety of tools that we're gonna have to deploy to make that happen.

It's a sort of administration-wide effort between BC um HRD external partners as well, such as DTE, the land bank.

I mean, there's a lot of different partners that we're gonna have to get together to do you know, pre-development to make sure that we have synergy between, you know, again, DTE and developers to make sure there's not extended timelines for utility setup.

I mean, we're having and we're we're creating those tables right now to partner and to um you know add, you know, uh some fuel into this strategy to build infill housing.

The costs have to go have to come down, and the timelines have to come down as well for this to be feasible, and we're all laser focused on that uh part of the mayor's directive.

So um definitely looking forward to working with HRD and across departments to make that happen.

Yeah, thank you for that.

I I definitely know um what a great task it is to even have this as a goal, a vision, a even a thought.

Um it takes a lot of conversations, it takes a lot of people coming together to address um in fill housing.

Um, but I know you all can do it.

I know we all can do it, and so I'm really excited about it.

I would love to be involved in conversations, lean in however I can because it's something that is not only important to me, but important to everybody, all of my colleagues, um, and you know, providing housing at various levels is important.

We all recognize that.

Uh I just always want to make sure we don't leave anybody out, even though it's tricky.

It's it's very tricky to do, um, but I know we all can do it.

Um my other question is relative to the apartment complexes that I've been talking about.

Um, as I was driving here this morning, right before I get on the highway on the on the service drive at 94 in CADU, I see two apartment complexes that have recently um essentially been vacated.

Now there may be some squatters in it or something.

Um, and so I'm wondering if I don't know if HRD in collaboration with BC might have an inventory of apartment complexes throughout the city.

There are many that are vacant.

They are likely privately owned, but how do we either get the owners to make some progress on reactivating the apartment complexes?

Are we looking to pursue them so that we can identify developers that can help get them back online?

I think there's a tremendous opportunity there, especially as you talk about affordability in housing units in apartment complexes.

Um do you all have any tools that you currently use to incentivize reactivation of those apartment complexes through the chair to council member Johnson?

I I think that one of the things that I'm most excited about in the more focused scope of HRD is to really continue to explore ways that we can uh bring housing affordability houses affordable housing, but that including including naturally occurring affordable housing to the the city of Detroit.

And so one of the things that we've started to see with the the pilot is uh applications coming in, being approved for vacant afford vacant affordable housing, or sorry, vacant apartment buildings.

Um and we're also seeing it with buildings that are have some some partial occupancy as well.

Uh we have about 13 applications that we've received for occupied non-government funded projects.

So that would be uh likely naturally occurring affordable housing.

Um we have five of them that are in have fully submitted their application, we're hoping to approve soon, eight that are in the kind of secondary application process.

So the pilot seems to be um, which we had really thought it would be when we were structuring it and designing it a tool to help those kinds of of properties, and we're starting to see that.

I think the thing we have to figure out now is how do we for owners of those properties, how do we let them know that that resource is available, and if not, really work with our enforcement partners to um push to make sure that those properties are rehabilitated.

I'm sure I know that's certainly something that we need to use in Palmer Park, which I um have been talking with Councilmember Callaway about, but I think that that's an important uh tool that we've seen being used.

We also have the Detroit Housing for the Future Fund, uh, which we're expecting to continue on, and that tool really found its its niche in getting vacant or partially occupied apartment buildings, smaller apartment buildings back into operation and providing really what is more kind of the naturally occurring affordable housing.

It is regulated, but it's not regulated as tightly as you know, a light tech or home unit.

But um, those and those tools in combination, I think will be really powerful.

Thank you.

And the affordable housing trust fund, right?

Um I would I would think it would align with more of the apartment complexes as it relates to the AMI through the chair to council member Johnson.

It it can the the Affordable Housing Trust Fund requires 70% of the units to be at 30% of the area median income or below, and what we've really seen in operating expenses is the operating expenses are are exceeding what those what those rents would be.

So I think it can be used in in places where um certainly the the building is right, but those those we tend to use those in partnership with federal funds, so they tend to be more heavily regulated.

But I think it's it kind of points to why we have to have a lot of tools in our toolbox to make sure that dollars are aligned with the the development in kind of the way that kind of helps helps the entire ecosystem develop more housing, but it's it's certainly an important and valuable tool that we we have.

Thank you.

Um Mr.

Chair, I do have a couple of motions that I'd like to make, but I will come back to them.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

All right, thank you.

Uh next up, we have member Callaway.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Speaking of Palmer Park, thank you for that, Director Schneider, because that's exactly where I'm going.

Um these apartments were built between most of them.

Um there are 54 total, all of them unique, no two alike, um started being built in the 20s and the 30s, um, ended in I think right around the 1960s, um, and have all seen better days.

Um it's a beautiful, beautiful area, and the apartments are registered on the National Register of Historic Places since 1980, and they uh they need help.

Fourteen of them, and I would never have done this had I been on this council back in 9 in 2020.

Um, I think 21 of the buildings were sent to were purchased by one company out of Phoenix, Arizona.

I think it was called urban communities.

They never had the resources or the financing for that purchase, but they were allowed to purchase 21 buildings in one bundle, and they've been um collecting rent in some of them.

Some of them have been abandoned, and now 14 of the 21 are in total receivership with a company in Troy, and they owe close to 4.4 million dollars in property taxes, and they're in trouble, and um, we don't have to um build.

We have apartment buildings that have been built by Albert Kahn, and we need to take a look at those buildings over there.

They just need some upgrades, and some of them have been burned, um set on fire.

Um, we have squatters in some, we have people living in some with squatters, so it's a very, very bad situation.

I just sent my um colleagues a 17-page report.

Um dated February 16th, 2012, where the city of Detroit's historic commission commissioned this report, and I'll make sure you get it, um, Director Schneider.

My colleagues should have it by now.

I just sent it.

What are we gonna do?

What can we do with the 14 of the buildings that are in receivership?

Um, and they're right there at the bus line at Woodward.

It was an amazing concept where you had studios, one bedrooms, up to three bedrooms.

Mr.

Bricks, who was the original owner of the tigers, built the one at I think on Covington, and some of them have fireplaces, but that is not in receivership, but it's surrounded by um buildings that are in receivership.

That was completely occupied, and I think they're turning those into condos, but some of those spaces in Mr.

Briggs, the former owner of the Tigers, when he built that were for his players and their families.

Well, some of them have three bedrooms and they face the park, Palmer Park.

We really need help over there.

And what can the city do to help with the 14 that are in receivership or the seven that are not.

And then the rest of them.

It's 54 of them.

Two are burned now.

So that's 52.

Thank you.

Through the chair.

Through the chair to council member Whitville Callaway, I um had anticipated you would want to talk about this because it's it's such an important, it's such an important topic.

So you mentioned it during my uh confirmation interview, and and I said that you know, I'm I am committed to this, and and so we've taken some steps to um number one.

I think to this point we haven't had a total assessment of an inventory of the properties up there.

So there's uh a little over a hundred properties.

That doesn't mean there's not a hundred buildings.

There's somewhere around um between 50 and 54 residential um buildings up there.

So we've been our first step has been to develop a kind of source of truth of all of the apartment buildings up there, and then um really spend time walking through the the neighborhood, visiting apartment buildings that we can can get inside to to see those things that you talked about.

They're really um Council President Tate, we talk about size of units, right?

Wanting bigger units, and you walk through those apartment buildings and and they're there, and many of them are unoccupied.

And so it can be such a important source for affordable housing housing affordability uh for people of different incomes because it really presents a lot of different options up there.

So we've identified um so the way we're thinking about our our approach is really from a neighborhood wide scale, and we're early on in this, so I can tell you some thoughts on what we're doing.

So we've identified about 12 to 18 properties that are in the kind of worse condition and need assistance and intervention more quickly and probably to a greater greater extent.

Um and so we really want to focus on on those buildings as we're identifying and some of them are in receivership, but but we I think as we're thinking about the entire neighborhood, don't want to only be focused on those properties that are in receivership because there's a larger need within that community.

Um so we are going to be working through with PDD in the historic district commission because we need to identify uh a plan as they are in a historic neighborhood, but we also need to um balance there's there's slate roofs there, there's terracotta roofs, there's um uh divided light windows that there's there's um a lot of things that cost frankly a lot of money to um to rehabilitate.

So we need to develop a plan for the area that's respective of the the area's historic character while also trying to get properties um uh a path to rehabilitation.

Um I don't know all the what that all the details will look like, but that's gonna be a key component of it.

We need to look at parking within within the area as um there uh council member.

We've talked about parking behind buildings, but I think we need to do an assessment of parking within that community because of all 1,500 units, which is what we we estimate there's about 1,500 units in that area with the existing floor plan.

As we're developing getting more information, we'll refine that number, but we think that's about 1,500.

Um, does that work with what people's needs for for parking are?

So we will look to to use federal historic tax credits, low-income housing tax credits.

We'll look to deploy the pilot there where we can, if there's opportunity for us to be involved in and taking ownership.

I would certainly be be open to that with the resources that we or tools that we have available if if something's coming through foreclosure or such because I I think that we can do a good job of securing and getting properties.

So it's going to be a a long process.

There's 2,000 units of affordable housing under construction.

There's 1,500 units in this area.

It will take us time, but um I I think we're actually pretty excited about it because it's um something that we haven't taken on in this way, but we're we're looking forward to it, and we'll certainly be working with your office as we develop more solutions and ideas as we um we're also working.

I just want to say we're also DPW did an assessment, uh, did a survey of illegal dumping in the area this week.

Um at this point, they identified one option, but we'll one one point that needed to be cleaned up.

They did that, um, but also identified some other concerns that we'll be continuing to work with related to dumpsters in the area.

So those are it's gonna take several of our agencies, but um we're starting to to get us up uh an idea of the scope of work that's gonna be necessary over time in that area.

Thank you so much.

Um that's hope.

You've given us hope.

I know um some residents over there are listening as they always do, but that's an area that's just been neglected.

And for us to have commissioned a report, the city commissioned this 17-page report back in 2012, and we didn't do anything with it.

Um, and now if you were to go over there, some of these buildings you wouldn't even recognize.

We have historic um synagogues over there, we have temples over there, it's just not residential.

You have religious institutions with that are historical in nature.

So um it's a beautiful, beautiful area, and I just believe that um with the right support and resources, it can uh be revived and rehab.

I just believe that.

So I'll be looking forward to the 12 or 13 buildings that you've identified, and look forward to the walkthrough once the weather breaks with my team and your team and some of the residents because they're excited about this conversation because it's down the street from the golf course, it's across the street from Palmer Park and our the Merle Fountain that I'm going to talk about.

But this land was owned by a former senator, um, you know, Senator Um Palmer.

He donated that land to the city, and um, you know, we um have to do better by um taking care of and looking after our jewels and not focus on downtown and midtown all the time because right there at Covington and Woodworth, that was our last um toll.

We had a toll there.

It costs money to come across eight mile into the city.

The toll is there.

There's a historic marker there, right there on the corner of Covington and Woodward.

So we have a boulder there, has there was um I think donated by the daughters of the American Revolution, I think was in 19 in the early 1930s.

So that area has a lot of hope and potential, and a lot of families would benefit by moving into that area, and it's right there at a few steps from the bus line on Woodward, which is a direct shot, smart, and the um D Dot stop right there at Seven Mile and Woodwork.

They both share a shelter.

So um I'm excited about the 12 to 13 properties that you um have um have identified.

I'm looking forward to knowing what those are.

So I'm going to make a motion to put this into the closing resolution, just continue conversations about the city um the city's willingness um to look into supporting and resourcing and rehabbing possibly the 12 to 13 properties that have been identified by you, um Director Schneider.

So that is my first motion, Mr.

Chair.

All right, colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

Hearing none, that action shall be taken.

Thank you so much.

And I'm hoping in that conversation you can identify again because you were going so fast with the federal historic tax credits.

You gave a whole list of potential resources and funding that may support this endeavor.

Um, lastly, um, and I'll send I've sent you my questions on March the 13th, but I do have an um one.

I've been in talks with Pastor Wendell Anthony, and they bought some land from the Detroit Land Bank a number of years ago, and they are um they need help.

Um we're talking about affordable housing right over there, right around Lindsay and West Otter Drive, and um it's right behind the church, and it's not a huge gap that they have right now.

They've got most of the funding.

So I'd like to um ask you to take a look at that.

I think that was one of my questions.

That's number three of five.

So we need to um I'm hoping that we've helped other organizations before, and I'm hoping we can put this on the list that we can support in their efforts to build affordable housing in that area.

It's just desolate behind the church.

Um he's looking to build townhouses, apartments, all affordable, and people want that to happen over there, and it's just been um too long.

It's been too long that that land has been sitting there vacant.

Um, and then um hoping that we can also have a conversation about our homeless youth ages 14 to 24.

We have a large population of them, and sometimes we is it's difficult to identify because they couch serve.

They go from couch to couch, and sometimes they're embarrassed to to describe their housing um needs or their lack of housing.

So um those are my three concerns.

Um, Palmer Park, Fellowship Chapel, and the homeless among our youth.

And I'll um resend the questions if need be.

But while we were sitting here, I drafted some more questions that I'll make sure you get once we type them up because you can't read my handwriting.

But thank you so much.

Thank you to you and your team.

Thank you, Mr.

Bowser.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Through the chair to Councilmember with Phil Callaway.

So just a couple of points.

Um the mayor is uh going to be launching a faith-based development initiative where we're providing direct technical assistance um and also funding assistance to our faith-based partners.

We're looking to uh develop land around them.

And so we started initial conversations with a group and looking forward to following up on how those resources will be deployed.

But I think that that could directly assist in that particular issue.

Um and also in terms of the homeless youth question, um, the human homeless and family services um uh presentation tomorrow will sort of cover the beginnings of a new homeless strategy that uh addresses needs from you know all the way from youth to um older individuals as well, and looking to get upstream from homelessness to prevent homelessness altogether.

That's a key tenant of the new strategy.

So looking forward to talking about that tomorrow as well.

Thank you so much, Mr.

Bowser, for that information.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

Well, we'll we'll get discussion in you.

Oh God, yeah.

Thank you.

All right.

Uh we will now go to Member Waters.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Good afternoon.

Um we know that the HUD compliance is now resting in the will be in the future in the OCFO's office.

So how is that going to uh impact your department's ability to monitor maintain and enforce HUD compliance standards across housing development projects?

Now, for example, it's my understanding that 7800 East Jefferson River Towers has been sold.

Uh what are we going to do about those 300 somewhat seniors that could potentially be displaced?

Uh so and and that's all a part of this HUD issue and compliance issue.

Uh sorry.

Sorry.

Uh oh, yeah, go ahead.

Um, just uh through the chair through council to council member uh waters.

So just to give some background over the move in terms of compliance.

So as we split HRD into homeless uh human homeless and family services uh with HRD, the HUD dollars are going to live in a couple different places, and so the idea was to centralize compliance so that um you didn't have compliance living in one department and looking to oversee another.

OCFO being that sort of centralized entity to provide technical assistance to both departments uh was a better practice as we have sort of dissociated where C D B G ESG and other funds lie.

So looking to maintain and actually increase our level of compliance with that arrangement, but uh hand off to uh director Snyder for the rest.

Um through the chair, and if uh Rebecca Lebove is is on um she perhaps can help uh in response to the River Towers question.

But um so the the compliance portion that's moving to the OCFO is really related to to grant compliance.

The affordable housing asset management remains an HRD.

And so once a property is completed construction in our in our workflow, it goes over into what we call asset management.

And so in asset management, what they're doing is um so we are typically charging some sort of kind of uh interest-on payment.

It's typically not more than 1200 1200 dollars uh even a year, but we want to maintain compliance with um with our loans.

Uh we want to make sure that the we're getting income certifications and verifications annually.

We do that through that through that division, but also we have a private contract.

Um we have a private contractor that does that as there's a lot of personally identifiable information that gets submitted in those processes.

Um that that will maintain um be maintained within HRD.

And then we also uh are doing compliance inspections, so we're actually uh soon council should see uh a contract to expand those services.

The reason we're doing that is we've added we've actually added a lot of housing in the last um few years.

We've added about 25 percent to the overall existing um affordable housing stack in the city, so we need to increase our compliance inspections so that work remains in in HRD.

So we need to increase our compliance inspections.

So that work remains in in HRD.

Ms.

LeBov is on, and so Ms.

Lebo, uh the council member has asked about the sale of river towers and concerns about potential displacement and wanted to uh if you could speak to how we are typically engaged with property owners and actions we take to to to prevent displacement.

Good afternoon.

Um Rebecca Lebeau, Chief Development and Investment Officer for Housing and Revitalization.

Um through the chair, if I may clarify, is the property that you are referencing at 7800 East Jefferson, the um 470 unit apartment.

Yes.

Okay.

Thank you.

So this property is within the city's asset management portfolio, as Director Schneider described on some of the ways in which we maintain and oversee compliance in those properties.

Um there is an outstanding principal loan to the city of 3.5 million dollars, um, which is in many ways um sort of our leverage to ensure ongoing compliance for a large property like this.

And because that loan is recorded along with an affordable housing restriction uh requiring city affordability, uh there's also MISHA uh state required affordability and HUD required affordability and Detroit Housing Commission on this particular property.

So we are one of many layers.

But because our um loan and restriction are recorded, um those any sale of this property would require approval of the city of Detroit to transfer that ownership.

In some instances, um if there is a um a transfer of the interest in a particular entity without actually changing the ownership entity, um those things can happen without the city's oversight.

Um but it's not allowable under our documents, and we would pursue remedies under our loan agreement.

So we have seen this property marketed from time to time over the last few years, but has not had a developer or new buyer um actually be ready to come to the table and transact.

So we will continue to monitor um, we are in contact with the the initial owners, and we check in with them from time to time as we're doing our compliance assessment, and we would review any proposed um new ownership for their capacity to continue to operate this building um experience with federal funds and subsidy, um, all of the compliance requirements that accompany that, um, and we would be able to either approve or deny that change in ownership entity.

Okay.

Well, please keep us um informed.

Um management had had a meeting with with some of the residents.

Um the the owner, the owner, the company that owns uh the building right next to it, you know, that new development.

Um the residents believe that they are the ones who will be taking over 7800 East Jefferson.

So I wanted to put that out there because we we need to know uh from you all how closely you are monitoring what's happening at River Towers so that we'll know uh what's happening with with the seniors there.

Thank you.

Through the chair, um, you know, I our department is not aware that the entity who's um working on those new construction projects has any um interest to purchase those.

However, we will certainly following this follow up with the current owners and um brokers involved to get an up-to-date status on um what's going on there and we'll keep your office informed.

All right, well, thank you so much.

If I could add one thing through the through the chair, is that the the developers of 7850 East Jefferson, they are an affordable housing developer primarily, so um, to just give you a sense of what would what they do.

I don't we don't again don't know what their interest is, but we do know that they're um uh uh an affordable housing developer that does a lot of.

I was there for the groundbreaking.

Yeah, I know the so Rainy, yes, it was fantastic, yes.

But you know, okay.

So my last question is um what percentage of uh projects rely on f federal subsidies and what is the contingency if these funds should decrease and we know they're going to decrease.

So do you have a contingency plan in place or what?

What percentage rely on federal subsidies?

Uh for regulated affordable housing buildings, 100% of them have some combination, likely a combination of federal funding.

Whether that be low-income housing tax credits, whether it be uh a rental assistance contract, uh that uh our funding, home, CDBG, uh I could I could go on, but federal funding is really what makes uh affordable housing possible, including uh loans from from HUD.

So the the funding has been going down over the last uh 30 years.

Um the City of Detroit used to receive about 16 million dollars of home funds a year 30 years ago.

So you can just think about inflation and how much more that would that would be today.

Today we're getting between five and six typically.

So um the way that we've our approach has been to make sure that we're utilizing our resources in combination with with other resources that are also declining.

Um but we've increased the affordable housing uh construction in that time, and where we've received other dollars such as ARPA dollars, where we've received CDBG disaster recovery dollars, we've um supplemented them.

And of course, like increasing the amount of funding going into the affordable housing development and preservation fund is also is also key.

Four million dollars is in the proposed budget, which um is about a uh 800 to a million, it's about a a million less than we get from we get from HUD.

So we are starting to increase the funding that we're putting in as well, which has helped us to make these these deals work and continuing to uh do things such as recapitalize the Detroit Housing for the Future Fund with private philanthropy has helped um that that program and its first in its phase one helped to uh about 900 apartment units.

And that's so that's if we've built three thousand like thirty two hundred in the last um six, seven years, uh a substantial portion of that are coming through through a fund like the Detroit Housing for the Future Fund.

So we will continue to look at both how we're trying to um really make the most efficient use of our resources possible as well working with our partners very closely to make sure that MISHTA is getting as many dollars here as as possible and also working with private partners as well.

Okay, all right.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

President.

Thank you.

Sorry, thank you.

Uh member McCampbell.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Uh good afternoon to you all.

Thank you for the presentation, all the information.

Um I will I also have questions on the NFL housing and the strategy there, knowing that you all are working on a strategy to finalize.

Um is the administration thinking about social housing in this plan or or um any of those ways to increase the true uh the access to a truly affordable housing.

Um through the chair to council member McCampbell.

So um social housing is a is a uh a newer term that's um often used to refer to housing that is publicly owned.

Um I'm just saying that for the um for for those who are are listening or or watching.

And so we we are part of the reason it's so important for the Detroit Housing Commission to reposition itself into a strong performer is not only um for them to to make sure that all of the existing public housing that they they have is is can be and is occupied, but also so that they can get more involved in in development.

Um they they um are I know they're going to be exploring how they can use um available fair cloth.

So fair cloth is um a reference to when you think about public housing, you often people talk about section eight.

So section eight is referring to an area in the code of federal regulations.

Section nine is public housing.

And so in some time in the late 90s, I think 1996, they established a fair cloth limit, which set the limit of how much public housing could be online.

Um then through such things as hope hope six um units came offline.

So the DHC has uh fair cloth limit, and with recent changes to the the RAD program or rental assistance demonstration program, it's possible to actually bring them into a place where they can be financial and work for that development.

So this is a long answer, but I I want to kind of provide the the different aspects that are necessary to actually bring on more social or public housing.

But it's not something I they are better positioned as the public housing authority and what's they're unable to do under state state law than we are, but but I'm really happy to see the growth and progress of the DHC in the last couple of years because we need them to be a strong partner for for housing in Detroit, um, not just as HRD, but in Detroit, we need our public housing authority to be strong, to be providing quality housing that is affordable for extremely low-income households, which is I think um the housing that you're talking about.

So we are supporting them in whatever ways we can, whether it be funding, expertise, and and we'll continue to do so over the the coming years.

Thank you for that.

And um I I would definitely I can definitely follow with you all and the commission on uh further work on that.

Just to follow up to this on uh um in field housing.

Um are you all thinking about um intentionally thinking about workforce development with this plan um in particular like convos with labor and and contractors for apprenticeships for uh Detroit because I know as we talk to skill trades a lot when they're thinking about housing, um they they say that they need uh really these projects to be at a larger scale, and the a thousand of those is the scale that may be feasible there.

So just thinking about has there been any convoys around the workforce development around this.

Through the chair too, council member McCampbell, it's absolutely has to be a part of our strategy work.

So if you think back to the the Great Recession, one of the the kind of longer impacting um problems that came out of that is that our our workforce who who built housing who did a lot of this work um moved um to other regions in the country that were that we're building.

And so if we're going to do this work, we need to make sure that we're investing in the workforce because this will be an expanding industry, right?

If it's going to be expanding, then then uh to really facilitate that work.

We need to make sure that um Detroiters not only benefit from having the option of being able to live in that housing, but constructing it as well.

So uh certainly uh been talking with uh um uh Terry Weems and DESC leadership, but also the DEGC as they're uh looking at business attraction and the workforce that would be needed to support some new building technologies coming into Detroit.

So so yes, and it's part of the the many layers that are going to be necessary to make the strategy successful.

Appreciate that.

Thank you.

Glad to know that you all are having those comments and thinking about that.

I um yeah, because also as you say, those skills are needed, those skills don't go away, and and really is uh would be beneficial to our residents.

Um my second overall question is the uh on the for both preservation and uh of homes and also new building.

If you can just go over what investments are being made to allow seniors and residents with disabilities to remain safely in their homes, um, and if you have a number of how many homes that have been modified to support agent employees, um through the chair to councilmember McCampbell.

So um Mr.

Rico Razzo is coming up to the table.

Um Mr.

Razo is uh our chief of of home repair and neighborhood stability services within HRD and who has been responsible for um the Detroit Housing Accessibility Program and I think is looking at how do we continue that program as well.

Thank you, Director Schneider.

Uh through the chair, a little closer.

Through through the chair uh to council member McCampbell.

Uh we launched the Detroit Home Accessibility Repair Program, which is uh ARPA funded 6.6 million dollars.

We identified 232 households that will be served through that program.

We just crossed the 200 mark, so we'll wrap those up by the end of this fiscal year.

The good thing about it, uh the dollar per house amount that we've been spending is coming in lower, a little bit lower than we anticipated.

There's uh some contingency funding left.

So in that program, we're gonna be somewhere closer to 260 households that will receive uh porch accessibility repairs, and we provided bathroom accessibility kits as well for any household that was interested in uh receiving one.

In addition to that, um, and I will uh direct this to council member uh waters left.

I'm sorry, uh, because I know this comes up a lot out of council member waters' office during that time when we shifted the scope of work from doing walk-in showers, bathroom accessibility to to solely porch repair with the bathroom accessibility kits.

We also utilize some healthy home production dollars to uh do walk-in showers, bathroom accessibility for close to a hundred houses, and some of those I believe were on council member lists that we were provided.

Um so we at the same time we were doing DHAP, we were also using HHP money to do walk-in accessibility, and currently, uh, and I want to thank your office for a letter of support, but we're asking for a five million dollar earmark from the federal government to both uh uh Congress uh member Rashida Taleb and Congress member Tanaders 10's office uh to do more bathroom accessibility.

So we we have the five million dollar ask in, and we're hoping if we are granted those dollars, we can continue with accessibility.

I'll say my final note here is when we created uh the critical home repair program after we sunset the senior emergency home repair program, we did actually add a uh scope of work for bathroom accessibility.

So before it did not exist in our scope of work, now it does.

So you'll see um currently we have our August pilot of critical home repair that had um 212 homes that were selected, a number of those will have walk-in showers, and then we're gonna select another uh probably close to 300 households, and a number of those scopes will also have walk-in showers.

Thank you through the chair.

Thank you, sir.

Uh, and I appreciate the work.

I know that it does take oh director to you mind if I added just one thing to that is that um so uh in this year's budget we have uh a pilot program to both to assess the existing conditions of of buildings and their the their accessibility.

Um so that is uh a contract that should be coming to council as a as a start of that program.

So it's not work that we've done before, so we're trying to our older buildings were often built far before a lot of the accessibility laws came into place.

So we're doing uh it'll start with doing an assessment um by uh uh a firm, an architecture firm that has a lot of specialty in in both assessing and and retrofitting existing existing buildings, but then we are also um looking for funding at the state level to be funding um accessibility improvements to to senior buildings as well.

Thank you.

Uh appreciate the um attention to senior buildings for sure.

And I know as soon as that money comes in, it goes out uh to these programs.

So appreciate the work that's gone on there, and anyways that can continue to be helpful in pulling down those dollars.

I will do so.

Um and I would just say for um if there can be consideration around the in-field housing, but also just new um uh development period, just um just want to stress the need around accessibility um accessible homes for our seniors and folks with disabilities.

So thank you all.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

I'll have motions at the end.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Member Benson.

Thank you, and thank you all for being here.

If Mr.

Razo could please stay at the table.

Appreciate that.

Thank you, Mr.

Razo.

You have tomorrow too.

So um, number one, just thank you for being here today and your level of responsiveness to talk to you on a regular basis.

Uh Ms.

Snyder, uh RICO talk on a regular basis as well.

Uh 0% interest loan is a huge um program that we like to see re-implemented and know there's money that's been allocated to ensure that we properly redesign that program.

Uh in addition, this looking at the life and legacy uh program, which I know is is no longer in HRD, at least as per our uh our org chart, but I think in re in logistically, it's still gonna be managed there.

Am I accurate there not today?

There you go.

Sorry through the chair uh to council member Benson.

Legit it'll be managed through HHFS where the staff is moving to my questions then when it comes to uh life and legacy on that one, but just want to uh say thank you for all the support and then go to housing then looking at page 10.

Uh your support and the subsidy.

And you mentioned earlier subsidy is a very important portion, but it looks like 14 million of annual subsidy, and you talked briefly about the reduction from 30 uh 30 million a year down to to five million a year in home dollars.

What are we how do we how are we looking then?

Moving forward.

We only got 14 million dollars a year annual, although we have this one-time money, but just the sustainability of affordable housing, looking at the numbers that I'm getting from developers, 450 dollars a square foot.

Thousand square foot house, 450,000.

Obviously, not affordable to many income levels, let alone to your middle and upper middle class and wealthy families.

What can we do?

How can we help?

What is it going to take?

And I heard there's technology, um philanthropic community, which is 450 a square to get that down to a space that's attainable for your common, even somebody who may be middle income workforce housing.

How do we get it down for our our low-income families?

Um the chair to council member Benson.

So I mean the the funding picture on housing and affordable housing has been headed in a particular direction, which is which is down for decades.

Um in the 50s, um, we had these programs through HUD that offered low interest loans plus rental assistance.

There's about 9,000 of those units today, and it's why we are so focused on preservation because they were created decades and decades ago, and once they go away, they're gone.

So it's important that we that we that we do that.

But it's why you can't look at the the picture for housing and affordable housing with any one only one tool in mind.

You have to bring all of the tools to bear.

The construction costs that you estimate is one of the reasons why it's so important that we bring our vacant existing affordable housing building back, as there are um often the case you can um bring buildings back online for for less.

Not always, um, but but often you can, and so that is why we we why we need to continue to do that work.

We've also seen the the the pilot um is something new to us, right?

We we we really um with the the support of the the council really changed uh a process that has had um quick results in we've we've seen the pipeline for that really increase because it's regulated dollars, HUD dollars, LITEC dollars, they are what we would call in the housing like a housing industry, they're kind of expensive dollars.

Um they tend to drive up the cost the overall cost of your project.

It's why when you see one funding source, one federal funding source, you see you tend to see several funding sources because of um a lot of the additional regulations that are put in place in the those those programs for good reason, but they do make those dollars more expensive.

So it's why we at the local level need to consider options like pilot where we've seen um 3500 units units approved, and about um 1300 of I believe maybe it's eleven hundred of those are are not LITEC.

That's a that's a that's a big number since June, right?

And so it's why we need to keep looking at processes to identify ways that we can help do things that aren't just financially um focused.

Um, and also continue to work to to bring on doubt bring on additional resources more locally or f philanthropically because um of the the direction of those funding sources and and we do see some interest at the federal level.

The this the um there's a a bill in the Senate, but um that that could be beneficial, but I think at this point with what's happening at the federal level and the direction of funding for housing, we have to really look at what we can do locally in terms of processes to um and and dollars that we can raise from local sources to um bring more housing online.

Thank you.

Are you looking for oh I was just seeing a number?

I it looked like a couple of you were looking at something behind me, and I was wondering what was happening.

Are you looking for oh I was just seeing a number I it looked like a couple of you were looking at something behind me and I was wondering what was happening at personal speaking up we got you somebody sneaking up zero percent interest now when we say run down to do it up until then is that staying with HRD or is that moving over to health human FS which program zero percent interest loan program?

Um the zero percent loan program as a home repair program will be going to HHFS.

Okay, great.

All right, then I will ask for and I'll just save my well no I'll do it right now.

So two two three motions one to closing resolution, um continued support for the life and legacy programs a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objection?

See none that action shall be taken.

Executive session motion to put one million dollars into the life and legacy program.

There's a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objections?

Seeing none that action shall be taken.

Do you're still to Mr.

Corey that is reoccurring?

And then lastly, on the closing resolution, um strongly urge the continued support of the zero percent interest loan program and very robust repayment terms to be modified as designed.

Colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

Seeing none, that action shall be taken.

All right, thank you.

Thank you.

Pro Tim Young.

Thank you so much.

Always a pleasure to be with you.

Before I begin, I just would like to say uh to Mr.

Razzo and uh to Director Schneider, thank you so much for always responding.

Thank you so much for always being there for always being available whenever I had questions or whenever you did anything, you guys have been tremendous.

Uh, I just want to say uh Rico Rosso, I hate to fat you wearing that suit, man.

You too sharp, man.

You know what I'm saying?

I want to wear a suit like that.

I don't like you came in here now, shying me like that.

I just wanted to say that.

Um first and foremost, I wanted to ask you very quickly.

In Los Angeles, and I'm gonna like explain this out first, and then you can respond to it.

So just kind of bear with me here.

But in Los Angeles County, um, they have a program called the Housing Stability Intelligence System.

And what it does is it uses artificial intelligence and city data to predict who is at risk for becoming homeless six to twelve months early, and it intervenes with rental assistance, eviction defense, case management, and rapid rehousing.

So the core shift from reactive after homeless to prevent it before housing loss.

And how this system works is this is abbreviated, but it's data ingestion.

So the data is eviction filings, utility shutoffs, unemployment, health plus social service usage, AI prediction, so it signs a risk score of zero to 100, flags high risk households.

Uh the trigger, what's it triggered?

Outreach team is deployed, financial plus service support is activated, and the outcome is evictions are avoided and housing is stabilized.

Now, the homeless prevention impact of this is a 15 to 30 percent reduction in entries into the homeless system, homelessness systems.

So a Detroit terms that could prevent 800 to 1500 households a year from becoming homeless, estimated.

Is an eviction reduction of 10 to 25 percent reduction in eviction filings, and its strongest effect is when paired with legal aid plus rental grants.

The cost efficiency, so your cost per homeless person I've I've seen without the system is 30 to 60 K a year, 30, 60,000 a year with the system that's avoided, and your cost per household, prevention costs goes to two to five thousand dollars.

Prevention is ten times cheaper than response.

Let me say that again.

Prevention is ten times cheaper than response.

The fiscal impact of this, your annual system cost is eight million dollars, and your annual avoided cost is thirty million to sixty million for a net annual savings of twenty million to fifty million dollars.

Have you implemented this system and if not, why?

Really like lay this on thick.

Like give me the Schneider special of why, if you haven't done this, why like really kind of try to convince me why?

Um press me here.

Well, th th through the chair, I uh want to uh as as homelessness is uh and homelessness management is moving to HHFS.

I want to talk about what the the want um chief of staff Bowser and and Miss Neblet to talk about the future on that.

I will say that part of the part of the work to getting to that point is understanding your existing system and doing and and collecting data as well as analyze it, but then collecting the right data in order to get to that point where where you can implement and design such a system, and so um that is work that we have been we have been doing that.

Um we've been doing that in partnership with uh government performance lab at Harvard and are um I think moving into a direction where we'll be able to really utilize a lot of um more uh technology and the and the work that we're doing, but I'll I'll kind of just stop stop talking there and let them carry it forward.

Yeah, um through the chair to uh pro Tim Um Colman Young.

Uh so the mayor has been laser focused on us uh sort of focusing on prevention and and trying to make this shift from emergency response away to prevention.

Um we have plenty of data around what is causing folks to be homeless, uh the issues that are leading folks into a homeless shelter system.

We've created some temporary fixes around even the phone number that you call routing you away from shelter system to other services.

But now as we move forward, the mayor has instructed us to reach further upstream before people become displaced in the first place to provide services then.

And I think there's many different ways to operationalize that AI being one of them, but we also have some basic program changes that we can make.

And so uh that's one of the things that we kind of wanted to talk about tomorrow uh in the HHFS um presentation, but I also wanted to hand it off to um Chelsea Neblet to talk about some of our other strategies as well.

Um thank you, Chief Bowser through the chair to Pro Tem Young.

As uh Director Schneider mentioned, we are currently receiving support from the government performance lab at the Harvard Kennedy School of Business.

Um and we have had some conversations um with the California policy lab around what it takes to implement the program, and it is a lot of data sharing across um different agencies, both state and local, and so we are having those conversations.

It's very early, but it will be something that we um continue to explore under the the new HHFS division.

Oh no, I no, I appreciate that.

Uh I think that's very important, and I think that it and hopefully I would I would hope that it moves from conversation to actually implementation.

I would really like to see that.

I mean, I understand you want to look through it to go through your paces, and it's a lot, you know.

So this is not like a normal ass that I'm asking.

It's a quite big price tag.

That's why I'm moving most of these things the closing resolution.

Because I understand it's a big price tag, and we're in a perilous situation economically right now.

But I would really appreciate that because six to twelve months is a big deal.

I think that's life or death saving deal.

And we got to understand something.

Whenever unemployment goes up, 38 to 40,000 people die in the country.

That's that's been estimated about like 800 to maybe a thousand the city of Detroit, give or take.

So we gotta remember this is literally life or death that we're talking about here, particularly with the issues just people who are homeless and people who are living in poverty.

And so I think that's a big deal.

Um, secondly, I wanted to ask you, and I don't maybe this is going over to um this is going over to the other department as well, but I wanted to ask you are there any innovation zones that you have in terms of building houses, whether it'd be encouraging 3D printing, whether it be encouraging um, whether it be whether it be encouraging you know having solar roofs on houses or green housing, whether it be encouraging building wooden housing in certain instances, um, whether it would be encouraging uh modular homes and things that nature.

Has there are there any sort of innovation zones that businesses could come apply for to be able to build that?

And the reason why I'm saying that one is because you want to be able to encourage innovation.

You want to be able to encourage that, you know, whether it's through a 3D printing aspect, whether it's AIDS core or whether that's uh through icon companies, but also as well, because most of it is greener and most of it's cheaper, and it's more energy efficient.

So you have people who are these these houses that are there long term, and so I want to know because we have such a housing crisis right now.

Are there any innovation zones that you planned?

Do they already exist, and what is that like?

Usually I would ask you about InFill, but I know that's the issue with zoning.

I'm not gonna I'm not gonna apply that to you.

Um through the chair to Pro Tim Young, I I was very much looking forward to a question on 3D printing.

Um it's been years, so I have a much better answer this year.

Good.

Um all right, so as you asked yes, specifically about zones, and so I kind of want to take a little bit of a broader aspect and then kind of answer your question.

Um I think what's really exciting is in the last um last couple of years, we've seen real improvements in 3D printing technology that not only can start to get to a more cost-effective solution, but also deliver a product that people want to actually purchase and live in.

I think one of the problems that we've seen in the emerging construction field is that what's being produced is very much looks like a research and development project.

It does not look like somebody something someone wants to invest their their life savings into and not sure about how it will transfer generational wealth to to their their family, but I think in the last couple of years, we've really started to see some some real improvements both in the cost of construction um for these technologies as well as the um like the the kind of consumer marketability of these products.

You also need lenders who are willing to make a mortgage on these products as well, right?

And so we've seen started to see some real um improvements, but and one of the things I am really excited about in this um uh revised scope for HRD is working closely with the DEGC on attracting businesses who can build this type of housing and locate their businesses in the the city of Detroit.

And um I think that the the industry is going and looking for places like to trade to locate in, and so we're really want to to focus on bringing them here.

In terms of zones, I very much think like in the as we're doing the in-fill work, we are going to want to identify areas to to pilot different parts of the the this effort.

It will involve likely some how we look at zoning, um, and making sure we can do this work quickly.

The pre-permitted designs are a part of that, but also building technology.

I very much think that that will probably be a part of that scope of work, but we have to to get to the point that we're developing it, so we're not we're not there yet, but it's um certainly something I think we'll think about.

No, I was just thinking about your building codes.

I don't understand in terms of state level you had this up.

There are some issues in terms of that as well.

So I mean, I can understand what you're doing.

And I'm glad you kind of cleaned it up because at first we were talking about houses that people didn't want to invest in.

I was like, I totally disagree.

I mean, there's neighborhoods in Texas that they have used 3D printing to print entire neighborhoods with.

But you you but but would you clean it up in a yeah, you talked about that that's been a big difference.

I was I was getting ready to intervene, like I totally disagree with you.

110%.

I've seen I I actually have a 3D printed house across where I live at.

So I see that.

Now I'm not recommending that because it was over in the 200,000, so I'm not saying that.

But there's been other places in Mexico that have been much more affordable for people who are homeless, for people who are drug addicted, who are recovering, who have lived in these houses that were 3D printed.

And so I so I really appreciate you re-looking at this.

I think it's probably better if you contract this out than if you actually did this in-house, because you gotta trade the people things that nature, so I understand that.

So I just I'm just gonna go over really quickly why you should implement artificial intelligence exactly the way I told you to, one because I told you to, exactly because it will benefit you if you do it, because I believe all my ideas are superior.

Uh the total artificial intelligence and um the housing prevention system if implemented, the cost would be 25 million to 60 million.

Your that'll be your uh total cost, your annual operating costs or OPEX or operating expenditures be eight to 20 million.

Your annual new tax revenue will be 40 to 120 million.

Your avoided costs would be 25 to 70 million, and your long-term revenue will be 150 million to 300 million a year.

Break even at two to four years, and combined system efficiency would be 25 to 40 percent in probe it.

Blight vacancy would go down by 20 to 40 percent, evictions would go down by 15 to 35 percent.

The cost per unit would go is currently 250,000, 250,000 to 400,000 K.

It would go down to 175,000 to 300,000.

Uh the permit time right now is six to twelve months, it'll go down to thirty, sixty days, and the housing output, the current system is two thousand to four thousand a year, it'll go up to five thousand to ten thousand a year with a fiscal impact of fifty to one hundred percent increase.

I will send you all this information via email or texts.

Uh that being said, I am done.

I would like to make a motion to move to closing revolution resolution to put the homeless prevention artificial intelligence system in closing resolution.

I am made a motion.

Thank you.

Colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none, then action shall be taken.

That's it.

Thank you, Ms.

President.

I'm done.

Thank you.

I want to gotta sneak in a brightmore question, as you I'm sure anticipated.

So just want to get now that we're kind of breaking up the responsibilities of HRD, HRD dealing with structures and uh HHFS dealing with you know people more people centered.

How does that connectivity work?

And we've got scattered homes that are over there, we've got uh unfortunately real T and Real T has just done damage all across the city.

And knowing that they're out of money, um, and these are you know folks who live in in these uh homes uh that are very challenged.

Uh, how are we anticipating first the I real T situation that you know once they go belly up, uh how do we as a city address the concerns and part of that may be tomorrow's discussion that's dealing with the people, but these are all structures as well that these folks live in.

What's the game plan?

What are we thinking about as we're now in litigation and uh they very well may be going belly up real real soon and then weave in also how we're uh connecting the two uh the departments as it relates to the Brightmore Scattered Homes under NDN Dr.

Through the through the chair to council president Tate.

Uh so I I think first of all, like we being being united under one department means that we have really incredible relationships across teams.

Um we've worked for um the since since the department has been growing, um which really really started in 2023, um part of our work has been to make sure that um there is sharing of information across teams, which can be um can be quite siloed, but we really wanted to make sure that our our division directors are connecting and that we're developing relationships.

Those relationships will will maintain we'll maintain.

Um they're built on shared interest and and service to Detroiters.

Um in terms of Brightmore and the scattered site work, the scattered site work in terms of uh helping current runners become homeowners.

Um that work remains within HRD.

Um we currently have a a third party under contract who does the the really um involved tenant counseling with residents to help them become homeowners and get them engaged in the program.

Um so far um through that through the ARPA program, we had 73 households go from tenants to homeowners, another pilot program that we had supported um previously with Sonera converted another 40.

Um we have we're expecting to close uh we have eight households in the Brightmore homes phases, either two or three that we're scheduling closings now for the next um within the next two weeks.

So that work is continuing and it remains within HRD.

In terms of how we're engaging with uh the the services aspect of properties that are owned by real token, um that work is really going to continue to be uh managed and led within the the DHS division, which is going to HFS.

Um, and so um if Miss Nebelett could talk about how um their continued engagement works on that, and I can try to wrap up how we continue to work together.

Well, I just want to talk about again the the structures that these folks are living in.

Okay.

They that are in like major disrepair.

That that sounded like that would fall under your shot.

Um are you talking about real token or real tea as well?

Yeah.

Because I mean again, we're talking about hundreds of properties.

Yeah, hundreds of properties across the city of Detroit in the various districts.

Um we've got to be anticipating what happens next when they go belly up.

To uh to the to the chair.

So I we are working closely with with B seed on those on those conditions in terms of structures.

We right now I believe some of them are under receivership and we do not we do not own them, so I don't have an um an ability to make an investment in them.

Um I think it's part of the things that we're struggling with with um with Palmer Park, where a lot of those properties have gone to a receiver and it leaves us in a place where we're really kind of more on an enforcement um operation until we can have an owner that's looking to reinvest in those those properties.

However, with real token, um there are there is the possibility where dollars have been put in from um put in escrow to make improvements to two properties, but that is that is more about the tenant services side of things than like dealing with like creating a long-term affordable housing solution within those within those structures.

Um without without ownership or an interested party, we really are in an enforcement, kind of in an taking and have to take an enforcement approach.

Um we think that may be the case again.

I I I keep bringing up if they go belly up, that will be the case.

And because there's I'm thinking of potential others uh um uh outcomes than just the receivership, and I'm I'm just trying to again think of how are we thinking ahead of what those possible outcomes could be.

I know that's one, but there's others.

How how are we thinking about from what I recall like eight more up to 700 plus properties?

Yeah.

These are single family dwellings, and I know we're talking about developing a thousand, but we've got almost a thousand right there that need some help, and I would say I don't I I don't have the latest numbers, but at least half of them have you know families living in them, if if not more than that.

To the chair, we we haven't experienced a lot of portfolio-wide bankruptcies, but it would be a bankruptcy, which um when bank when properties are going through a court process, um, it's not a it's not a quick process, even when the owner be is um not available um by several means.

So like our we in those instances, what we've seen is that the tenants of those of those properties are who are um have to to deal with the problems of bad management and bad property ownership the most.

So I would say that like our priority because bankruptcy cases can be quite drawn out.

Um I can think of a couple that that if it were experiencing now or have been going through that have lasted for um over a year, that the priority really has I think has to start with making sure that the residents are of those places are are in safe and secure housing, and right now that's that's not the case for many of the real token residents um as the property conditions need to continue to be um inspected, monitored, and where um possible we need to provide the relocation services for people that are in really substandard conditions.

Um I know you were pivoting to Chelsea, it looked like and want to provide her an opportunity to respond as well, please.

Um Thank you, Director Schneider.

To the chair.

So we've had an HRD for the real token properties, uh multi-pronged approach over the last um year.

So one is we are working with our partners, our nonprofit partners at United Community Housing Coalition to ensure um that doors are knocked and residents are um outreached too.

We've also been partnering with various city council offices, your office.

Um I know our team has gone out, so that we can reach every single resident, every single family in the property.

So UCHC has been doing um an excellent job making contact with residents, providing um legal services, escrow related support, and kind of some general light navigation.

Um additionally, HRD has been working alongside the law department and the building and safety department.

So when there are properties that rise to a very serious unsafe condition, um the Detroit Housing Services team has stepped in to relocate some of those more urgent households where it's just not safe for the family to be there.

So really kind of a multiple prong approach over the last year with our outreach proactive as well as ensuring that we are responding um to the unsafe living condition.

So to uh Director Schneider's point earlier, uh we will continue to work um across departments as we do.

We always have a really responsive um interdepartmental um working group when we have these types of emergencies and situations that arise to ensure that we're providing services to to residents to keep everybody um safe.

Thank you.

Um we'll more than likely have some follow-ups on on this particular one because we're trying to look ahead and make sure that we don't get caught uh flat footed, so to speak.

Um so the other question I have is regarding I mean it's piggybacking on another uh question that I asked earlier in terms of like the landscape.

How do you all determine you know the area that you're looking to focus on?

And we uh place into executive session um a conversation discussion about uh redeveloping the apartment complex complexes along Greenfield.

Uh member Callaway also joined in because it's a long stretch, it's multiple apartment buildings once again, giving us an opportunity to uh repopulate an area, uh also provide affordable housing in an area that uh in the past was not as challenged, but now they're closed, some of them burned down, need some assistance.

Um clearly there's some coal violations there, but in terms of and maybe chief, you can uh help uh with the coordination of this as well.

How does that area become the next area that we focus on?

Essentially is what I'm asking.

Uh whether we own the properties or not, where we find out what is needed to make sure that we can stand up those apartments and get folks moved back into that um uh that stretch of Grand River, long excuse me, of of uh greenfield, a long stretch.

And think you said all the way down to Schaefer?

Yes.

Yeah, from Grand River all the way down to to Schaefer.

That's a pretty long stretch.

And we're talking about multiple apartment buildings that uh have hundreds of units that are not occupied right now, and that would really transform again that area gives us an opportunity even to, as we talk about jet retail, you know, increase that uh because of the density that would be created.

Uh, how does that area become the next on our list to focus on um to the chair?

I can talk about it from uh from a housing perspective.

I think like over the last since HRD's inception, which was in 2015, it kind of officially became a department league.

We've looked at how do we how do we identify areas of for our focus both from a personnel aspect of it as well as well as funding, and it's it's changed over time.

The way that we are typically identifying areas is a little bit dependent upon which which tools make sense in certain areas, but that's not the case.

Like low-income housing tax credits are gonna um because we're working with uh a state agency that allocates them, we want to um position ourselves best to support um projects that are are going to score in that criteria, but that doesn't mean that our work isn't um more encompassing broad more broadly encompassing than that.

And I think you've seen that in some of the um work we've done in, for example, um uh the Midwest Tirement area, putting out a couple of of RFPs and advanced marketing for that work, which is um because not one of our original areas of of focus on preservation, and we look at preservation pretty broadly.

Like for us, it's not just um preserving existing affordable housing, it's preserving the existing um housing stack and apartment buildings.

Um and it certainly I'm I'm familiar with that area driving through it.

I see the the potential there.

There tend to be like two to three-story buildings, which is um uh can be a really attractive option for for many households.

Um I think that I'd be certainly happy, we'd be happy to partner and work with your office on developing some sort of um plan that would make sense for that area.

I think these areas of concentrated apartment buildings are um are new for for us, so we don't have uh kind of playbook that we've done in ten different neighborhoods.

We kind of have to work with with your offices and those communities to identify what's appropriate because what's what's in Palmer Park is heavily historic, or it is historic, right?

And I don't believe that the area you're talking about is so it requires us to have different diff different interventions.

I I don't have the all the answers now, but certainly willing to to work through them, and that could be a really great way for us to bring units online um in a way that's much more cost effective than we can do with with new construction.

Um but it requires a lot of engagement with owners.

Um I see Miss Lebeau is is on um who can maybe talk about some of the how we try to engage with owners, but it it takes that work, it takes enforcement, it takes bringing tools to bear, um, takes resident engagement and all of those things.

I I think are would be needed in in either area.

And and I'm bringing up and I'm gonna turn to Ms.

LeBo, but uh some of those apartment buildings are owned by real token as well.

So again, this is all it's it's intertwined.

You got law, you got HRD, you got BC, and it takes a whole lot of coordination uh to make that happen.

Uh Ms.

LeBoe.

The chair.

Um, you know, I think I could reiterate much of what Director Schneider said.

Um, and in the recent past, some of our outreach to owners of any occupied buildings was focused on um through an ARPA program, we had no cost pre-development activities, and we were able to build a pipeline of preservation projects by providing things like capital needs assessments and energy assessments.

Um and so uh, you know, that is a program for that we we fully expended the the dollars on, and we were able to bring a lot of programs or a lot of projects into our our preservation pipeline that way.

Um one of the tools that we use now more heavily is the pilot, and so when we have uh properties such as those in Palmer Park where we identify that there could be benefit from using the pilot to help stabilize the property, um it's it's a useful tool, and we try to promote that um as best we can with the development community.

Um and I think you know, it's I think was mentioned earlier.

The pilot is not sufficient to get a project done because it requires meeting an investment threshold.

Um we are working right now with our partners at LISC to sort of co-promote um a couple of different tools together.

So that would be the pilot, Detroit Housing for the Future Fund, which they manage and are continuing to fundraise for our new Section 108 program, which provides low interest capital for affordable housing.

We um just this week um introduced some of those loan products to developers, although the application is not live yet.

Um, but this is another tool that we're trying to bring to the table to provide capital to owners and and developers that are interested in rehabbing their properties when we know you know the amount of grant funding that we have is um is of course very limited.

Gotcha.

Thank you for that.

And um, you know, as I pivot to the mayor's office, I got we got the chief of staff here, and you're pretty high in the food chain.

I know you're not at the top of the food chain, but but you do make decisions and you're right there.

What what does it what would it take?

I mean, I'm hearing from everyone else.

What does it take to make this area a priority for us?

Yeah.

So to the chair, there are a variety of different tools that would have to be deployed.

Uh but I think the good thing is that this mayor has told us all that she wants us to focus on neighborhoods.

And so this will this will be a focus.

Um what we are sort of looking at through the neighborhood economic development plan right now is the many layers that go into making those decisions about what gets deployed where moving forward, it's not really a conversation about which neighborhoods get investment, it's about what neighborhood gets what investment.

And so that has to do with um current you know, metrics around uh uh area media and income, crime, density, all sorts of things generate the the option of tools that we can use.

And so as we have that sort of neighborhood by neighborhood conversation, we'll land on the toolkit for this particular neighborhood.

So there will be um that conversation.

The planning department is uh either having planning studies done or planning those studies for every area in the city.

Um and so we will prioritize the the plan and you know, obviously be working with you to make sure that we're landing on a solution that uh makes sense specifically for that area.

But right now the conversations are building the toolkit and then learning how to apply those tools in each individual neighborhood moving forward.

So it is gonna be a um a longer term conversation, but it's one that this mayor has told us to have about just about every neighborhood in the city.

Okay, looking forward to it because at the top of that that that stretch I mentioned was Grand River.

Uh and at Grand River and Greenfield is where we got the Mammoth Building knocked down.

So again, another opportunity for us.

So I'm looking not just pie in the sky, but trying to build something in an area that really needs it, deserves it, uh, and we're ready for it.

So I'm willing to help in in any way that I can uh to assist.

So thanks for that.

Uh, we'll be sent many additional questions.

Um, but now go to colleagues who have motions that they would like to place on the floor.

I'll start with member Callaway.

Thank you so much.

Um Mr.

Chair, I didn't know if you wanted to put that conversation about the apartments from Grand River to Puritan off on Greenfield into closing resolution.

So we did earlier.

We did yeah, we took it from Grand River to Schaefer.

Oh Grand River to um Puritan.

You want to take it even further to Pierce?

It's Puritan because Schaefer and Greenfield run um Right, because I thought you said Schaefer.

Yeah, I did, but when I thought of my said, no, no, no, no.

So it would be Greenfield from Grand River to Puritan.

Okay.

Grand River to Puritan, is that's what I was thinking.

Yes, sir.

All right, so we put it in the we put it in the closing resolution already.

That's what I said previously, and you added Schaefer.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, so um, I'd like to place uh make a motion to place fellowship chapel and the gap gap funding that they need um and closing resolution and executive session, two million dollars.

There's a motion, colleagues, to place that item in executive session with discussion.

With discussion, uh member uh pro tem young.

Member Calloway, I'd like to join you in that motion.

Absolutely, sir.

There's a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objections?

See none, then action shall be taken.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

Uh no member Johnson indicated you had something as well.

Member Johnson.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

I'd like to add to executive session for HRD to map vacant and underutilized department building citywide and develop a comprehensive plan to reactivate these properties.

There's a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objections?

See none that action shall be taken.

I'd also like to uh make a motion for um the executive session for continued support and conversation for community land trusts.

All right, colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none, that action shall be taken.

Uh with discussion prior to the motion being called.

Member Johnson, I'd like to join you in that motion.

Absolutely.

Uh Mr.

Corley, if you can please note.

Member Johnson.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

And lastly, I'd like to make a motion to add to the closing resolution for HRD to identify city-owned properties that could be repurposed for emergency or transitional shelters.

Colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none that action shall be taken.

All right.

Um go to member waters next.

Okay, well, thank you.

I um Mr.

Mr.

President, I want a status of my workforce development fund.

Do I need to put it in executive session again this year?

Because it was never established last year.

Mr.

Corley.

All right.

Waters?

Is there a motion?

All right.

Motion um to place um a workforce development um fund into executive session.

There's a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objection?

See none that action shall be taken.

All right, member McCampbell.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, these are two closing resolution motions.

The first is a motion to add language urging the HRD and administration to ensure that in field housing initiatives um have housing units that have accommodation for folks with disabilities and seniors.

There's a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objections?

See none, that action shall be taken.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

And the second motion is um for the closing resolution motion to add language urging HRD and administration to ensure that the in-field housing initiative and all other housing programs prioritize workforce development and skill trace training for Detroiters.

Colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none that action shall be taken.

That's it.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

All right, thank you, Member Callaway.

I'm gonna come to you, but before we do that, I'd like to uh call if there's anyone who would like to provide public comment, please raise your hand now.

If there's anyone from the public who would like to speak, please raise your hand now.

I see one in the committee of the whole going once, going twice, going three times.

Collection of public comments have now concluded.

Thank you so much.

Member Callaway.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, I'd like to add um make a motion to add coffee middle school and bethune.

They're both um abandoned, neglected into the closing resolution.

I see that you featured Higginsbotham, which is a repurposed school in district two.

Um, and the closing resolution I wanted to include the repurposing of those structures, Bethune and Cook, similar to what we've done here with Higginsbotham.

That is my motion, Mr.

Chair.

All right.

There's a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objections?

See none that action shall be taken.

We have one more.

Okay, we'll let Member Calloway complete.

Are you mister Mr.

Chair?

Did I say coffee or cook?

Because cook is in district one.

You said coffee.

Okay, cool.

Thank you.

All right.

Um member Waters.

I'd like to add um senior accessibility program into um executive session.

All right, colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none, then action shall be taken.

Uh Pro Tim Young?

Yeah, so this is a response to what happened with uh real T.

And and I plan on introducing an actual ordinance to be able to kind of regulate tokenized uh real estate.

But I wanted to add in closing resolutions community ownership requirements.

So big I'm not saying you should put this in there, but the reason what this what this will do to explain it, make sure at least 20 to 40 percent of the tokens must be reserved for Detroit residents.

So I'd like to make a motion to add community ownership requirements regarding to tokenized real estate.

All right, college there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none, that action shall be taken.

And then my final my my final uh motion is um to I would like to also add in the closing resolution a city enforcement kill switch.

So the Detroit will retain the authority to freeze token transfers, seize control of mismatched properties, revoke licenses, and liquidate maintenance bonds.

So I would like to move to closing resolution city enforcement kill switch for tokenized real estate.

All right, there's a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objections?

See none, that action shall be taken.

Member Waters.

I'd like to add uh land use fees to um executive session.

All right.

There's a motion on the floor, colleagues.

Any objection?

See none, then action shall be taken.

Any further?

Okay.

Uh Mr.

Corley.

Uh Mr.

President, so as I promised yesterday or or the other day, we're gonna give you um a spreadsheet, executive session spreadsheet um through the Corley.

You want us to uh wrap this hearing up first, or is it pertaining to this particular hearing?

We can wrap this up.

Okay, all right.

Want to give them an opportunity to give their closing remarks.

Um Chief Bowser, Director Schneider.

Uh to the chair, uh the administration looks uh looks forward to sort of relaunching HRD um to the city and making sure that affordable housing, in field housing development, home ownership um is being prioritized uh for all Detroiters uh in the city.

Um there's there are quite a few new strategies being launched, but we want to make sure that we're transparently putting our information out there, making sure that resources are available.

That's another uh focus of this administration as well, so that everyone understands clear entry points into the new programs that we're creating.

So there will be additional initiatives to make sure that, for example, there's like a one-stop shop for certain services to make sure that you know exactly who to call for what services moving forward as well.

So thanks.

Thank you, Director Snyder.

Um to the chair.

So I believe this is my my sixth budget hearing as the director of of HRD.

And I think what um like I've we like solving problems related to housing.

Housing is so important for um for Detroiters.

Um it's it's where people it's where we each have start our start our days, we we feed our families, we do all of our core functions, um, starting in our house.

So we really believe in the the importance of housing and housing affordability for all incomes.

I think that when I when I listen to the questions and I think about the things that um we'll be working on going forward, I think there's a lot of things to really be excited about, not a lot of easy things, but um, but we're not we're not in this work because it's easy.

Um we're in this work to to be public servants and serve Detroiters.

So I'm really excited to uh about the a lot of the conversations we had today and really and just looking forward to to working with you in the next year.

All right, thank you so much and send our best to all of the members of your team.

Yes, if teams plural now that they've broken up a bit.

Uh but thank you for all the work that you have done and will continue to do.

This now closes out our uh budget hearing for the housing and revitalization department.

Thank you so much.

All right, Mr.

Corley.

Thank you, sir.

Um so you so council will get uh executive session spreadsheet as long as long as well as administration uh tomorrow, probably tomorrow afternoon.

Um the executive session spreadsheet would probably include all the items that you put into executive session through tomorrow morning.

Um but we would like for council members as quickly as possible to come up with any numbers that you want to add in executive session.

Uh we need that obviously to uh try to balance this out, and then as well as language.

Um you can see there's a lot of items going into a closing resolution that's gonna require you know a lot of language.

So the more you can provide to help us with that, we greatly appreciate it.

You know, as we know, executive session starts next Tuesday.

Um, and next Tuesday is gonna be a challenge because not only do you have former session, but you have Mayor Sheffield giving her state of the city, you know, at seven o'clock next Tuesday.

So next Tuesday is gonna be shortened, probably when it comes to executive session, so that further reduces possibly you know the time that we have in executive session, it's gonna be good.

And so the more you can help us, you know, with the language, with numbers, uh, you know, the sooner the better.

Thank you so much.

And good Friday as well.

And good Friday as well.

Yeah, we lost that down.

And then April the 7th, the day that you vote is a former session day.

Yeah.

So, you know, it's it's it's challenging.

We're gonna get to know each other very well in these next couple of days.

Thank you, Mr.

Corley.

Uh approach M Young.

Yeah, so uh Mr.

Quarley.

So basically, just to clarify what you're saying is get this information to you now, as early as we possibly can.

And do you have that list available of all the closing resolutions or that's gonna be tomorrow too?

I just mean sure.

Okay.

Or do we have to provide that?

I just want to know what how that all right.

All right, thank you.

That's it.

Thank you, Member McCampbell.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair, and definitely Mr.

Corley will make sure to get you all the language to that.

Uh Mr.

Chair, I have um some motions related to the DPW.

Um, if I can make those.

Yes, sir.

Uh, two are closing resolutions.

The first are um a motion to add to the closing resolution as DPW expands to placement containers that they prioritize corridors that currently have the minimum amount and bus stops on routes that are less frequent.

Colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none, but action shall be taken.

And then the next one is to urge uh for the there's a motion for the close resolution language to urge DPW to take an earnest look at bringing more services in house in the effort to increase job opportunities for Detroiters with the city.

Right.

Colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objection?

See none, then action shall be taken.

And the last one is to put place in an executive session.

I would get numbers as quickly as possible.

And this is uh truck traffic study for district seven, especially now with the added trucking activity at the former AMC site.

Okay, colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none, then action shall be taken.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

We shall now go to public one, please, sir.

Member Callaway.

Okay, thank you.

I'd like to um place um into executive session.

Um, and I'll get the figures later.

Um, the Detroit Housing Network.

What would executive session for funding of support?

Okay.

Uh colleagues, there's a motion on the floor.

Any objections?

See none, that action shall be taken.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

We shall now go to our public comment section of this uh budget hearing session.

And we are, as I mentioned earlier uh in the week for the duration of budget hearings, we will have abbreviated public comments.

Uh so everyone will have one minute, uh noting that on March 30th, there will be a uh public hearing on the entire budget that will be taking place that will have full public comment.

I know Mr.

Hall, you had stepped out, you mentioned to uh staff that you wanted to speak, but you had stepped out at that time right there.

Uh so we'd have two individuals in the committee of the whole would like to speak.

We're gonna start off first with Mr.

Maurice Weeks.

The floor is yours, sir.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Uh, my comments regarding the HRD budget and strategy for this fiscal year.

Um, so I agree with the phrase Director Schneider said, which is that you don't solve affordable housing with just one tool.

To that end, I would add that it can't be solved with one type of partner either.

The city has many for-profit housing partners, and I'm curious about and would urge the city council to leverage the tools we have for more mission-driven developers, specifically those with mission with building mission-driven social housing like limited equity cooperatives.

Additionally, uh Councilmember Santiago Romero brought up the conversion of abandoned office space into affordable housing, a policy spearheaded in California.

I would urge the council to aggressively pursue this strategy.

We have nearly 20% of our office space vacant, but it's roughly four million square feet back of the envelope, Matt says that's about 5,000 one-bedroom decently sized units.

It's the most cost-effective and environment environmentally friendly strategy to increase affordable housing, a third of the cost, 60% reduced environmental impacts.

Um, as you may guess, Mr.

Chair, I'm gonna send you guys this information uh to you and all the assisting members of this council.

Uh, thanks for your consideration.

Thank you as well, Mr.

Reeves.

All right, Mr.

Aaron Hall, the floor is yours, sir.

Thank you, uh, Mr.

President.

Uh my name is Aaron Hall.

I'm the vice president of Detroit Market for CH and Housing Partners, the managing organization for the Detroit Housing Network.

As I know my time is brief, I'll be quick.

I will say thank you publicly to member uh Whitfield Callaway and members Letitia Johnson, one for your guidance and leadership and our quest to receive more funding via executive session for Detroit Housing Network, and to thank you to member Letitia Johnson who joined me this morning as we uh had a press conference uh launching the construction of Jefferson Apartments in the Jefferson Chalmers neighborhood with 52 units of affordable housing ranging from 30 to 50 percent of the Wayne County AMI.

Uh I want to leave you guys with a couple of numbers before my time runs out, uh two of which being 40,000 and uh 22,000.

We have the Detroit Housing Network have impacted the lives of Detroit residents via uh 40,000 unique services and more than 22,000 households since 2022.

Uh many of our members are struggling to keep the doors open, and we would love your assistance unrelated with my time.

Sorry.

If you would like to add your additional comments to the clerk's office, they will be placed on the public record.

I'm sorry.

All right.

Yeah, but we you can always communicate uh other ways.

We know you very well here all thank you.

Appreciate it.

Uh right.

We shall now go to our online public comments.

Colleagues, team.

How many callers do we have to know?

Sorry.

Good afternoon, Council President.

We have six callers online.

Our first caller is going to be caller ending in 482.

Caller ending in 482.

The floor is yours.

You have one minute general public comment.

It's not a way with Hey, James, you're not getting ready to be the mayor.

I'm not going to allow that what you're trying to do to Mary Sheffield happened.

Even though I can't stand Horace Jeff Field, her father, she can't stand them either.

I know more than what you think I know.

James E.

Tate Jr., City Council President.

You are Solomon Kenlock, and your game is getting ready to get exposed.

I'm doing exposing.

You ain't got no choice now.

But to face the facts.

The facts are the facts.

The truth is the truth.

And I gave the information to number 47.

You cheated in.

All your elected officials.

Absolutely five with us.

I cheated in.

And I'm Motor City Ruin.

I got to get all y'all off the way.

Can you get what you want?

Ask for and deserve.

Now give her a set on the board of police commissioners meet.

All right.

Love you, Ruben.

Next caller, please.

Our next caller is going to be Betty A.

Varner.

Ms.

Betty A.

Verner.

The floor is yours.

You have one minute.

General public comments.

Good afternoon.

This is Betty A.

Barner, the president of the Soda Elsewhere Black Association asking the council to consider in their budget to allocate monies for the land use hearing, that $1,500 to pay that fee.

Also, in regards to those walk-in showers, there are people who are still on uh honorable uh Mary Waters list who need those walk-in showers.

So I'm hoping that uh if the five million dollars is available, that we will be considered for those walk-in showers because we have been on that list for two to three years, and I advocated every day for those walk-in showers.

So I'm hoping that we will be considered also monies for corridors.

We need monies to beautify our corridors.

I'm advocating for my think of corridor, but there's quarters throughout the city of Detroit who has not received attention, and we need help.

Thank you for that.

Thank you, Ms.

Varner.

Next caller, please.

Council President, our next caller is going to be iPhone.

All right, iPhone.

The floor is yours.

You have one minute general public comment.

What is the vacancy rate at Brewster Holmes, which is managed by the Detroit Housing Commission?

I look, I thought I heard somebody tell me they want to tear those down, and they look like they're empty when you drive through.

Not very many people are still there.

That's public housing Detroit Housing Commission.

They tore down Brewster projects to put that up now.

They want to tear that down, I think, to put something else up.

Uh if you have Intel housing, please have a zigzag with the current housing on each side and set it toward the back of the lot as much as possible so that you don't get within 10 feet.

You're supposed to have 10 feet of drainage for a basement and five feet for um crawl space.

And uh you need to set make sure that you build those with that foundation for a second floor, and they can add it later.

Uh and I just call me harmlessness.

If you need to prevent it because people don't come off of it very easily.

Thank you.

Next caller, please.

All right.

Our next caller is William Davis.

Mr.

William M.

Davis, the floor is yours.

You have one minute general public comment.

Hello, can I be heard?

Yes, sir.

Okay, first off, uh, on Greenfield between uh is actually between Greenfield, uh Grand River and McNichols.

There are a whole lot of apartments close down by uh vacant apartments down by McNichols.

Uh secondly, I think it needs to be a study on how many uh people are actually homeless in this city.

I think the numbers are much higher than what they project them to be, and it would be hello.

Can you hear me?

Yes, sir.

Okay, I think that our that can talk with our overall population.

We need to know who's here and where they are.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next caller, please.

Our next caller is owner paper.

All right, caller, the floor is yours.

You have one minute general public comment.

Good afternoon.

May I be heard?

Yes.

Thank you.

I would have I would have I'd had some interesting questions for the HRD person.

Um, I would like to know why are we listed as non-compliance and income verification?

If you have AMI, the entire program is based on income.

So how could you be a non-compliance of income verification unless corruption had been going on?

And my it's very interesting how black folks or negroes get programs while other folks get money.

Every time I turn around, you have a new program.

She has programs, she hasn't done anything to affect the problem.

Do you know that Detroit tore down the size of Flint in terms of housing?

And and now you want to talk about you know what you what you want to do now.

And Mr.

Mc why do why don't they want to go to Joy Road?

We we pay taxes too, and we want to make our quarter look better as well.

Um you're not saying anything, but I want them to go all the way to Joy Road.

I'm tired of the way my my neighborhood looks as much taxes as I've been paying.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next call, please, Council President.

Our final caller caller is Marguerite Maddox and Scarlet, and only one caller raised their hand after the cutoff.

Thank you.

Miss Marguerite Mannox Scarlet.

The floor is yours.

General public comment.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

Um the same amount you make sense that the house and the putting and the street and be ready.

Let's see.

And with the sex the uh no.

I am going to teach you that okay.

I did not know that I need a book.

I say 15 I mean, and you can do it.

I'm here and can't get my first J E L A O D and My Sivity had gotten wishing.

Every single then my disability had gotten worse but I get it we may not know what the future may hold with the workers' dollars of the edit I got recruitment that we up many later and people need to realize that someday that they can wish that the city would upgrade the house the accountment the condoms what every living situation that we pick them keep we're gang thank you thank you and it takes us to the end of our public comments uh Mr.

Coley I think you probably told us what you wanted us to know and we appreciate that and we will uh begin again tomorrow at 10 a.m.

colleagues where we have uh believe four uh budget hearings uh tomorrow starting at 10 a.m.

There's no objection this meeting so stand adjourned.

This meeting is adjourned.