All right, well, let's call to order the public works committee of March 10th at 4 p.m.

We'll start with the pledge.

And to the Republic for Nation.

Liberty and Justice.

And feel free to take your coat off because we've got the sauna on inside this room today.

So our first agenda item is to start with a review of the housing work plan.

And Claire, can we pull that up?

It has taken me, us a while to get our first draft together because, as you know, there's a lot of layers to this onion.

So we're working our way through it, and I would ask that you view the document as a work in progress.

This is what we think we're doing as of today, and we may have to amend it as we delve into the topic.

And so our plan from a macro standpoint, and it's divided into phases, and I encourage you to read those phases, but we'll start with a policy discussion, and the policy discussion will involve by the way, which will start today with thanks to my colleagues.

So I all that is on the table for discussion as we as it relates to that.

And there'll be similar uh spirited conversations about rental licensing and other aspects of these programs.

But we're going to start with that, and then we'll move in and talk about specific types of housing and the barriers that we're experiencing as it relates to having that housing built.

And so it's a heavier lift, again, as everybody here is aware, uh, as the uh AMI percents go down.

So um so just to let you know that the task ahead from a from a uh a work plan.

And again, as we get into it, I we can expect to have amendments and and changes to that.

So but that's that's my tee up, and I'll ask for my colleagues to offer comments.

So Councilmember Hempel Randy.

Well, one of the things that has been on my mind is to keep in our minds the long-term feasibility of whatever it is that we come up with.

So one of the challenges in housing, as you all know, is housing for homeowners is one of their biggest assets.

And so, in order that for that to be an asset, it has to outpace inflation, whereas wages are not necessarily keeping up with inflation.

And so we're gonna have a larger and larger gap between incomes and housing over time, unless we have uh spectacular crash, which I don't know.

So as we're thinking through housing plans, um I would like to think about the immediate need because it's it's urgent for a lot of families, but also be thinking about the long-term need, how this gap is going to get bigger and bigger unless there's some dramatic, like I said, some dramatic market corrections.

Um there are people who know a lot more about that than I do.

Uh so I don't I don't know where else to begin with.

Um that's with our plan here.

Thank you.

Councilmember Shockerford.

Thank you, uh Chairman Brown, um, Councilmember Ronnie uh Hemple Rani, my apologies.

Um of course, no, you know, Councilmember Brown, we've had some extensive conversations around these, so um I'm um glad that we have some uh preliminary timelines.

Of course, they're fluid because of um our conversations also in terms of our policy initiatives also uh in terms of um what happens with the with the market as well and also crises are in it, but I think this is this is a good plan for us, and it also makes the um public and also our advocates um aware of where we are in these respective um categories, and so they can participate and of course not only participate but be a big part of what we're trying to do.

It's it's interesting because uh I don't know if government does a great job of building houses, one, two of also maintaining them.

So it's important that we have our advocates in those um organizations and entities who who do this for for a living or do this in terms of this is what they do.

I think it's so important.

One of the things I always say, particularly from a government perspective, is government should not try to do everything.

Um but what it can do, it can lead.

So what we can do is we can provide the leadership support.

Also we have access to resources that some of our uh partners may not have, and so I think it's important for us as we talk about particularly from a financial aspect and also the resource we have through other means and other channels that is important that we use this in partnerships and also use these uh wisely because we know particularly in this time frame that resources um may be scarce, unfortunately.

So it's important that we get the most bang for particularly for our buck a term would be in terms particularly from our financial resources.

I think it's so important in this time frame that we really engage with our partners and really be supportive of the work that they're trying to do.

Great, thank you.

Uh and I would invite again anybody who is watching this after the fact uh if you have a question, a comment, or a concern about the work plan to please let council know because we can certainly incorporate those ideas and suggestions and feedback in the document as we go forward.

With that being said, is there anybody from the public today who would like to comment on the work plan?

All right.

Well, thank you very much.

Let's move on to our second agenda item.

Uh and that is an overview of moderately priced dwelling units, rental licensing, and payment in lieu of taxes programs.

And I appreciate the health and excuse me, the health and housing team being with us today.

Yes, good afternoon.

Uh Stuart Campbell, I'm the director of the Department of Housing and Human Services.

And let me apologize in advance.

I'm gonna let Jody do most of the talking.

I've got uh throat issues.

I don't know if it's allergies or cold or what.

Um but we're uh delighted to be able to talk about these three programs.

I think they are important programs that will help us uh facilitate and um lead as Councilman Shackleford has said.

And he's right, I don't think government should be in the role of building, but facilitating, incentivizing, leading, those are the types of things uh that we can do, and these programs I think really support us in doing that.

So I'm gonna turn it over to introduce yourself.

Good afternoon.

The training wheels are off, I guess.

Um Jody Ostage Housing Policy Advisor for the City of Frederick.

Thank you for your time this afternoon.

First thing we're gonna talk about is the MPDU ordinance.

So you may know that we have a city housing fund, and when um developers do not build the MPDUs, we actually take that payment in loom, put it into the city housing fund.

And so they are required to build 12.5 percent of the units that they are building, anything that is over 25 units, they have to build 12 and a half percent that are moderately priced.

And that would hit the pardon me, the 70 to 90 percent AMI for that if they build them.

Um currently their fee in lieu is $2 per square foot, and that changed in 2023.

I guess that's square feet.

Uh 2023.

Um, like we said, it's paid into the fund, and currently there is uh $4.5 million in that fund.

Yes, ma'am.

What is AMI at this moment?

Like what is the the numerical value?

So it depends on the number of the size of the family.

Um so there's a whole calculation.

We can get you the chart for for for it.

Um that will show you.

I I know that I've seen the chart, but I just don't have not committed it to memory.

So I'm just saying, nor have I, to be honest.

There's a lot of numbers on it.

And would you prefer questions at the end or as we go?

I'm good either way.

Yeah.

Right.

So and and Councilmember Shackleford may know this because you were here, but what what was the logic behind $2 a square foot?

I can give that because that was a sponsor of that legislation.

We what we did was with the county, we looked at um basically our MPDU fund.

There's I think it's like 215, but of course, with development occurring in the city.

We are encouraging that development in the city due to the infrastructure and also deliverable predict master plan.

Um we increased and that and that and that involved uh elected officials, housing advocates, developers, realtors, kind of the whole network of persons who were interested in housing.

And the genesis of that was because ours was 165, they raised theirs to 30,000.

And then of course, now it has us the option in terms of what we use.

We can kind of get in this conversation later because you know there's always the impetus when many people say just build the units.

Well, sometimes we also know our housing needs are run of various subspectrums, and then you also were talking about just building houses.

Now you're talking about electricity, talking about water, you're also talking about other utilities and and and fees along with that.

So part of this was allow the county, it was consistent with the county.

Of course, we're um encouraging development in the city.

And what it allows for us is now developers now really do have the option.

Previously before I could just pay my way out.

The 165, I'll just pay, I'll just pay out.

Now really um they have the option, and not only that, it's based on per square footage.

Previously before, if you had a 3,000 square foot home that was being built, it was 16.5.

1,200 square foot home was 16.5.

Now, if 3,000 square foot home, if you're gonna pay 2,000 square foot, now there's really some finances being generated from that.

So now the option is really clear.

If you're gonna pay, you're gonna pay.

And so now also allows the option to say, you know what, I'll build the 1,500 square or the 1,200 square foot instead of paying to $2,000 square foot.

So it allows us to be in a position for developers now to really have an option of saying we're gonna build, but if not, then it also allows us as a city to have these funds to cover a vast array of housing needs in our in our city.

Great.

All right, that that's helpful.

Very helpful.

Thank you.

Um understanding that the $2 a square foot was the county rate.

No, there's theirs is higher.

There's just higher.

There's higher.

Okay.

There's higher.

And so what our logic for not making it equal or higher than theirs was we would.

Because we're encouraging the because development is occurring in the city and infrastructure, then you start talking about taxes and fees.

Remember city county, city residents are county residents, which means we do pay county taxes.

And so it's kind of like we are already paying twice, and so there's no need to place a heavy uh extra heavy burden on city taxpayers as well.

Okay, thank you.

And uh what about the and again, I I don't know this, but what about the 12 and a half percent?

Why not 10 percent, why not 20 percent?

Well, well, that was just consistent.

I mean, that's just that was just consistent.

There was no need kind of to change to change that.

And that was, and like I said, there was a you know, amazing enough about this and it and the square footage um incorporated it, like I said, a number of different um aspects from um I use the word partnership, like I said, from elected officials to housing advocates to realtors to developers, and believe it or not, everyone kind of came through this agreement and no one felt as though as though someone was getting over on another entity.

Great.

All right.

And if I can add um when I uh so it sounds like, oh, 2023, it that's three years, so it must be producing one way or the other, but um multifamily developments and single-family developments take literally years from I think nine years from start to finish is what some of the developers have said.

So we don't yet know how much of an impact that you laws a square foot is having.

Um I think a valid discussion would be should we increase it, you know, things like that.

Those are conversations, but at the moment we just don't really have a great sense on whether or not it's worked.

I think that to Director Campbell, I think there is a small sample size of that because when we the legislation was passed, of course it was what was the permit, and then we had to change that because what was already allowed, we then had to kind of let that kind of funnel through.

But from what I'm understanding, there is a small sample size in terms of where to get the the funding statistical analysis.

This has been um very helpful from that standpoint.

Uh because I think in the it would be interesting to see in the 4.5 million dollars since this legislation, how much does that also has been has been paid?

Because I think at some point, if I'm not mistaken, it was we might have got $3 million since this let's say since 2023.

If I'm not mistaken, we because we we allocated some money towards Litech projects.

Right.

And I think it was down to one and a half, 1.5 million dollars.

So we have 4.5, so it may be $3 million since 2023.

You can sure.

She has uh yeah, I have some of the projects, but the dollar figures, if you want to talk about that, if we'll get to that slide, I'll give that to you.

But but just to check, it it's any site plan.

I'm I'm not sure that's the right term, but it any site plan that was approved before 2023 is the priority.

Grandfather, basically.

And what do we know what that was?

Oh, it was a fixed rate.

Yeah, fixed rate, 65, 16,500.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

All right, back back to you, Judy.

Did I go too far?

Okay, good.

So there are eligible activities, and this is per the ordinance.

There are 10 eligible activities, and they are um there's room and flexibility within these activities.

I will say that the ones that we use most often, I won't read all 10 of them to you, um, are in the second column to provide grants for the modification to promote accessibility, uh, to address health and safety issues and gap financing for affordable developments are currently what we do most often.

Uh Councilman Shackleford, this will get to your question.

So um just a little history, this ordinance was put into place in 2014, uh and I have some data from back at that time, and how much revenue has been coming in.

And um the revenue has been fairly consistent, but again, remember these are grandfather projects, right?

Um so in 2022, 2.7 was taken in, and 23 uh 2.1.

Uh so over the lifespan of this, uh we've taken in 9.7 million.

Okay.

And over the same period, we have spent 4.9.

And the vast majority are on this screen.

We're in 2024.

The biggest year we gave out money, um, MPDU money was 2024, and some of those projects are up here, like the junction, uh, like Madison, um, redevelopment of Lucas Village housing needs assessment, all that.

So that's where a lot of the money went.

Before I move on to rental licensing, are there other questions about MPDU?

I I'll come back because I'll it probably all ties together my questions, line of questions prior all ties into all of these together.

So thank you.

So rental licensing was adopted in 2022.

It was effective in 2023.

Okay.

When effective.

And so per the statute, uh, as of last night's presentation, Councilman Breamy will remember that.

The director of public works is in charge of uh putting it into place and um in charge of the registrations, the code enforcement, the collection of all of that.

And then um the statute allows for the special funds administration to be directed by our department.

And currently there are 1.3 million in funds in this department.

Or I'm sorry, in this fund.

This ordinance allowed for the operating cost for the Department of Public Works to just kind of be taken off the top, basically.

And then the remaining funds were divided 50-50 between the rental assistance fund and the affordable housing conservation fund.

And so you're gonna hear from our partner and friends Habitat here about their experience with the rental assistance.

I'm sorry, with the Affordable Housing Conservation Fund, and then our friend Nick Brown is here too.

I talked to him today about rental assistance.

So as far as I know as of today, kind of going back to last night's conversation that both of these organizations received their funding late in the year and still have funding available to carry out the duties that they were given, and they actually have until December 31st to spend the funding they were provided.

And that was intentional.

Um normally I would give a year for funds to be expended, but because of how long it did take to get through what I loosely call a process.

I mean, there really isn't one, and that's a that's a challenge that we're working on now.

Um I extended it to December 31st just so that they would have ample time to fully expend the funds.

Of 2026.

26, thank you.

So we allocated these funds, I think in June or July.

It was it was yes.

The council voted in June or July, I don't remember exactly what month.

And then we had some back and forth.

Um so one of the challenges is that there isn't a formal request for proposals.

And um it uh it meant that we got some information that what really wasn't what we needed to fully understand what they were going to do.

And you know my grants administration background.

Um I I really want to be black and white in terms of what okay, what am I going to do with this money?

Uh it's public funds, I want to make sure that they are spent appropriately.

I have no reason to think they wouldn't be, but it's just in my DNA.

So um we went back and forth um and got essentially a budget and proposal that was um very structured, and then at that point I was able to work forward.

And at the same time, if I can say this, I was very new and it was me.

And um I didn't have a uh director of housing, and so um I was also learning the system, how to get a grant through the city, how to you know make sure payments are made, all that kind of thing.

And so it did take uh longer than any one of us would have liked, and that was why I wanted to make sure they had ample time to fully expend the funds.

I didn't want them to feel like, okay, you gave this in December, now uh it ends in June.

That you know that's not fair.

That 1.3 million dollars is accumulated over the couple of years or one year.

I didn't watch yesterday's presentation from the rental license and registration.

We just started our third year.

Third year, okay.

And 1.3 million dollars is now left in the fund.

Correct.

Okay.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Um has the that fund, like are when you say rental assistance, like are individuals or individual families contacting your office, or are you distributing funds to partners?

We we distribute funds to partners and beyond shelter is the partner right now.

Um at the end of the day, I I want to make this again from because of my background, a competitive process.

I want people to submit an application, um talk about what they're gonna do, give me a budget, show me are there any matching funds, not that you know they may or may not be required.

I don't know.

That's don't panic, gentlemen.

Um so that there will be an actual process, and then it you know, could be others.

Um the statute just tells us basically these two things.

This is what you can spend the money on.

It doesn't tell us how.

That's left to the department, and we haven't done a great job historically in actually getting that plan together.

And so one of the first things I talked to Jody about was both MPDU and the rental licensing fund.

We need to have structure around it.

We need to be able to say, so I mean it's fair to everybody.

Anybody who is interested can see on the website, okay, this is how I apply.

This is what they need.

And so that we can have a process that will then get the money out faster.

And I appreciate that because I know initially, of course, for a kind of a history lesson where we advocated for this department.

One of the things was, of course, about the housing aspect and have someone Jodi Gladio on board is someone who kind of had a policy background with housing in terms of just not only just in terms of how do we shape policy and formulate policy, of course, from this diocese, but also someone in who is in the day-to-day has that policy background and that knowledge and that kind of the expertise to kind of also inform us as we kind of shape policy and support policy.

Um because previously, before as you well know, when you entered into it, it was sort of like the director was trying to do all of that.

Yes.

So now of course we now have a somewhat specifically who housing is a specific area that a focus and not yourself trying to manage a whole department.

And of course, we know the great need of housing, and now you trying to do all of that in your department, which it was a little overwhelming.

But I am so excited to have Jody here.

Yes.

I tell her that often.

I'm excited to be here.

Thank you.

Yeah, and I just wanted to tell you specifically your question about partners.

I did get some figures today from Nick at Beyond Shelter, and so far out of their $263,000 distribution, they've spent roughly $60,000, and they have served 34 households in that time.

Um that's about sixteen hundred dollars per household that they've served so far.

And along with it, I'm glad um Director Campbell, you mentioned particularly around a uh formal application process.

One that we talked about, we talked about the green need in our community and I know previous the previous council, since beyond shelter already had the apparatus.

They were already kind of um respected in the field and they they had that area kind of focus, a focus.

We thought it was only appropriate in terms of starting kind of a pilot to see how this goes.

Yeah, absolutely.

And and I want to be clear, I don't want to, you know, if someone does all they do is is I don't know, pick something, uh, run a food bank, and then they say I want to do rental assistance, that I need experience.

I need to see that they have a history, that they have the ability.

And you're right.

Uh uh, you know, both Habitat and Beyond Shelter have a really strong apparatus in place.

It made total sense at the time, and uh I mean they'll probably be very, very competitive because of that.

So um but I just want to be fair.

Well you might have mentioned this, but how much was allocated for affordable housing conservation?

Uh 150,000.

Okay, great.

And I know they're going to give you the update.

And um, you've spent about 35, 40 percent of that.

Along with that, I know I know um Director Brownson from the um Beyond Shelter.

I think one of the things we also talk about property information is the money we allocated goes just to city residents.

Yes.

Yes, yes.

I just want to be clear about that.

I think that's important for us to make note of.

Right.

Absolutely.

Correct.

Okay.

Can we go on and talk about pilot then?

Payment in lieu of I'm sorry, yeah, payment in lieu of taxes, which is kind of a weird name for for this ordinance.

But it was originally created in 1991, and it was amended in 2014 and 2024.

So this is basically to give affordable developments a form of tax abatement or discounted taxes on what they're building.

And the 2024 amendment kind of separated us from what the county does.

So previously the 2014 hooked us to the county, so whatever the county does, we would do.

The 24 separated us to give us a little more flexibility and how we would um the decision making that we could do with that.

But of course, we do always uh work with our county counterparts, especially for, as you said, uh Councilman Shackleford, city residents are also county residents.

So the term of the tax abatement is pretty much follows regulatory agreements with CDA, DHCD, or any sort of county deferred loan program, or even the housing tax credit agreement.

I believe there's flexibility and how we decide to or what we decide to tie that to and for how long, but it could be tied to the initial affordability period, which would be 15 years, or it could be tied potentially to an extended affordability period, which would be 30 to 40 years.

So I don't know that there's really consistency about that in maybe what we've done in the past.

It is recorded as a lien.

It is a subordinated lien against the development.

And currently the max waiver is 468.59 cents per unit.

And I don't know if you may actually be saying this in the next slide, but um this does come to the council for final approval.

It's not something that's determined in-house, so any agreement has to have the blessing of of the council.

Does this have a 25 unit or higher criteria as well?

Please say again.

Does it have a uh uh number of units criteria, or could it be for a building with 10 units, or does it have to be more than 25 units?

No.

There's no per unit requirement.

No per unit, okay.

So uh wouldn't you say that it's recorded as a lien in the land records?

Is there a stipulation that uh it it can't be sold at market value for so much time, or like how is that a lien rather than um a grant, let's say?

Yeah.

That's why it's tied to other agreements that they have for the development, okay.

So typically there's going to be um how do I say a stack of financing that's related to a development, and there's an order in which those liens uh take precedence.

Okay.

So this is going to be a subordinated lien against that project.

But it's um like if they failed to hold up to what they said they would do, then we have recourse essentially.

And is there a definition here of low to moderate income in terms of AMI?

At the very agreement to reduce taxes on low to moderate income.

You know?

I'm trying to remember if it's in the statute, but from our perspective, it's usually low is um well, I mean, yeah.

So this is usually going to be a 40 to 60 percent project, typically.

But I I agree, I don't think it's recorded in the statute of what it needs to be.

Um I'm sorry, go ahead.

No, I uh uh I apologize for interrupting you, but um this is also something that doesn't have a real formal process.

The developer at this point calls and says, hey, I'm interested in this, and you have sort of a discussion and a negotiation.

Um the county typically goes first, and then they do theirs, and then they let us know what the decision is, and then we take take theirs and basically put it in into our uh agreement.

And um the the 468 is it higher or lower than the counties I think it's it's higher, it's tied to the tax rate.

Um so um we then take that and legal writes it up and then it's submitted to council for approval.

But there yeah, there is no application process.

There's no I mean it's it is to be clear, it is a binding legal document.

So at the end of the day, I'm not worried about the about that.

It's just my um OCD side, I guess, wants there to be a process that everybody because some people call them, they're like, I uh so-and-so told me to call you about a pilot.

I'm like, oh yeah, okay, well, let me talk to you about that.

Um pilots have historically or always originated with a request to the county, and then somebody calls the city?

So they so when they call the city, what we usually do is explain ours, but then we say you definitely want to talk to the county, um, and then they kind of have the negotiation first and then it comes to us.

And so do all pro I'm using that word intentionally, all projects have two pilots, one county, one city?

Yeah.

Potentially, yes.

We could decide not to, but yes, right.

And so if the counties was $200 to make the math easy, then the total tax discount would be $668.59 cents max or something.

Is that correct?

Yes.

Okay.

Yes.

Per unit.

And so this is one of the tools in our toolbox, and we know this needs to be fully developed, like uh Director Stewart said, right now, people just call us willy-nilly and ask questions.

But this really is part of a developer incentive and how we can put that into a toolkit.

And even the moderately priced dwelling unit money, the City Housing Fund is part of that.

So figuring out how we want what we have available to incentivize developers, while at the same time the city gets what it needs, as far as the deeper rent targeting and things like that.

So if it doesn't come out of the task force, that is going to be something that we are having conversations about about how to I have ideas that I don't want to say what they are because I don't know if they'll come to be.

But you know, like really figuring out how we can incentivize deeper targeting on rents, even within affordable developments.

Yeah, and we we often get calls from uh parties interested in building in Frederick.

And so, you know, either Jody or I talk about what it what we exist you know have it in existence.

But I would love to be able to have a much more formal, like a presentation, this is why you want to build here, look at these incentives, how is an application, that kind of thing.

Uh and I think we'll get there.

It's you know, it's just not where we are now.

And I assume, which is risky, but that this is represents just lost revenue to the city.

Funds aren't being transferred from some other fund like MPDU dollars back to some other department to make up for the name is misleading, because there is no other payment in lieu.

Um it is basically less you pay less taxes.

But it is an incentive.

And they you know, they bring economic benefit to the city, um, you know, they still pay impact fees, all of those kind of things.

And you know new residents and things like that.

Um but it is just a tool to incentivize building here.

And I want to say just having past experience being a developer and an owner operator, this is critical to the long-term uh financial viability of a project.

If this were not in place, we would really struggle to get these types of projects because the margins are just already really narrow on them.

So when you go through the first 15-year pro forma that they put out there, um they might not exist if we didn't have this in our toolkit.

Do you have another?

You absolutely answered the question I was going to ask.

So I was going to ask about how effective this is in attracting developers and uh you you beat me to the punch, so uh just one, and you'll hear this again, but as we walk through these different policy discussions and financial discussions, um the public works committee will be interested in hearing your thoughts on what we could do to make these programs better.

And as an example, no answer required today, is in order for this pilot to help support 30 percent AMI units, what change would we need to make?

Would we need to make that tax credit $600 a unit?

Again, no I realize it takes more, but but I think you make a good point.

When you so in order to get lower um AMI, you need they need to be paying less money to build and operate it, right?

So any way we can reduce that can incentivize lowering uh AMI.

Or maybe even just lowering it for the units that have lower rents, not the whole project.

Right, right.

Something like that.

Yeah, exactly.

Are these only for rental units, or are there also below market value uh properties that people could purchase and build wealth?

That's a really good question.

It has not traditionally been used that way, right?

Because when people purchase, they're pretty much responsible for the taxes, right?

On what they purchase.

But our friends here have a land trust that helps so they can tell you all about that.

But traditionally this has not been used for that.

Great.

All right, thank you.

That's the end of our presentation.

All right.

No more questions?

Oh, yeah, questions.

So I know previously before one of the things we talked about, particularly now we have a housing director, and we had these funds in terms of allocation was specificity in terms of how they be spent.

Uh I think if I looked at one present, I know Stuart, we be um Director Campbell, you can't be forced previously.

There was this long laundry list of trying to how do we now use these MPDU funds in in particular.

And I know we talked about kind of um narrowing the scope, or do we broaden the scope or what is that kind of can you kind of talk me through that or talk us through that?

Yeah.

So if you go back um the list of the two columns, um there are a number on here that are actually duplicative of existing Federal or State programs.

Um one I point out is the promote energy efficiency and conservation.

There there is the weatherization program, which is a Federal program.

The State has a special loans program.

Um they uh award through us.

Um we're a past through agency, we go out to folks to help weatherize their homes.

Um there are um I hadn't I it's been a minute since I've thought about this, but to provide home buyer education, delinquency and default counseling.

We have an entire home uh you know housing counseling program.

So those are things that I would certainly encourage the council to look at.

You know, do we need to add something in here or do we want to kind of focus um I I like that.

I mean what I was gonna say was offer us offer some recommendations, similar to what you just said.

Some of what you just talked about some of the overlapping um sources.

Can you make recommendations in regards to this in that way that help us because you you know particularly what what are being sums are being double up.

I would be happy to.

Yeah.

And I think that would be a great facilitate our discussion.

And like I said, I think the part for me, and I think the other question is, and you know we we have I think it's gonna be a further conversation.

We we oftentimes hear, particularly from an MTU, the fund is why don't you just build the houses?

Just build them, don't accept any, don't have any fund or have anybody to pay buy their way out, pay their way.

Offer some perspective on that, because I think sometimes that gets lost in Sure.

Well, as Jody mentioned earlier, we we have awarded over half of the funds already, and those funds have helped create affordable housing.

Um the um a lot of LITEC properties development here, they they need a little extra money to close the gap that they have.

And so if we're able to provide that, then they build 200 units, whatever.

Um if we didn't have an MPDU fund, either we would have to get those that money somewhere else, or we would not be able to do it.

All I would add to that is um remember that the requirement for them is that they build those for 70 through 90 percent AMI.

This is how it translates to the lower AMI.

Exactly.

And the deeper targeting on the AMI.

No, I think that's important, particularly from our public, like I say, we oftentimes hear just to build the units.

So if you build 20 units, 30 units, that that of course that we talk about home ownership, which is a kind of a different conversation, but yet we now are not able to have 200 units, the 150 units, or we have 10 housing houses that are built people can move into, but that's still we're now leaving 300, 400 people out sometimes, and and that doesn't help.

Although home ownership is a separate kind of a separate it's kind of a separate conversation, if it is relevant, of course, but it's also a lot of different things.

I just think it's a nuanced conversation, right?

Like we don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, like we don't want to get rid of this entirely or have everybody build them because then like you said, we'd be cutting out a fairly large group of folks.

And you know, the fact of the matter is the housing study showed we need all kinds of housing.

We need any kind of housing really.

We just need to to create housing.

Well, I uh I pardon me asking a question, so everybody knows why I stand.

Any other questions?

Well, rental rental license, I know we previously before, of course, when the legislation was passed initially, um the fund was created that for persons who may be in displaced because of you know something wrong with their occupancy and yeah.

And so I know y'all got the report yesterday in terms of that problem was not as widespread as we thought it was.

And so now we had to make some some arrangements in terms of now using these funding, this funds.

And so I guess the other piece of this is 1.3 million dollars is, and now of course we have not had the other for this upcoming year also in terms of what that what that rate would be or that uh that the amount would be.

And part of my concern is similar with the MPDU fund.

We accumulated all this all these money, all this resources, and it just sat there, and there was a great need.

We recognize the needs in our community, and it just sat there.

And that doesn't bode well from a public perspective that we have money that we are allocating as a government entity and not utilizing not getting that back out to help our residents.

So I really want to, you know, I guess from our perspective, emphasize the need for us, not only you, but I think for us as a as a body to um to ensure that those resources are being allocated and used wisely.

It is a delicate balance because you have to make sure you are still getting enough money to replenish what you have put out, right?

Because we could spend it all in one year, but then next year we won't have any funds.

And you know, that means the developer will move go to Montgomery County or wherever.

Um it does need to be a balance.

We do need to be consistently expending the funds.

Um we just need to figure out what that number looks like, and it could be tied to that year's revenue projections.

You know, there's a number of ways you can do it.

Um we just don't want to spend all the money in one go and then not have anything for the future.

And then we also talked about percentages in terms of that percentage of the money being being utilized as well.

And then we could look at in terms of the revenue generating source in terms of the projections of course our projections, but that also allows us the opportunity to summon what you said not to use all the funds in one year and then the next year, and all of a sudden we are you know we're in a bind.

I don't want to use the word bind, but now all of a sudden, you know, we didn't able to allocate the resource like we the need is in our community.

I just wanted to speak directly to your comment regarding about people affected by the code enforcement.

Um my friend Mr.

Brown back here did provide me with this information that they have helped one household uh that was uh impacted by a code inspection failure with the money uh dollar amounts I gave you earlier.

And from their budget, I brought their budget for their grant, and they had set aside $10,000 for that for the year.

Thank you.

Building on Councilmember Shackel for his comments, I and again, this is aspirational, but it in addition to a projection of what income we thought would be coming in for the following year, if there was a project that we knew was going to take four million dollars, I don't think there would be a problem reporting to council and the public, hey, we're going to reserve a million dollars or 1.5 million dollars for that project that we are pretty sure is going to take place next year.

It is a question of sitting there with no application plan for it.

Oh, absolutely.

No, I 100 percent agree.

I mean, we do need to get the money out for it its intended purpose.

Uh you will not get any argument from either Jody or I on that.

So and then also building on Council Member Shakerford's comment.

We are looking to you to give us your suggestions on not only policies but amounts and even I think bigger picture issues such as with the total package for uh again, I'm gonna go back to 30 percent because I am told by experts that that is a big gap right now in the U.S.

Absolutely.

So but to spark 30 percent, do we help buy the land?

Do we help with financing?

Do we pay APFOs out of MPDU fees?

Do we offer the tax rate?

What would your recommendation be on the combination that would be a lure to help that kind of do we waive impact fees?

But only for projects that go really really low?

Exactly.

And if yeah, you you have read all five chapters.

I haven't cracked the book yet.

So yes, that kind of knowledge is the type of stuff that we're gonna need in order to say, yeah, that makes sense, or hey, let's tweak this or something else.

So thank you.

And I don't know initially uh um when I kind of start when I was um previously I gathered, well, Rachel is not here, but Zach, and we talked about our MPDU fund being part of helping projects maybe possibly waive an impact fees and quote unquote paying our paying the city back.

So allow projects to move forward quicker.

Because sometimes with impact fees, there's delays in terms of how you pay those fees, and then of course, when it comes into play, and there were some projects, I don't know, habitat may have been at the table with one of those conversations, um, that in essence to help projects get across the finished honor move through the pipeline quicker, waive the impact fees in the city then quote unquote reimburses.

I think it's something we could talk about.

Yeah, something that I'd have to think through that and understand the timeline stuff.

Yeah, yeah.

I think that's conversation.

So just as a reminder, our our focus is going to be after this introduction, and we have some other preliminary work to do, we are going to come back for a deep dive on the rental database and on rental licensing fees, how we're spending them and what we want to do with that.

And that's mid-April.

So we're looking for that kind of expertise on just rental licensing, and then we'll follow up with pilot and MPDUs later.

So but just you know, we're going to take them one at a time.

Okay.

Good.

I'd like to ask a kind of in the weeds question, and you can tell me if, hey, we're going to talk about that later.

But as I'm looking at the these two columns that are up on the screen right now, uh the to provide grants for the modification of MPDUs to promote accessibility.

So we know that a lot of people who are on disability or on SSDI are people who would likely qualify for these programs.

And are we, or do we have any mechanisms to build in already accessible units to serve that population?

So rather than modifying an existing unit is to require, you know, a certain percentage of the cost appropriate or affordable units be accessible.

That's a really good question.

And that does already happen.

Sometimes units are created for mobility.

Sometimes they're created for hearing loss or blindness as well.

So yes, there are ways to build those within developments.

How do we initiate that?

Or is that something that's done by the developer?

Is that something we require or how does that happen?

Yeah.

So because people approach us right now and we're not necessarily driving.

Right.

Like we're responding, we're not putting that out in the front.

They're deciding that and really the funding that they get, we call it a funding stack.

Okay.

So that funding stack that they get determines the unit mix.

So if they don't pursue funding for those kind of units, we don't have them.

I at some future date, I would love to see some data on what kind of units we have and like what the need might be.

You know, we have a large deaf community in Frederick, and it would be great if we were cognizant of that need and being proactive about it.

For sure.

Absolutely.

Anyone?

Well, many thanks for your patience and your education and your time in prepping this.

Any time.

Thanks.

Our next presentation is by Habitat for Humanity.

Good afternoon.

Eric Anderson, I'm the executive director for Habitat for Humanity of Frederick County, and with me I have a Hi, I'm Coralin Wells.

I'm the family services coordinator at Habitat for Humanity.

So just on behalf of Habitat, just want to say thank you, Councilmember Brahm, Councilmember Hempel O'Rane, Councilmember Shacklford for just taking the time to evaluate to hear feedback to help shape a more efficient and successful and hopefully sustainable process in regard to the rental licensing fee usage.

And sort of before we get into how we've used that and some of the uh successes as well as some of the suggestions that we have, just wanted to give a quick overview on habitat and and what we do.

Habitat is focused exclusively on affordable homeownership.

So that doesn't preclude us from working with another developer on uh a rental project.

It's just that the homeownership piece uh is what we are focused on.

Um we assist prospective home buyers.

Excuse me.

We assist prospective home buyers in securing a traditional mortgage.

Uh one of the best examples of this right now is our West All Saints project uh at the corner of West All Saints and Ice Streets, uh, which will eventually become uh twelve condos that are part of a community land trust so that it stays affordable in perpetuity.

Um the buyers there earn between 50 to 80 percent of the AMI uh typically uh you get a glimpse here in the photo of uh actually one of those uh one of those condos there at West All Saints one.

You mentioned can you walk through I think it would be good what it means by and perpetuity.

Sure.

So with a community land trust, the um we're building homes or in this case rehabbing homes, and so when we get a qualified buyer, the buyer is basically purchasing the home, but the home is on it's part of a ground lease, so they'll pay you know it at West All Saints.

So with that, um we uh we have got four remaining units in phase one, uh all inclusive.

It's about an estimated monthly payment of about $1,500, which we think is very reasonable uh compared to to rent.

And then we also have a new home thanks to the uh um the bequest of uh someone who recently passed uh a new home in the in the city.

It will be a single family home uh that we are looking forward to also uh having as part of the land trust uh and versus a condo may offer the possibility of uh you know the uh a larger family living there.

So the home builds is what habitat is typically known for, but habitat uh habitats across the country definitely here in Frederick have grown their home repairs programs extensively.

Uh it's no cost repairs for homeowners that are earning below 80 percent of the AMI.

Uh what you'll find from Quoralin here shortly is that most of those that we provide home repairs for are well, well below that 80 percent.

Uh there are repairs that pertain to safety and structure and security.

Uh so it's not uh um cosmetic modifications, it has to be you know uh a safety or or a danger uh in that home uh or an accessibility improvement.

Uh so a lot of aging in place modifications.

Uh and what this really does, there's a lot of talk about creating inventory that's affordable housing.

But the when this uh fund, the Affordable Housing Conservation Fund first was brought to our attention through the rental licensing funds.

This is one of the first things that we we thought was that is the opportunity to conserve affordable housing that already exists.

So to talk about the progress of the program, particularly related to the rental licensing funds.

I'm going to turn this over to Coralin.

Thank you.

Um can I have the clicker when you have a second?

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Yeah, so our experience applying for the RFI, there were several things that worked extremely well, and then there were also some opportunities we feel that could be improved.

Um firstly, the city staff communicated the eligibility of the funds very clearly.

We knew um from the start that we would be eligible for the housing um preservation funds.

Um the online portal was also accessible and user-friendly.

Um it was a fillable PDF to submit the RFI, which um we had no problems with that.

And the RFI included clear questions that defined the expectations.

Um as far as opportunities for improvements go, we were very unclear about the amount of available funds.

Um as we heard before, um, there were sort of three pots that that was going to be split into, and then it got turned to two pots, and we uh we just weren't exactly sure of how much we could ask for.

Um additionally, the fund approval cycle um overlapped with the city election as well as some changes in the um housing department, so that created a couple of delays as well.

Um then just to emphasize the RFI was due on the 21st of February 2025.

We attended several follow-up meetings um and then the funds were awarded to us on October 2nd.

However, we did not get those funds in our hands until uh November 24th, which was also the day before Thanksgiving, so that created more timing delays as well.

So just a quick interjection.

Thank you, Director, for your anticipation that it's gonna take more than 30 days to spend these funds and extending it through the next year.

That's that's great.

Thank you.

So to continue on some opportunities to strengthen um an earlier notice of the annual funding allocation would be much appreciated as it would help us um plan programmatically.

We would also appreciate a pre-RFI information session where nonprofits could have the opportunity to ask questions and clarify the expectations, as well as as mentioned before, um what the anticipated funding levels are.

Um additionally a timeline for the funds received and what the um disbursement for those would be.

We would also appreciate to see standardized reporting year after year to ease some of the administrative burden on us.

Um it just makes it easier to know what's expected and what the um council wants to see.

So to speak on the impact that we've had so far in the city, this is just for the funds allocated.

We have spent other dollars from other grants on city projects.

But the total funds we've allocated since I said the receivable of the funds in November, we've allocated about $61,000.

We've completed 10 projects with that.

So the average project costs is about $6,163.

We have also been able to engage our team of dedicated crew leads on eight of those projects, and that really helps us keep costs down.

Obviously, not having to pay a contractor for some of that work makes it more affordable.

It's worth noting in that photo because that photo, it's uh more of a rare outdoor stair lift.

But when we talk about average project cost being $6100, and Corlin will speak to there's projects that are very low cost.

But then from an accessibility perspective, if you have to get into adding a stair lift or in some cases multiple stair lifts or custom uh or tub to shower conversions, it does take the average price of a project up fairly significantly.

And and understanding that there was a delay in the funding showing up in your bank account, do you do you anticipate using close to the $150 by the time we get to the end of the extended period of the process?

Oh, absolutely.

Yeah.

Great.

And so another question, not for today, but another question when we get to it would be in a perfect world, how many dollars, again, all things being equal, would you wish for in order to meet the demand for the projects that you either think anticipate or know exist out there?

But not today, just to keep that okay.

Thank you.

Um, and with the remaining funds from the rental license fees we anticipate to serve about 10 more households.

Um so of the 10 households we've been able to serve so far, that included 16 city residents.

That's anything from a child, a senior, um, a grandson, um, seven seven of those ten households contained a person who has a disability.

Six of those households had a senior or seniors living in them, and then three of those households were also veteran households.

Um, and so as Eric alluded to earlier, our program does serve any homeowner under 80% of the area median income, but most often we see um that people are falling far, far below that.

Um, and then to answer your question earlier, um, the 80% area median income for a household of two is eighty-five thousand four hundred and fifty dollars, but the average household income that we've served with the these funds is thirty-six thousand three hundred and fourteen dollars.

Um, so that's a very dramatic gap.

And do you all prioritize projects based upon AMI or first come, first serve or some combination?

Um, we take the applications as they come, um, but there are some times where we might push something up because it's a bit more of a critical need.

Um, for example, someone needed an HVAC replacement, which I'll talk about in a second.

Um, and so we did bump them up because that was more critical.

Please take take more time.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Ms.

Jackson.

Um so the types of projects we've completed so far um include things like weatherization, which is pretty simple.

That's just weather stripping, replacing storm doors, um, ceiling windows, those are things most often completed by volunteers.

Same with the other minor household repairs like drywall patching and um porch and deck repairs.

Um we have done accessibility modifications like tub-to-shower conversions, we did a custom-made stair lift because curved stair lifts um need to be measured and customized, and it takes quite some time.

Um, but they do make a huge impact on the homeowners.

Um, and as mentioned previously, we did do an HVAC replacement.

Actually, the Wednesday before the big snowstorm in January, we went to a house and it wasn't even on their application for an HVAC repair or replacement, but obviously it was very, very cold in there upon arrival, and so we were able to get Holtz Apple, which has been a great partner to us.

Um, they were out there on Friday, and by midday Friday, the house was already warm again.

So they were able to um you know go through that snowstorm in comfort.

Um and so here's some before and after repairs.

Um, this was done by our volunteers.

This homeowner lives in downtown, and she had a major roof leak um which caused issues into her bathroom, and so another agency in Frederick was actually able to repair the roof for her, and then we were able to uh patch the drywall.

And then again, here um we replaced the old wooden door with a new vinyl door, which will um last in the weather a lot longer.

We also patch some of the screens, or I'm sorry, some of the holes in the screens that way it will prevent debris and um rodents and stuff like that from getting into her home.

Um so some of the unmet needs we are still seeing in the community is that our housing stock is rapidly aging, um, and it's not designed for the people who are aging in it.

Um a lot of the homes in downtown Frederick, especially only have bedrooms and bathrooms on the second level of the home, and that creates a challenge as people are aging.

Um and as we know, fixed income seniors are unable to finance those repairs because you know their household income is like I said, on average about that $36,000 range.

And our average project cost is six thousand dollars, and that would come out to about seven seventeen percent of their income being spent on repairs.

Um especially as a senior, there's health cost concerns, other housing concerns.

Um having to spend 17 percent of your income on just a repair is pretty detrimental.

And so um we feel that partnership with the city matters because it helps keep our vulnerable residents housed.

Um accessibility modifications will keep people in their homes versus institutional care, which is often extremely costly and less dignified than aging in your home that you've been in for decades.

Um it also prevents damage from escalating.

Early interventions can save homeowners from costly repairs down the lines.

We know things like a leak in a roof can turn into mold issues and damage into the bathroom and all sorts of um hazards that we don't want to see happen.

Um it helps to preserve the naturally occurring affordable housing stock that we currently have in the city of Frederick.

Um it will help to reduce the long-term municipal costs by preventing emergency responses, condemnation, and displacement of Frederick residents.

And so I believe this is the last slide, but some of the recommendations we have for the committee would be to maintain or expand the rental licensing allocation for housing preservation.

We would like for you all to continue to prioritize health and safety repairs for eligible homeowners in Frederick.

Um we would really love to see multi-year funding structures.

It would help us uh plan administratively.

Um we would also uh really appreciate to see the continuation of administrative costs built into the um grant.

We like I mentioned earlier, would love to see streamlined reporting processes.

This would ease our administrative burden, and also um we would like to see the reporting requirements align with housing outcomes in the city.

And lastly, we hope to continue um nonprofit partnership engagement and policy development.

So thank you guys for your time.

Thank you.

Council members, any or comments?

Uh yeah, first of all, thank you so much, and thank you for the work that you're doing for the residents in our community.

Uh my question is: how does a homeowner access services?

Is there a form on the website or a hotline or some such thing?

Yeah, um the forum is on our website.

We also have them readily available at the restore.

Anytime someone's coming in to shop, um, we have some at our help counter area.

Um also just getting in touch with me.

I'm happy to mail out applications for people who might not have access to the internet.

Um yeah.

The timing of your question was great because there was uh I believe in the earlier presentation, uh there was uh you alluded to the potential of a wait list.

Uh and our wait list right now is very short for this program.

Uh and so I think that all of the council members recently received some background on the program from the family services team, but that is uh uh we would like nothing more than to spread the word in the community that this resource exists, uh that um there's you know, for for whatever, you know, sometimes people may not reach out because of pride or may not think well, this well, maybe this doesn't apply to me.

Uh we would just like them to reach out and ask the question and uh and so that we can respond from there.

Thank you.

Uh just one.

What what do we build in for administrative costs?

Like 10 percent or 15 percent?

So sorry, we factored in 20 percent for administrative costs.

40 percent.

Okay.

Great.

Uh and then uh just a request.

Uh I don't know if you've got this is the second time I've seen the 10 MPDU things that we could work on.

But if you could take a look at that and when we next visit with one another, let us know which of these 10 you could take on.

Because I look at modification to promote accessibility, and I'm thinking, hmm.

I know somebody who does that already.

So uh in other words, we so that we don't have MPDU dollars and rental assistance dollars competing to do the same thing.

We we can push them apart.

And that way all y'all are experts at the repair part of thing and all y'all are on the building thing.

Yeah, I'm just making that up, but that's kind of philosophically.

So really quick.

I know previously before Eric when we talked about allocating these funds, we were talking about what's the percentage of city requests you receive.

I think we talked about that.

So in like prior to this year, based upon the last three years of data and the four years of data, it was about 36% curlin that was uh city requests versus the remaining 64% or county related requests.

Yeah, we was in the 30s.

That's uh when Yeah.

Thank you.

Other questions?

Great.

Well, thank you also for very helpful background information and tutorial as good news.

So uh just as kind of an extra credit, Nick Brown, did you want to share anything about Beyond Shelter and the rental assistance part of the world?

Thank you for the invitation.

Uh all apologies.

I was clocking this meeting later this month.

So I was just telling Jody this morning, I was like, oh, I'm coming later, and it turns out I was supposed to be here today.

So you know, apologies for that uh miscommunication on my side.

So uh yes, um the rental registration has uh uh funding has been particularly helpful.

Um plus one uh just about everything that Habitat said as far as the process goes, except our trajectory into this uh was a little bit differently as we started uh speaking, I think initially about the MPDU dollars um with the previous director uh as a possible means for rental assistance.

Um through council discussion that was then ruled out as far as an applicable use, and that was um stopped at that point.

So uh we'd had uh few conversations about potential um pivots in the rental assistance using the rental licensing uh with the interim uh leadership, and then that when uh director Campbell came on board was able to solidify that, uh which is appreciated.

Um we have spent just over or just um just about sixty thousand dollars with uh in in one quarter time.

We uh signed the agreement uh similarly in October.

We're funded uh just by December, the beginning of December, and we've pushed since then uh about sixty thousand.

And it has been uh it has been particularly helpful.

Uh we have we're averaging six uh uh sixteen hundred and sixty-nine dollars per household.

Uh one trend that we are seeing, uh we built the program to be able to deal with one of three um ways of of uh just uh distribution.

Either all two arrears, some to arrears, and some to a prospective need, or all to a prospective need.

And what we're seeing is that folks are coming in with three in three months in arrears.

So if we're addressing that, we're not really that they still have a prospective need that we're not yet able to address going forward.

Um so in retrospect, we may look in future agreements to see if they're um uh if there's any uh elongation of that coverage period.

So we we based the numbers that we put in this the original summary on real-time data, and at that point we were looking at three months in arrears.

Excuse me, at about $1,500 is was the average rent that we were seeing, you know, at the time.

So we tried to react to the data as you know as best we can.

Um we've gone it's good.

Sorry, it's gone well as we've uh seen the needs, and the way we produce rental assistance is by as a review of the hardship, uh the review of an income to debt ratio, and we look at sustainability after the fact.

And if we can marry up all of those things, then we can provide whatever that award you know needs to be as as we go.

Uh we have some some needs that are are growing, and I want to um I appreciate the conversation into both um standardizing the process as we go forward and what some of those um you know some of those recommendations are.

Um and this is kind of outside of the rental registration side of things, but we are as a provider not just a um eviction prevention provider, but we're also an emergency shelter provider.

Uh and if I'm ranking one or the other, the emergency shelter funding-wise takes more of uh you know burden than anything else.

Um I've said this in uh meetings and workshops here.

I I'll say it again um I'm sure tomorrow, but um we are in desperate need of something for senior homelessness.

Uh the Linton shelter specifically has become the de facto nursing home for homeless seniors, and there are at any one time a half a dozen or more individuals that are beyond our capability in all reality to to um responsibly house them.

We do because there is nothing else but um any clinical you know space, any other thing that can address their very complex needs that we're seeing.

Um that goes across both mental health and physical health as we go would be wildly appreciated.

So we are looking at ways of uh to to expand our own facilities.

Um and any th any uh focus on that would be would be wildly appreciated.

Um speaking to um something I think that that uh habitat mentioned the the admin draw was appreciated as well to not just say it's a blank percentage of the award that can go to admin, but to recognize that the services are a element or a feature of the service itself and include those costs therein.

That's a big that would that's a um uh uh important distinction to make and one that's uh very appreciated indeed.

Um thing that I wrote down when we're looking at the MPDU usage, uh one of the things that I'd always kind of held in the back of my head as a potential use that that cuts across our spheres is the uh the allowability of um uh funding for special populations and affordable housing.

Uh I I can make an argument that poverty and you know certain households with disabilities are special populations, um, and if that means to secure them in to their homes to keep them from touching the street from touching other providers, um that would be a great look at a use of that that uh that funding.

So I don't have a huge uh presentation cooking because I was not prepared today, but I'm glad to take any questions about how we are operating currently.

Do you have an idea of kind of who how many people you're serving for emergency shelter versus the rental assistance?

And is that program for uh kind of short-term emergencies rather than you know, a lot of uh families who fall on challenging times, you know, it's difficult to resolve that in a few months.

Um I guess so that's a two-part question.

Like, how many people are you serving?

And uh can you describe that rental assistance as far as longevity?

Sure.

Yes.

So the numbers um shelter versus rental assistance.

We generally see um in one uh fiscal year, about 300 different individuals through the emergency shelter, through the specifically just the adult shelter.

Uh we have 88 beds, so it speaks a little bit to the transient nature of you know of homelessness and shelter provision.

Um rental assistance is a tough one, is a little bit of a tougher one to um to land on.

That one can ebb and flow, specifically by the weather, the the time of year, otherwise.

Um we've seen a uh an uptick since the beginning of last year of folks through the door, uh, an exponential increase in utility requests, uh specifically utility requests, um, and rental kind of it it there's no real pattern that we that that that we followed.

So I don't have that number um directly.

I'm sure my uh director of operations is watching and will text it to me by the time I'm done talking, but um I don't have that directly uh with us here.

And certainly get it to you though.

Yes, Director Brown, you mentioned so three months, that's the data you you you've that's the data point in terms of you look at three months in a rear, so that's what you're truly paying.

And just for clarity, I think it's important for you to note that when those um funds are dispersed, they're def they're dispersed, not to the individual, but to the 100 percent.

Yes.

Um all of our funds.

Other there was a federal allotment back with the COVID funding, but all of our dollars go directly to the landlord.

Um there are some cases where our accounting processes require W9s from the landlord and some landlords outright refuse.

So there are some other means, but yeah, the bulk of our dollars will always go to the directly to the landlord.

Thank God these are important for everybody to know and be aware of.

A couple things.

One is did do does the program beyond shelter administrators also help with utility bills?

Did I hear that correctly?

Uh the rental registration does not, is aimed just for rental assistance at this point, uh, unless it was somebody uh adversely affected by the registration itself, and we kind of opened up the eligibility at that point for whatever that household would need.

Um generally aimed at transitional services, uh motels, storage, moving trucks, those kind of those kinds of things.

Um otherwise uh utility is another ball.

And then did I understand that you you were uh suggesting that MPDU funds be focused to some extent on housing for people with disabilities?

The special needs, yeah.

The special populations, it's kind of a broader term.

Okay.

Um generally will um the severely impoverished or disabled households or otherwise typically fall into special populations, at least in the grants that we we look at.

So if that is any way um applicable or you know, agreeable, that would be a good uh uh good recommendation from our side.

And and then finally, reflecting upon the shelter population, i if we could wave a wand and all of a sudden units would show up, uh what percent of the shelter population do you think would be able to or accept housing?

Again, I understand that we need to be wraparound services along with that as well.

Uh my rough estimate would be two-thirds, right?

Um uh any one night we house about 54 percent of the identified homeless in Frederick.

So that's the um the 88, and right now we're in overflow for cold weather that will end soon.

Um but there's a about a hundred folks in that building along with up to what can be 50 in the family shelter.

Uh the last count, uh, I haven't seen the official numbers yet.

Two we um Frederick has stayed flat between about 220 to 250 identified homeless uh during the point in time, uh with a number of uh 20 to 25 as the unsheltered count.

Um so each night, you know, we we house about that 54 percent.

Uh we've looked at this through some of the other conversations, some of the other work groups, as far as if we had housing, how many would go?

Um and the rough estimate right now is two-thirds.

That other third is a gray area population.

Many seniors are fall into that.

But these are the folks that have heightened mental health issues, that have heightened substance use issues, that can't volunteer to go into these programs or can't take the initial steps or all of the steps, right, that that would be uh needed to get into uh into housing.

Uh uh permanent supportive housing is well, was old hoods, darling.

Um, and that aims at vulnerable people uh with substance use with with uh severe mental health issues, but even that is difficult to get people into with very low barrier, you know, uh straight away.

Uh Montgomery County has an interesting model of their permanent supportive housing in which they have a coordinated entry process, which we have in Frederick as well, uh, but they have intensity uh layers.

So if there's somebody that that is scored, they're also scored in their intensity.

Some only take high, some take medium to low.

Um and that's something that we don't have um here in Frederick, partly because we only have five, you know, four providers directly.

Um but there's a yeah, there there's a there's a need there that we haven't been able to hit, and that's the the folks that are severely mentally ill, um heavy into substance use disorder, that there really isn't any direct output that we can see.

So those are all also the folks that you say here are the keys, they're not going to be able to hold that lease up for really any amount of time.

Great.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

Well, thank you also for sharing your time and talent and knowledge with us.

It's just been very helpful.

Upon the next invite, I will be prepared.

So thank you.

Every day is special, so uh is there any public comment that anybody wishes to make?

Anything?

I well, thank you very much.

We're adjourned.