03/11/2008: "Home Trust Grant For Buck Property Turned Down"

The County blessing of a affordable housing grant proposal for one affordable housing group over a lesser request from another group, has been turned down by the state.

The recommendation by the Council to support the grant request was in competition from other recommendations from other counties in the state, and on Tuesday the Council was informed the request was turned down.

When the County Council voted to recommended the San Juan Community Home Trust (Trust) proposal for a one million dollar grant from CTED (Department of Community Trade and Economic Development), over a request from Homes For Islanders, there was concern expressed that by so doing, they might end up with nothing. That is what has now happened.

There is still some hope some money may be forthcoming. Nancy DeVaux is the Executive Director of the San Juan Community Home Trust, and she said “officials at CTED called on Monday with the ‘good news’ that they will support the project with Community Development Block Grant ‘Housing Enhancement’ dollars instead of from the CDBG ‘General Purpose’ Fund dollars.” She cautioned that “the exact amount of funding remains to be seen.”

The Council had been uncertain which recommendation to make, and at the last meeting that decided the recommendation to CTED, Councilman Gene Knapp said it was difficult to decide which one should go forward with a council recommendation; but in the end he was joined by a majority of the council in support for a recommendation of the Buck property.

The grant was to be used to help off-set some of the cost to install utilities/infrastructure in the proposed development on the property. (Link to previous stories) .

The two affordable housing programs are not the same. Homes for Islanders is a “sweat equity” program that provides on-hands assistance in constructing the homes; help with down payments, and group participation in building the homes. The home owners retain the right to sell their home later for a limited profit.

The program the council went with was the San Juan Community Home Trust, which “acquires land, builds homes, qualifies applicants, packages mortgages” and leases the land to the applicant. The house -not the land- can be sold, but the price is strictly controlled by the trust, and the purchaser must meet the buyer criteria of the Trust.

Representatives from the two groups had made presentations to the Council, and both stated the homes are kept affordable for future buyers; although they use different means to do so. Much of the Islanders’ presentation was spent in correcting what they said were incorrect statements made to the council by the Trust as to how the Islanders program operated.

A motion had been made by Councilman Alan Lichter to recommend the Islander’s proposal, because, he said, the Islander’s proposal was more likely to be approved by CTED due to the “readiness” requirement by CTED (the project is already under site construction), but Lichter’s motion failed to receive a second.

Myhr had said that “I have serious concerns on the readiness of the Home Trust project.. the county would be well served by Homes for Islanders.” Councilman Peterson had also seemed to favor the Islander’s proposal, but said he was concerned that the motion would result in a split vote.

Kevin Ranker made a motion to support the Trust proposal, a second was received, and the motion passed with Lichter opposed; and Myhr -as Chair at the time- refusing to vote. This resulted in Lichter making a motion to force Myhr to take a position, which he did by joining the majority in voting for the Trust.