Mercer County Affordable Housing Fund

MEETING MINUTES

MERCER COUNTY AFFORDABLE HOUSING FUND BOARD MEETING
Wednesday – September 4, 2002
Mercer County Regional Planning Commission Offices

Present:

Board Members – R. Glenn Adams, Sister Clare Marie Beichner, DeWitt Boosel, Dr. Joyce M. Cuff, Ron Errett, Thomas Fiscus, Donald A. Koontz, Debra Musial, Pamela Prince, Randy L. Riddle, and Bob Siegfried

Others – Olivia Lazor (Mercer County Commissioner), Ronda McClelland (Mercer County Recorder), Denny Puko (Executive Director, Mercer County Regional Planning Commission) and Chris Conti (Senior Planner, MCRPC)

Absent:

Board Members – Jim Miale, Dave Ryan

The meeting was called to order at 7:30 p.m.

Mr. Puko welcomed the board members, thanked them for their participation and noted the background behind the board's creation and its advisory role to the county commissioners. Board members and visitors introduced themselves and gave their backgrounds. A paper was distributed to the board listing their names, addresses, phone numbers, and their terms (either one or two years) on the board. Board members were asked to update the information on the list if necessary and give their e-mail addresses if they had them. Mr. Puko stated that unless a member noted otherwise, it was preferred that communication would mainly be done electronically.

Mr. Puko discussed the purpose and mission of the board by reviewing several handouts. These handouts included the:

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Act 137 of 1992, Optional County Affordable Housing Funds Act-The definition of "affordable housing effort" in Section 2, the disposition of funds in Section 5 and examples of affordable housing efforts in Section 6 were briefly discussed.

History of Mercer County Affordable Housing Fund – Handout gave brief history of Pa. Act 137, the creation of the Mercer County Fund, collection of the fund by the county recorder, and the administration of the fund by the Mercer County Regional Planning Commission (MCRPC).

Mercer County Affordable Housing Fund Ordinance No. 02 of 2001-Mr. Puko noted that Mercer County Commissioners were not required to create a housing advisory board, but created a board that "shall review proposals and make recommendations to the commissioners and draft program guidelines to be approved by the commissioners".

Resolution Number 23 for 2001 to Establish the Mercer County Affordable Housing Fund Board-This resolution created the board, its mission, composition, membership terms, stated the minimum number of meetings per year, and its responsibility in establishing guidelines for the use of the affordable housing fund.

Mr. Boosel noted that the state legislature passed Act 137 ten years ago. Counties that had created affordable housing funds had a competitive advantage by using these funds to leverage other affordable housing funding sources available at the state and federal levels. The creation of the Mercer County Affordable Housing Fund will now allow affordable housing organizations in Mercer County to compete on an equal footing.

Mr. Puko noted as an example the Pennsylvania Brownsfields for Housing Initiative. Only counties that had created an affordable housing fund as provided by Act 137 are eligible to receive these funds. Mercer County has been eligible for approximately $85,000 in brownsfield funds each of the last two years due the creation of the county affordable housing fund.

Draft by-laws to guide the board's future operation were presented. A motion was made by Mr. Errett and seconded by Mr. Koontz to approve the by-laws as presented. The motion passed unanimously. After adoption of the by-laws, Mr. Puko discussed the roles of the Chairperson, Vice Chairperson and Secretary of the board as required by the by-laws.

Mr. Puko facilitated elections. Mr. Errett made a motion, seconded by Mr. Boosel, to nominate Mr. Fiscus for Chairperson. The motion passed. Mr. Adams made a motion, seconded by Sister Beichner, to close nominations and cast a unanimous ballot for Mr. Fiscus as Chairperson. The motion passed unanimously.

Mr. Errett made a motion, seconded by Dr. Cuff, to nominate Mr. Boosel for Vice Chairperson. The motion passed. Mr. Errett made a motion, seconded by Mr. Adams, to close the nominations and cast a unanimous ballot for Mr. Boosel as Vice Chairperson. The motion passed unanimously.

Mr. Errett made a motion, seconded by Sister Beichner, to nominate Dr. Cuff for Secretary. The motion passed. Mr. Adams made a motion, seconded by Mr. Siegfried, to close nominations and cast a unanimous ballot for Dr. Cuff as Secretary. The motion passed unanimously.

Mr. Fiscus asked Mr. Puko for an explanation of the proposed program design for the Mercer County Affordable Housing Trust. Mr. Puko explained that the draft guidelines were through the efforts of several meetings between himself, Mr. Boosel and Mr. Errett. Mr. Puko, Mr. Errett and Mr. Boosel each noted that there were three key decisions to be made during this process and discussed their rationale for making these decisions:

Define affordable housing activities eligible under the act. It was decided to make the program open and flexible to all affordable housing activities rather than narrow program eligibility to one or two activities. There are many housing needs in the county and the program did not want to stifle creativity in prospective proposals. Organizations would be eligible for funding; individuals would approach an appropriate organization for potential sponsorship if they had a project in mind.

There would be a 20% cap on funding awarded to operational activities in any funding cycle. There was a desire to avoid funding a potential applicant's operations on a long-term, annual basis. Funds should also be used for new activities. Act 137 funds should not be used to replace funding previously lost by an organization. It was felt that the majority of the fund should be used to leverage "brick and mortar" projects.

Act 137 funds would not fund an applicant's whole project, it was to be used to leverage other funds or as "seed" money. Ideally, the funds would be used to leverage projects both large and small, for the whole county with both rural and urban needs to be addressed. Initially, a letter of commitment from other programs would serve as a match for the Act 137 funds. In conclusion, it was felt that the Mercer County Affordable Housing Fund should encourage projects that met the broad intent of Act 137.

Selection of projects for funding under the act. Discussion under this topic was centered on the selection criteria for project submittals. There will be two ranking criteria, the initial threshold (applications meet minimum standards) criteria and then the competitive selection (applications compete with other proposals) criteria.

Use of the 15% administrative fee allowed by the act. The board was told that the decision was made by the county commissioners that the Mercer County Regional Planning Commission (MCRPC) would, by working cooperatively with the county commissioners, recorder and treasurer, administer the fund. This would be part of MCRPC's "normal" services to the county as a member of MCRPC; therefore, 100% of the fund would be able to be used for affordable housing activities.

After this discussion, Mr. Boosel made a motion to approve the guidelines as written for solicitation, review and ranking of potential projects. Dr. Cuff seconded the motion and it passed unanimously. Ms. Lazor stated that the county commissioners would also adopt the guidelines at their next meeting on September 12, 2002. The board noted that the guidelines, as well as the initially agreed upon funding cycle, could be changed at any time.

The next agenda item to be discussed was the initial funding cycle. A discussion of whether a regular funding cycle with fixed time-periods would be established or not was entertained as well. Mr. Puko began the discussion by noting that according to the county recorder, the fund had accumulated approximately $150,000 in its first year.

The board took into consideration the wide variety of state and federal programs that the Act 137 funds could leverage throughout the year, the desire to let the fund grow large enough to be able to effectively leverage other funds, as well as the flexibility to either hold funds for occasional emergency situations or leave minimal balances. After deliberation, the board decided that the first funding cycle for the Act 137 funds would be from March 1 through April 30, 2003. This decision was formally approved by the board with a motion by Mr. Boosel. This motion was seconded by Mr. Siegfried and passed unanimously. Subsequent funding rounds would be decided on after the initial round was completed.

Workshops will be held during the application time-period for potential applicants. A letter was to be addressed to the county treasurer, informing her of this initial funding cycle and requesting the existing Act 137 funds be invested in the most appropriate manner and for the greatest yield.

Mr. Puko announced the Brownfields for Housing Initiative application to the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development (DCED) was due December 2, 2002. Ms. Lazor announced that this year, the county commissioners have selected the Mercer County Affordable Housing Fund Board to solicit, review, and recommend potential applications to the county commissioners. It was decided to begin soliciting for applications immediately with a deadline of October 25.

Projects would then be reviewed with the same criteria to be used by the board to assess the Mercer County Act 137 applications. The applications would be reviewed by MCRPC staff against the initial threshold criteria. The board would then receive the full application and review the proposals against the competitive selection criteria with assistance by MCRPC staff.

The next meeting was scheduled for 7:00 p.m. Thursday, November 14, 2002 at the offices of MCRPC.

Mr. Errett made a motion to adjourn the meeting. Mr. Boosel seconded the motion and the meeting was adjourned at 9:30 p.m.

Certified as true and correct,

Dr. Joyce M. Cuff
Secretary

 

Mercer County Regional Planning Commission
2491 Highland Road, Hermitage, PA 16148
mail@mcrpc.com    www.mcrpc.com

 

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