SHIP funding flexibility through local housing plan
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I saw someone got money from
BattleBots. That's what I think.
Thank you. And again, Marcy Esperg, Director of Community Development. And I am speaking about the statute, which is the Sadowski Act, which uh came into play about 1991. And in the statute 420.9075, it gives every community very clear direction on how to establish an affordable housing program,
a plan, and how they have to allocate the funding. That they get. So as you know, we are a community that gets Sadowski funding from the state. It's our SHIP funding. and you know, we have gotten anywhere since I've been here to zero. Um uh to five point five million and with the increase that is coming um from the Live Local Act, we I think are getting seven point seven
million. Um however if you look at the statute um and it is um uh uh on um I guess I don't there's a section of the statute which tells us how we have to spend our funding and sixty five percent of the funding that comes in has to go to homeownership activities. And this is uh throughout the state. So this is
very prescriptive. They're telling every single community this is what you have to do. Mm-hmm. So when you do the math, um, let's let's just use seven million dollars, sixty-five percent of that, uh over four million dollars has to go to homeownership activities. Now while I realize um I spent ten years of my career in helping low and moderate income persons become first time homebuyers. And I realize that the That Home ownership
is the key to stability for our communities. It's the key to quality neighborhoods. It is the key for individual families building wealth. That's all absolutely true. But if you look at what home ownership rates were in 1991 when somebody could buy a house for $50,000 or $75,000 to now having to buy a house at $325, or I guess I heard this morning the average value of a home in Pasco County
is $408,000, $480,000. So it makes it very difficult for us as a community development department to spend the money in that way. And then what happens is I can't even submit my report to SHIP until I've spent money in every single one of those buckets the way that they tell me to s submit it. So uh Commissioner you and I have met and you know you you
know Dominium comes and they say We want a million dollars and then they say we want a million and a half dollars and I could I could tomorrow put all of that seven million dollars to multifamily housing. However, I wouldn't even be able to submit my ship report because I haven't Done the sixty five percent for home ownership. So uh my proposal is uh I'm gonna sort of tag team in an unusual fashion
uh and in an agreement with uh David Engel is giving uh giving the opportunity for the county to to do what is best for the community uh because I believe that really that the the sense Here is to bring funding from the state to the local community for the community to solve their housing needs. The bottom line is: we all want housing, we all want to meet the housing needs of
our community, but what might be right for Pasco County might be different for another county. And so in the beginning of this act, they uh Tell us that we have to do a local housing assistance plan, which we do every three years. So rather than them telling us you have to spend 65% of your money, my recommendation is we go to them and we say every community will d decide every three years based on
the market, what's happening in their community and the needs of what's happening. in their community, how much they're gonna spend on home ownership, how much they're gonna do for rental housing, how much they're gonna do for special needs, how much they're gonna do for construction. And it's the same buckets, it's just should be determined by the needs of the own their own community.
So giving us that flexibility. Let me ask you this Marcy, do you know um From the history of the statute, 420 point nine oh seven five. It was PRIM5, PRINA that had the the sixty-five
Who came up with that number? Who do you think came up with that number?
I d I my assumption is that th those numbers are reflective of the um many uh groups that were in favor of the Sadowski Act. The Sadowski Act is one of the those few kinds of uh pieces of legislation that brought in realtors, builders, habitat for humanity. You know, the list goes on on of the number of people that supported it. And um I would imagine that realtors and builders were heavily involved in advocating
for that sort of thing.
I was I was warning that if that's what what it was. So if there would be opposition it would be more than likely th th those same groups that would say, no, we want to lock them in and make sure
But it you know, it it's it's good to have that flexibility.
Well let me say this about flexibility. I think it's great on certain things. However, um and Marcia I think you use an all on the same talking points Commissioner Oakley used yesterday when we talked about home ownership. And I'm gonna say I want to see more home ownership in this county. Uh to put money in where it's just gonna be a rental thing and a rental thing and the rents go up at a certain point in time, now they're stuck and now they get moved. How many times have we have we heard about I just got bumped out of my apartment because it just went up six hundred dollars a month or three hundred dollars a month and I can't afford anymore? At least with the mortgage other than insurance
costs, it's pretty stable all the way through. If we need to Yeah. If we need flexibility on how to use that sixty five percent, maybe you can put more money now, maybe it was a maybe it was a cap on how much money you could use for helping someone get a home on their own. I'd rather see that number get more flexible to it than just drive the money out to a rental part. Commissioner Starkey.
Uh I'm thinking along the same s line same line and just plain devil's advocate here because you know I have so much respect for what you do. Um
Is there a a first uh what is it, a first home buyers? Down payment program that we participate in and do we just you know seeing if a if a house is four hundred thousand dollars, do we need to have more flexibility to be able to offer more on a down payment assistance program? We
just increased it and so for very low income we put fifty thousand dollars uh into that. Uh And there are communities that are doing a hundred and a hundred and twenty five thousand. However, that that goes to that family. and when they sell it you know, then we'll get that money back, but then ten years from now, how much is that hundred and twenty five thousand gonna cost? It might be at that point two hundred and twenty
thousand. So Um You know, m my argument uh my professional argument would be I could invest one hundred and twenty five or two hundred thousand into a rental unit that will stay affordable for thirty years and will help many families. And I will also say that Our right now are Um Our ratio of home ownership to rental in in our county is very heavy on home ownership. It's like seventy nine
to twenty one. So even even with
even with all the rentals that you've seen, it still hasn't flipped that ratio yet. And so um And what we are seeing is a real trend towards people wanting to rent over over ownership, especially with uh uh the younger population who saw what happened during uh two thousand eight and nine and people losing their housing, they're like uh you know, I'd rather rent. And so I so I think the key to any community is
balance. uh having a wide variety of housing units available uh and and this would allow us to spend our money.
I
think
so.
Well again I'd I'd like to take a look closer to the um if we can expand things. I d and I w I w wouldn't want it even to be like a just a first time buyer person. I mean you might someone might have bought a town home, now they want to move up. That's what you want. Kind of like a small business, you let them grow to something bigger. I wouldn't even want to limit to like first time buyer. I'd rather take that money where people can get in to their own home, own their own home, because I think they're then bonded to the community better and again they're have a chance to build wealth. and create a better situation with their family, a
stable situation where they know this is home. I'd I'd rather much rather see that focus. So if it can be expanded, and I think you'd get a lot of help from the realtors, because every time a home sold, that's the Dusty Fund's gonna get more money too.
Well I don't I'll just ask that I just looked up Florida and I looked up the state.
So one of the things we could put in here is not just this, but maybe allowing this to counties and certain percentage rates in ownership too. You know what I mean? If I'm the legislature and I look at somebody like Pasco County, who you just told me 79 to 21, that's a different percentage than another county who's sixty to forty, right? Yeah. So it's you know what I mean, it's more palatable, you know what I mean, than the whole state. I'm just I think it's
and she's asking for flexibility to design a program that looks but that works better for our community and maybe The things we just talked about are better for our community. She just I I see that the ask is just let each community determine 'cause each community is different, their their percentages that they feel is more appropri appropriate.
So we're hearing ya. We'll go back and work on a little bit and and uh come back with you on that issue. Well um
think about this. Now I've got kids that are Doing very well. They're looking at homes where they want to live, you know. Stocky Ranch. They want to be there and the money that it costs is huge, right? Other kids wanna go s somewhere else, whatever. Right. And that first move is a big move. It is. All the way through. And I I I had a I had a gentleman tell me earlier, he goes, if you're gonna take over my house, you better get ready to go pay a million dollars. It's worth like five or six now, but by the time you're getting ready, and he's like thirteen, fourteen, you better have your money aside. to be able to get this house.
So if I can help again a family grow to stay here, that's that's where I want to be.
Yeah.
So
if I get flexibility that way where she can devise a program, would that help? I'm I'm good with that.
There's also Habitat, you know, helping people. Um you know, in interesting, I had a conversation with Metropolitan Ministries yesterday. And um And I have something that they want to do which I'll share with you later. But you know, we were talking about how we have this pipeline now. where they take in homeless families And Matman. Then they can transition to our workforce housing. And then we could tr transition them out after a few years. to a habitat
house and what a great success story that is all right in the same community. If we could get that that whole pipeline thing going.
And that that leisure lane project I think was gonna be a great one until they went and sold the property on us. But that's the type of thing you could do and you could still do in smaller pieces to help them get their foot up. Right. And that that then they can go.
The other statistic that I find very interesting, because we just finished our consolidated plan which you approved that went to HUD is 30% of our households here are single-person households. So again, where where do they go when they're when they're here and they want to live? Um so uh so so maybe they have to start off in a rental before they end up creating a larger household to go and to buy. But it you know, there's different stages for
people based on their household and their and their um stage of life. Thank you.