characters and it was maybe like it was all >> texted me and he's like I'm very
>> I feel like he's But I got a pack so I might be there. And I was like, "Yeah, >> please don't be there. >> Far away." >> Yes. >> I feel like Yeah. I had a student who was in the ER yesterday with like a
spread of some stomach viruses going around. So yeah. Perfect. If I'm a couple minutes late, sorry. >> Oh, we haven't started yet. >> We haven't started. >> We're right on time.
I wasn't here last week because I had a Yeah, I didn't want to go. I was tired. >> I That's fair. >> It's fair. >> Had a doctor's appointment for a physical checkup.
>> Hey, I might have someone for the board. >> Awesome. Yeah, it looks like um I I don't I've seen it pop up that they seem to be advertising a little better because I've seen the need for board
participation for all the boards in a couple different places. >> Yes, sure. >> Right. What for location? >> You you don't need to write anything for location. We we know where we are. Um, yeah. So, I've seen it for a bunch of
different boards because it used to be often wouldn't see anything unless you'd signed up for the email. >> I don't have time to write my address cuz my address has not changed. >> But that's fine. >> That's fine.
In case of a true emergency, my phone I'm giving you my phone number in case of a true infinite weather emergency. >> Oh, okay. >> And if somebody calls in sick. >> Okay, sounds good.
>> All right, let's give Maria a second. >> Yeah, we'll call our meeting to order. >> Oh. or you can just sit it down there and we'll pick it up when we pick up any leftover papers.
>> Just you can just Thank you. >> I'm sorry. This is for the for >> Yeah, we'll get it when it's the meeting's over. >> Yeah, I give it before. >> I I know. >> Yes, it makes it easier for me.
>> Yeah, we just g when we pick the this Okay, cool. >> Thank you. >> All right, Maria, are you ready? >> Yes. >> Okay. Um, we will call the meeting to order. Um, may I please have a roll call of commissioners?
>> Commissioner Hicks >> here. Commissioner Rosen >> here. >> Commissioner Oor >> here. >> Commissioner Bain >> here. >> Commissioner Roalis, we have a >> Thank you. All right, we'll take a moment of silence, please.
All right, general announcements. Um, our next CRA board work session is Thursday, May 14th at 6 PM. And our next regular board meeting is Monday, May 25th. That's >> Memorial Day. >> That's Memorial Day. So maybe not. Um,
we'll uh we'll update that. >> I don't know what we're doing. >> Can we just reschedule? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Um, the redevelopment committee meeting is every first Thursday of the month from 3:00 to 4. um on Zoom. Uh the safety committee
meeting is every second Wednesday of the month at noon. Um and there's in person or um a team meeting. And then resident services is quarterly on the second Tuesday of the month from 1 to 2. Um
do any um commissioners have Oh, no. I'm not there yet. Sorry, guys. Any reminders or anything? >> No. Um just the city is currently accepting applications for boards and commissions. The current deadline is May 1st. Um and
one of those boards is Charlesville Redevelopment Housing Authority. This board um for one at large seat and then one resident commissioner seat. So, if anyone either here knows of someone interested or anyone um watching is potentially interested, um those seats
are open to apply for again with the deadline of May 1st. >> Thank you, Michael. >> Okay, I will open it up now for public comment. >> Hi. Um I'm Victoria Horak. I'm an attorney at the Legal Aid Justice
Center. Um thank you commissioners. Um I just wanted to make a public comment again about the minimum rent and um our suggestion that CRA consider um eliminating the minimum rent. I know this is something the board has thought about before. Um and I just wanted to
bring one new angle about it sort of the finances of the minimum rent issue. Um there are pending cases right now that CRA has against tenants who only pay $35 in rent. And that means that tenant makes $116 a month or less, which is
very, very little income. It's almost impossible that CRA would ever recover that income from those people through the court process. Great. Thankfully, CRA actually doesn't like try to garnish people's wages, but even so, they would be like legally prohibited from doing so because those people make so little
money. And it costs $61 for each of those filings um plus attorney's fees. So, this is just sort of our pitch to say like it doesn't make sense from CRA's perspective, but it also doesn't make sense from a tenant perspective. These are people who make so little money and they really need that extra
$35 um in order to pay for emergency expenses, child care expenses, things like that. So, we would just urge from both a housing authority and from the tenant perspective to eliminate the minimum rent. And I think it would save a staff burden as well of having to file
those UDs, having to appear in court, um that kind of thing. So I think a lot of stress would come off the tenants and there would be less administration for the staff. >> So thank you. >> Thank you. >> Um I had spoken to John about that um in
our 2221 meeting and and he had like we had spoken about maybe kind of CR coming like figuring out if they could run numbers and take those things into consideration. And so maybe that's something we can kind of start to think about more over the summer and and get a
sense of like how that would impact the budget and figure out if like if we can make a good argument, you know, I think obviously it would it's already a good argument for residents potentially. But but like if we can understand what the financial impact of that would be, I think that would be a helpful thing for
all of us as we like think about it before our next fiscal year. Awesome. Thank you. Do we have any other public comment? >> At Fridays after five there's been a that
bag check has been an issue for the past two years out of Yes. dance concerts and I thought and I heard heard yes I I wish the s
Yeah. I'm going to try to get the city manager to show me where to go G for dance concerts have so I don't have to Yeah. And try to
bring would not try to bring just my key. It's my keys and my money. My sunglasses. >> I I should bring and keys so I can put them I'll try to
put them in my bag so they don't get lost. This and that really has got to stop. And I don't deserve cuz it's a it's been a safety for guns and weapons and I don't
do do that. I'm going to try to discuss it with with my city manager eventually. >> Okay. >> All right. >> Thank you. >> Thank you.
Miss Giles, do you have any far comments this evening? >> I might. >> You might. Okay, we'll save it. All right. Any updates from commissioners or topics for discussion? >> No.
>> Okay. Um, next up is the approval of the board minutes from March 23rd. Um, can I get a motion to approve? >> Motion. >> A second. >> Second.
>> All right. All in favor? >> I. >> All opposed. >> And I'll just abstain as I wasn't at the meeting. >> All right. Next up, we have a property management update.
>> Good evening to the Oh, good evening to the board and everyone is there in person. Um, we have a few things. We um we sent out a spring reminder notice um that contained a
bunch of reminders um and for all the properties. So, every family got one. Um, reminders about the parking passes. We have a few days um
until 51. Um, residents have had over 2 months to now come in and provide their u required documents to get their new updated passes. Um, and we have sent
reminders out um through text.gov. we are using that a lot more. So to all partners um and staff, we are asking everyone to encourage residents to sign up for those reminders um from text.gov.
It's a much more efficient way to send out um reminders rather than posting papers on people's door, which we still do obviously, but um we also had our first beautifification
day last month. Um we actually did two sites. We did an initial run at West Haven and we did Riverside. Um it turned out really well. Um, we were able to get that done. Our next beautifification
day is >> it's May 8th at Mickey and Madison. I was looking at it this morning. >> Okay. Thank you. Um, so we we greatly encourage all of our partners to if you
can please come join us um in beautifying our properties. Um let's see. We did want to highlight that uh we have a lot of trainings for staff
coming up. Um we are really ramping up on training this year. We do it every year, but um we pretty much have the year planned out. Um and if there's any trainings that partners would like to see or have, please do feel free to
reach out and we will um we can talk about and plan um those trainings or learning sessions. Um I believe that is all I have. Does anyone have any questions?
>> All right. >> Thank you, Miss Banks. Thank you. >> Um, okay. HCV program update. >> All right. >> All right. If you um look at the Excel spreadsheet we have for the HCV report,
um you'll see that they're continuing work on regular inspections and research. There's currently 623 um HUD vouchers up and 66. Right now there's two vouchers on the street. or individuals trying to get
those vouchers in stuff. Um, nothing major right now for HB. We don't plan to release any vouchers at the moment until after the redevelopment units come online. Any questions?
>> No. >> Thank you, Kathleen. >> Sure. >> Um, okay. resident services. Kathleen. >> Yeah. >> Um the some of the resident service staff presented at the Virginia
Workforce Symposium in Harrisonenberg last week on building community resilience to economic challenges. It was the first time we attended um one of those symposiums. It was a new experience for us, but we think we will return because we're working on building
out economic opportunity programs. Um we discussed our ongoing work towards designing um more effective self-sufficiency programs to meet the needs of residents. Um we talked a lot about the importance of wraparound services and the need to prevent the
risk of housing instability. Um and that we really need to make sure the individual has housing stability before they can be successful in the workplace. And um it was overall a good experience. There's a lot of different um workforce
providers there who are often just pushing to get someone employed and maybe not pausing to see what might be happening in the household. Um the eviction diversion program continues to be challenging. Um we're hopeful here soon if we're able to get
some funding um from the city and we appreciated the board support on this. We currently have a resident service position posted and um I've been I did um a bit of door knockocking since we have an open position right now at six
sites and it was really helpful for me to um do that myself just to get a better feel for um what might incentivize some of our community to come talk to us more. And I do think having some rental assistance funds that
um could be talked about for them um coming to meet with us would really help. We're very excited about the city council approving the nonprofit and are eager to um assist in setting up this process and thank you also for the board
for supporting that. Our um youth services program continues doing beautifification and we give stipens to um our young community members at different sites who help with this. We really feel it fosters pride and connection um with our young residents
with their neighborhood and we're continuing to build out that program. Just a couple of things upcoming. Um, we hope to hear the next month or two about our grant application to Department of Labor. Um, and we will definitely update
you. Um, once we do hear that, we're finalizing our draft of the emergency plan and disaster response. And um, as soon as we have final management team approval on that, we're going to um, move to community meetings to review the
draft and get feedback. And the last thing I had is um we'll be starting planning for the annual plan process um late spring early summer. So you'll be hearing a lot about that. >> Any questions for me?
>> Um as far for the nonprofit, does that mean now that we have the city approval that we can file the paperwork with the IRS? And like what's the kind of what's the timeline there now that we've gotten that item checked off? And are there other things that would be helpful for the board to do in support of that
process? >> Um, the next step will be working um with our council, Miss KS, who I just noticed is also on here. Um, and I'm not quite sure about the timeline. Um, are you able to comment on that, Miss Cars?
>> Um, yes. So once we create the entity and obtain an EIN, we just need to work through the uh process for the 1023 application which is the application with the Internal Revenue Service for
the formal tax exempt status. So I will work with John and with Kathleen on the estimated budget for the first year of operations of the entity and then we have to also submit projections for the
two years after that. So we'll work on a budget, we'll work on refining the mission and activities and then we'll submit for IRS approval. And it takes on average about six months, but that's just an average. That's not a commitment. Uh it all depends on how
many applications are submitted to the IRS and how long it takes them to turn around any response. They may ask for additional information. They may ask for additional documentation, but usually it's about 6 to9 months
between the date of the submission and the actual approval of the tax exempt status. >> Thank you. and not um not a question but a comment on um the
eviction diversion um uh request and topic just that the city has obviously adopted our budget and we had kind of broader funding for CRA as a fundamental agency as well as funding for capital projects obviously uh but unfortunately
it was not included in the budget the request for additional funds for the eviction diversion program. Um that said, it's not the the end of the ability for that to be funded because there are both existing surpluses and
contingency funds um that are available for one-time expenditures, which this would be. um longer term, you know, there's always additionally, you know, the potential for a year in surplus, but that would take that would necessarily be towards uh end of the year, beginning
of next year. So, and I know the need is more immediate than that. All of which to say if if there's any um either community members or CRA board members who um you know would be interested in emailing city council as a whole about
why um funding that is a priority. Um I think that would definitely be useful um just to try to elevate it as a a top priority for how the city should allocate our our existing surpluses.
Do you think that there's any specific things that we should say that might um be persuasive? >> Well, I know um a few weeks ago um Kathleen had emailed out um uh just kind of a one-pager type document explaining
like the program as well as some talking points. I think that's certainly a good place to start. Um >> okay. But um I mean in general obviously just that um it's in the city's interest
to you know not have people um displaced and enter homelessness and >> um it requires investment and a lot of intentionality. Um and you know you can't do it without investment. So >> great Kathleen um would you be able to
send that to me please? Would you send that to me please? The one pager? Yeah. Thank you. >> Okay. Any um any other questions for Kathleen? >> No. >> Okay. Uh Miss Giles? No. Okay.
Um All right. Any any other topics folks would like to raise while we are together? >> In case we can't have have a m a public housing authority on Memorial Day, which is the fourth
Monday of May, which >> I can call and let you know. >> Yeah, we don't know yet. We just realized that we need to to change that. >> Can we just switch backwards to May?
>> Uh, I don't know. We'll have to figure it out. We'll talk to Mr. Sales offline and we'll follow up. >> Yes. And please write me that letter. I just gave you my address. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Thank you.
>> Okay. Uh, that concludes our agenda for this evening. >> I'll try to find it in the in the package. >> Okay. Um can I get a motion to adjurnn? >> Motion
>> and second. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> Yes. I >> All oppose. >> All right. >> Meeting adjourned. >> Good night. Thank you. That