HUMBOLDT – The Board of
Supervisors has again discussed the controversial idea of creating a Housing
Trust Fund for affordable housing projects as the Grand Jury has recommended it
as a means of addressing homelessness.
But most supervisors were wary
of heeding the Grand Jury’s advice to form a multi-jurisdictional agency to
manage housing funds.
At the Sept. 8 meeting,
supervisors approved responses to the 2014 to 2015 Grand Jury report. A section
on addressing homelessness includes a recommendation to create a Housing Trust
Fund that would be overseen by a Joint Powers Authority (JPA) made up of the
county and the City of Eureka.
A draft response from the
County Administrator’s Office describes the formation of a JPA as being too
costly for a county like Humboldt to handle. The office’s draft response states
that “redirecting funding or staff time towards the development of a JPA to
oversee a housing trust is not viewed as an efficient use of our extremely
limited resources.”
The response adds that a
housing trust fund has “potential future merit,” however.
Supervisor Mark Lovelace
pointed out that the county’s Housing Element includes an implementation
measure to establish a Housing Trust Fund and to reach an initial funding goal
of $500,000 by Aug. 31, 2017.
Lovelace said that should be
mentioned in the response and he described the homelessness situation as one
that needs to be worked on collaboratively.
“I would much rather see a
response that expresses a willingness to explore some of these relationships
and to recognize that we don’t just have the county’s homeless population and
the City of Eureka’s homeless population and the City of Arcata’s homeless
population – we have a regional homeless population,” Lovelace said.
He added that the draft
response “misses the target.”
But other supervisors had
doubts about embarking on a JPA process. Supervisor Ryan Sundberg warned
against endorsing a method that could obligate the county.
“I don’t know if we’re at the
point yet to where we have to formalize something through this process,” he
said. “Down the road, we can do something more formal and propose that through
the board but I would be hesitant to put something into writing here and force
us into something where we don’t know what we’re getting into yet.”
Lovelace reiterated the Housing
Element’s directive for a Housing Trust Fund. He made a motion to mention it in
the response along with indicating that the county is willing to explore the
establishment of a JPA.
Funding a Housing Trust Fund is
controversial because it is often achieved through charging developer fees and
taxes.
Supervisor Virginia Bass said
the idea of forming a JPA is more problematic, however, since a trust fund can
be set up without funding it right away.
“A trust fund does not mean you
put money in [it] – it means you have a fund that eventually you find money
for, you establish the way to make that happen,” she continued.
Seeing that other supervisors
were not willing to support his original motion, Lovelace subtracted the
content on exploring JPA formation. The modified motion was unanimously
approved.
September 25, 2015
Mad
River Union
By Daniel Mintz
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