DuPage County Community Development Commission Met April 6

By Angelica Saylo Pilo

Aug 23, 2021

DuPage County Community Development Commission Met April 6.

Here is the minutes provided by the commission:

1. CALL TO ORDER

11:00 AM meeting was called to order by Alderman West Chicago Lori Chassee at 11:00 AM. Chairperson Chassee stated the following:

"I am calling the meeting of the Community Development Committee (Commission) to order. A physical quorum of the members is not present; however, pursuant to Section 7(e) of the Open Meetings Act, members are permitted to attend remotely. Either one member of the Committee, the Chief Administrative Officer or our Chief Legal Council are physically present at the regular meeting location. In-person attendance and public comments are allowed, subject to attendance limitations required to ensure the health and safety of those who attend."

2. ROLL CALL

PRESENT: Arguilles (Remote 11:06 AM), Bastian (Remote), Bricks (Remote), Chaplin (Remote), Chassee (Remote), Chavez (Remote), Crandall (Remote), DeSart (Remote), Franz (Remote E), Deacon Garcia, Govind (Remote), Heniff (Remote), Jones (Remote), Kalchbrenner (Remote), LaPlante, Ozog (Remote), Page (Remote), Poeicha (Remote), Popovich (Remote), Renehan (Remote), Rutledge, Schwarze, Selmon (Remote), Sylvester (Remote), Viger

ABSENT: Barrett, Covert, DiCianni, Domovessova, Dragan, Eckhoff, Franz, Gargano, Gascoigne, Gombac, Grill, Hart, Krajewski, Malik-Jarmusz, Pabst, Puchalski, Smetana, Tornatore, Ungerleider, Walter, Zay

Staff Present: Mary Keating, Community Services Director; David McDermott, Community Development Administrator; Julie Hamlin, Community Development Manager (Remote); Austin Lewey, Housing and Community Development Planner; Tom Schwertman, Housing and Community Development Planner; Anna Sitton, Senior Housing and Community Development Planner; Hayley Woodbridge, Housing and Community Development Planner (Remote), and Amish Kadakia, Senior Accountant (Remote).

State’s Attorney -Katherine Fahy.

At this time, Keating requested permission to ask a procedural question directed to the Assistance State's Attorney, Katherine Fahy. Permission was given and the question was, “Given that there are 22 people on the call and everything has to be a roll call vote, would it be appropriate or possible to move to combine in one motion, combining all of the action items, and then discuss them one at time. This would be followed by one vote to approve all the action items, so that there would only be two roll call votes instead of five or six”.

Fahy asked if they were all based on the same funding? Keating responded that the funding was related to either Community Development Block Grant or HOME Affordable Partnership funding (HOME Investment Partnerships) noting that Action Items 5.B,C, and D, would go on to County Board and it was thought that the Minutes might also go to County Board as well.

Fahy’s direction was to keep it separate for now due to different funding.

Chassee requested to have the Assistant State’s Attorney’s response repeated which Fahy did.

Keating asked for verification from the Recording Secretary if only the individuals in attendance name’s needed to be read and that was verified as correct.

3. PUBLIC COMMENT

Chassee as if there was any public comment. There was one and it was read as follows:

Meeting Date: 04/06/21

Meeting: Community Development Commission

Name: Mark Buschbacher

Organization: Serenity House Counseling Services, Inc.

Address: 891 S Rowhling Road, Addison, IL 60101

Daytime Phone: (630) 620-6616

Comment Type: Provide testimony/public comment

Subject: CDC20-06

" I would like it to be mentioned in the topic of our Grant CDC20-06 discussion that Serenity House has invested over $20,000 in Architecture and Engineering to this project. It is only due to relocation of a NICOR gas line (and due to COVID are not guaranteed from NICOR) a time within the scope of our contract that would put this project in jeopardy of meeting our contractual obligation and possible forfeiture of funding. We have plans to reapply to the next contract year for that same project and are hopeful that we are granted the same funding of $400,000.00. Thank you."

4. APPROVAL OF MINUTES

A. CDC - Community Development Commission - Re-Scheduled - Jun 2, 2020 11:00 AM There were no corrections, additions, or comments.

On a Roll Call Vote, 23 Ayes, 2 Abstentions, the Minutes of June 2, 2020, were approved.

RESULT: ACCEPTED [23 TO 0]

MOVER: Lynn LaPlante, District 4

SECONDER: Elizabeth Chaplin, District 2

AYES: Arguilles, Bastian, Chaplin, Chassee, Chavez, Crandall, DeSart, Franz (E), Deacon Garcia, Govind, Heniff, Jones, Kalchbrenner, LaPlante, Ozog, Poeicha, Popovich, Renehan, Rutledge, Schwarze, Selmon, Sylvester, Viger

ABSTAIN: Bricks, Page

5. COMMITTEE VOTE REQUIRED

A. Action Item -- Recommendation for Approval of the FY2021 Slate of Officers and CDC Executive Committee as Presented.

McDermott thanked Chassee for her leadership over the past year and thanked the municipal partners for volunteering for the year ahead.

Chassee stated that if something unforeseen happened today and this would be her last Community Development meeting she said it was a privilege and thanked everyone. Keating wished Chassee the best of luck today.

On a Roll Call Vote, All Ayes, the motion passed.

At this time LaPlante, as the new Chairperson, took control of the meeting.

LaPlante thanked Chassee for all the work she did. LaPlante went on to say she was very honored and excited to begin serving as Chair of the Community Development. She believed that this Commission would play a very impactful role in the communities’ recovery from theglobal pandemic and looked forward to working with everyone.

RESULT: APPROVED [UNANIMOUS]

MOVER: Elizabeth Chaplin, District 2

SECONDER: Paula Deacon Garcia, District 2

AYES: Arguilles, Bastian, Bricks, Chaplin, Chassee, Chavez, Crandall, DeSart, Franz (E), Deacon Garcia, Govind, Heniff, Jones, Kalchbrenner, LaPlante, Ozog, Page, Poeicha, Popovich, Renehan, Rutledge, Schwarze, Selmon, Sylvester, Viger

B. Action Item -- Recommendation for Approval of the Cancellation of a Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Agreement between DuPage County and Serenity House Counseling Services, Project CD20-06 - WERC Expansion - with Reprogramming of the $400,000 in CDBG Funds.

After listening to the Public Comment, Schwarze asked for clarification on what was being voted upon.

Keating said what was being voted upon was the cancellation of the existing contract with Serenity House. Serenity House had the right to reapply for additional funds in the future. The reason for the cancellation was to make sure that the projects continued to move forward as quickly as possible. Congress requires a “timeliness test”. The County funds have to be expended in a timely manner. When projects were delayed, not only did it negatively impact that project, but also the entire portfolio. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has a formula it uses for the timeliness test. If the County did not spend funds in a timely fashion, HUD would then reduce the County’s annual appropriation and the community would lose those funds. Because this project would not make the deadlines established in the contract, the recommendation was to cancel this contract. Serenity house could come back at a later time and reapply for those funds. The Department has no reason to believe that they would not be eligible in the future. It was important that these funds were to be placed in a pot that would get spent.

McDermott said that once the work was finished (relocation of NICOR line) they would be slotted in the next funding cycle using the same application.

Arguilles asked for clarification if these funds were being reallocated and the answer was yes. McDermott said that there may be additional work at the (DuPage) Care Center to be completed with these funds that would have to be formally approved by the Committee as an agenda item.

On a Roll Call Vote, All Ayes, the motion passed.

RESULT: APPROVED [UNANIMOUS]

MOVER: Paula Deacon Garcia, District 2

SECONDER: Elizabeth Chaplin, District 2

C. Action Item -- Recommendation for Approval of Community Development Block Grant Coronavirus (CDBG-CV) Public Service & Capital Improvement project recommendations and for approval of Substantial Amendment 5 to the 2019 Action Plan Element of the 2015-2019 DuPage County Consolidated Plan – which reprograms HOME & CDBG funds & adds CDBG-CV grant funding and corresponding projects related to the Coronavirus Pandemic (COVID-19). (COVID ITEM).

McDermott said regarding Public Service, even though this was COVID money, it was coming from CDBG so it had to benefit low and moderate income populations. The Department has to be able to prove to HUD who received the end benefit.

Twelve public service applications were received and two were determined to be in ineligible due to the inability to prove the funds could be used correctly. It was not that the Northern Illinois Food Bank was a bad project, it was more of the concern that the department would not be able to show that the benefit was received by low and moderate income populations.

DuPage County received $1.9 million in funding requests and is proposing $1.5 million in awards. There were two other components for (CDBG-CV) capital. It was anticipated that the Care Center would have $1 million in capital needs related to COVID response. The other component was a category. The Department has talked to all shelter providers in the County. It was believed that they all will have capital needs in the next couple of years related to emergency shelter and COVID response.

To receive the $3 million, agencies will have to apply and hold a public comment period on their own. This agenda item today would allow the Department to put the money in a category. The County has to follow HUD’s timeline and the money has to be in the system, so that HUD can allocate it to the County or the money will be lost.

The other items were just cleanup of the 2019 Action Plan.

Chaplin had questions regarding the DuPage Senior Citizens Council “5-Pack Meal Pick Up Event” project. Had the DuPage Senior Citizens Council worked with any other organizations to try to have the meals delivered rather than the Sheriff’s Department. McDermott noted that the Sheriff’s Department was the only organization listed in the application. She questioned with the $160,000 going directly to the DuPage Senior Citizens Council, would they pay the Sheriff from any of these funds. McDermott said no, the application referred to the position as “Meal Coordinators”. It would be for the employees of DuPage Senior Citizens Council. Chaplin stated that these were federal funds used for the projects. She was concerned that this event (if in coordination with the Sheriff’s “It takes a Village” initiative) could become quite political (Facebook posts of political candidates at events), and there was a concern about using federal funds on political events.

Chaplin had additional concerns about the location of the events being held at the County Complex in Wheaton. She was concerned about low-income seniors, being able to get to the event and thought that the meals could go to the townships and the townships disperse the food. This way individuals were not coming from far corners of the County to Wheaton.

Keating wanted to make it clear that the funds would go to the DuPage Senior Citizen Council. It would only be paying staff and food incurred by the Senior Citizen Council. They were not providing any funding to any political candidates, any other elected officials, any County employees, or any Sheriff’s employees. It was unknown if anyone could control who volunteered at an event. There was no discussion of federal funding being used in any political manner. These funds were for qualified nonprofit organizations in Dupage County.

Keating also went on to say that the application did talk about the Abbington Banquet parking lot and that DuPage Senior Citizens Council would partner with the Sheriff’s Department and Abbington Banquets to host pickup meals in their parking lot. It sounded as though there might be two locations.

Chaplin reiterated her concern that low income individuals would have difficulty getting to those locations and would rides be provided. Keating said the Department could reach out to the Senior Citizens Council for additional information.

Ozog requested confirmation that the $160,000 was for staffing and food. McDermott replied that was correct. Ozog commented that the Abbington could be a difficult location due to heavy traffic at that intersection of Butterfield Road and Route 53. In terms of involvement of the Sheriff’s office, or volunteers outside of the Senior Citizens Council she was unclear of the roll of volunteers and was concerned if there could be liability issues. McDermott said that within the application, it was discussed that the Sheriff’s office would provide traffic control and DuPage Senior Citizens Council staff would conduct the enrollment process and distribute the food.

Ozog further queried since there was involvement of the Sheriff’s office resources, there would be an hourly charge and if that was outlined in the grant money. McDermott said it was not an included program expense. She asked for clarification if it was traffic control or was it actual distribution of the food. McDermott said the application specified traffic control.

At this point, Keating noted that comments were being placed in the Chat feature. Given that this was a public meeting she requested that if there were questions or comments please unmute and do not use the Chat feature.

Renehan welcomed LaPlante on her new position. She also thanked Dave McDermott, Mary Keating, and Julie Hamlin for the amount of work done. She was pleased to see that Prairie State Legal Services would be receiving their full request of $470,000 for legal for people facing eviction, foreclosure, or who need a public defender. However, she was disappointed to see that Hinsdale Community Services and Northern Illinois Food Bank did not make the cut, even though they had numbers higher than DuPage Senior Citizens Council. She assumed that being able to prove the individuals they would serve was included in the numbers when the rankings came out. She was also concerned about the DuPage Senior Citizens Council application and that there may be a back-end cost to the County. It did not count for the man/woman power getting the meals out. She wondered if Giving DuPage or other alternative sources/agencies could be used at a low cost/no cost to get the basic/primary need of food out to the seniors.

Keating said given that the applications specified that traffic control as the role of the Sheriff’s Department. She felt that there would not be a nonprofit or volunteer component that was appropriate to do traffic control on major streets.

Ozog, noting her concern about the location, suggested that if it were at a different site, not at 53 and Butterfield, the need for traffic control would be eliminated.

Shubra liked Chaplin’s idea of coordinating with the townships and thought that would be one way to limit administrative overhead if staff were involved and more resources could go towards the distribution of food, if they have programs such as Meals on Wheels.

Keating appreciated the comments but wanted to make it clear, that Staff did not have the ability to modify an application as it was submitted. It either had to be approved or not, and it was the Committee’s prerogative to do so. In order to make use of the suggestions of different locations or different ways to partner, the process would have been to deny the proposed project, then someone would reach out to the agency and explain why it was denied for the following reasons. At this time there was no plan for a second round of public service applications. It is the prerogative of the Community Development Commission and the Executive Committee to direct staff to do that. Staff did not have the ability to modify the application to the project that had been put forth in the competitive process. McDermott also said nor can the Department fill in with a township program. It could be done with a separate set of funds determined by a different body.

Chaplin asked how many events the Council was planning on doing. McDermott said the application only lists 3,000 meals. Chaplin wanted to know how the program would work if multiple locations were involved; could a person go from one event to another or would the person be limited. Hamlin reviewed the application and did not see clarification on the number of times the service would be provided and whether or not people could return for the service but based on the numbers provide it was for 3,000 unduplicated persons.

Govind felt this was a worthwhile program and asked if there was the possibility of a conditional approval with some guidance provided. Keating said, typically when a conditional commitment was given, it tended to be with housing development projects and was conditional on zoning or receiving funding from another entity. Without the agency being present, conditions of partnering with a different organization or different location, the department did not know if the agency was interested in pursuing the options. She felt that the possibility of a conditional commitment could be done specifying the precise conditions, so that if the agency met the conditions, the project would then be approved. The other option would be to deny the project and direct staff to either open another round of applications or simply return to that one application.

Keating reminded the Committee that there was a timeline involved. Once the amended Action Plan was approved by this body, it would go on to Health and Human Services then to County Board and then be submitted to HUD for approval. If there was a delay in approval of the Action Plan it would delay all of the projects because it was a sequential process.

Ozog said she really had a problem with the location, especially for seniors. She would like to modify the location; it would eliminate the need for traffic control and the liability concern. She also wondered if the modification could actually specify DuPage Senior Citizens Council discuss this project with the townships. She would like to see this modified, while realizing it was not a massive amount of money, but it was important to get it out to the community.

Arguilles wanted to reiterate that some of the concerns were legitimate with traffic control and who was being served. Due to timeliness, and this being a $160,000, if this was not going to be approved, what was the backup project to replace this moving forward. McDermott said if the recommendation was to deny today, the department would go back to the Senior Citizens Council and have them modify their application, while moving forward with all the other applications and proceed with submitting the Action Plan. If at some point, an application was received and was amenable to the board, the Action Plan would be modified and added back in.

Keating said this would require amendment of the Action Plan. That could happen, however remember the Action Plan has a long approval process and the Action Plan could not be amended until the initial Action Plan was approved, which would probably 45 to 90 days from now. It could not take place at the next County Board meeting. The other option would be to deny the project and the $160,000 would be moved into a different category; either the Care Center or emergency shelter category.

Schwarze heard and was on board with everyone’s concerns. To him, a bigger concern was did the senior population need the meals now; knowing he was not starving, but the committee did not know who was. Removing politics, he felt it was important to get the meals out as quickly as possible.

Renehan said that this project scored dead last while two other food insecurity places (49.5 one at 54 scoring point) seemed very worthy. She questioned the ability of this committee to make a decision if there would not be time. If that was the case, to change recommendations, this meeting should have been held a month ago for them to make decisions and give feedback. Keating said, it was not that there was not time, she said it would delay the process differently than just the two weeks.

The reason that the Northern Illinois Food Bank was denied, was that as a recipient of Community Development Block Grant funds, an agency has to provide income information for the individuals who were receiving the food. Even though it was completely counterintuitive to say they could not prove it is low income people going to the food pantries, unfortunately that was how the system worked. The Northern Illinois Food Bank does not have income information on the individuals who would receive the food. For that reason, it was not eligible as a CDBG-CV public service project.

Renehan questioned if that lack information was reflected in the scores. McDermott said that scores were based on all the different application components agencies completed. Then there was also an eligibility review. Hamlin clarified that the scoring criteria was built into the application, but the minimum requirements were not scored. If they did not meet a minimum requirement the application was automatically ineligible, but staff still goes through all of the application questions, to be fair to the agency, and give it an overall score.

Chaplin wanted to further clarify her comment about something being political. Federal funding could be in jeopardy if there was any type of political activity done with federal funds. She was now assured that none of the $160,000 was going to the Sheriff’s department, she felt that any federal funds were not jeopardy.

Ozog wanted to know if the Hinsdale facility met all of the criteria for low income. Sitton said they did not. They did not collection income documentation to be able to recommend the population.

Arguilles said having had experience in managing CDBG funding programs previously, she reviewed these applications as they qualify. Her personal thought was there would have been some follow-up items for next time, if there was a next time. She felt that it qualified as a low income project and hoped it was approved if timeliness was going to be an issue, and move forward with providing funding.

Chassee questioned if these applications were being voted as a whole or was there an opportunity or option to set aside one particular application. Keating said the current motion on the table was to approve the Action Plan as submitted. There would need to be a motion to amend or modify the Action Plan if there was a desire to remove a project.

On a Roll Call Vote, All Ayes, the motion passed.RESULT: APPROVED [UNANIMOUS]

MOVER: Greg Schwarze, District 6

SECONDER: Consuelo Arguilles, Comm. Development Director, Village of Villa Park

ABSENT: Barrett, Covert, DiCianni, Domovessova, Dragan, Eckhoff, Franz, Gargano, Gascoigne, Gombac, Grill, Hart, Krajewski, Malik-Jarmusz, Pabst, Puchalski, Smetana, Sylvester, Tornatore, Ungerleider, Walter, Zay

D. Action Item -- Recommendation for Approval of Release of DuPage County Deed Restrictions with DuPage Community Housing and Advocacy and Development fka Community Housing Association of DuPage on 27 Properties.

McDermott said these restrictions were initially placed on the properties in the 1980s when CHAD was a new organization. The understanding was that the County was trying to make sure that CHAD would have backing and support. All the properties in question have been maintained as affordable housing for over 30 years. The department’s normal maximum requirement is 20 years. The States Attorney was consulted. It was felt that the initial limitation was placed on by the County Board that it should go all the way through to County Board. This was the first step towards release. Staff did not have any concerns about releasing the properties.

There were no questions.

On a Roll Call Vote, All Ayes, the motion passed.

RESULT: APPROVED [23 TO 0]

MOVER: Paula Deacon Garcia, District 2

SECONDER: Consuelo Arguilles, Comm. Development Director, Village of Villa Park

RECUSED: Selmon

6. INFORMATIONAL ITEM-2020 YEAR IN REVIEW

A. Informational -- 2020 Year in Review

McDermott said because this was the annual meeting when all Municipal and County Board were present, staff tries to provide an update. He thanked his staff who worked very hard to manage the different pots of money that were very complicated and have many regulations.

There were three pools of money. The CDBG funding is primarily used for neighborhood infrastructure projects, and public improvements to nonprofit buildings and public services. Highlighted were projects in those categories as well as HOME housing projects. There were two projects that took years to develop, involving millions of dollars, which should be completed in the next six months. One was a large senior housing project in Warrenville. The other has a new construction and rehab elements in Naperville for senior housing. The County will be involved for many years (30 years in one project and 20 in the other) to insure that these projects stay as affordable housing.

The Emergency Solutions Grant (ESG) is related to homeless service providers for individuals experiencing homelessness or infrastructure that supports individuals who are experiencing homelessness and/or cycling in and out of homelessness.

There was still Disaster Recovery (Community development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery) money from a flood event that happened in 2013. The Department’s very last project is flood control at the Elmhurst quarry. The total amount of CDBG-DR funds received was $31 million.

He informed the Committee that there was $10 million dollars in COVID money, additional funding in HOME and more money in the infrastructure bill.

There were two programmatic updates. Historically, the County had supported a homebuyer program over the last 20 to 25 years. Participation had dropped drastically in the past five years. There were zero participants in the last year. It was believed that there are market forces in play; banks have better deals; HUD regulations are strict, and people have fallen out of the process because they could not pass all the underwriting standards. Mutually decided with H.O.M.E. DuPage was to end this agreement. There would not be a homebuyer program in the immediate future. If the situation changes the program could be reopened.

McDermott informed the municipal members that it was anticipated to hold a municipal project round this summer. In addition, to requests for streets and roads, funding could be used for parks, green infrastructure projects, and bike lanes. Applications are consistently received from Addison, West Chicago, Bensenville. Other communities have low to moderate income population to qualify for this funding. If interested, please contact staff for assistance. The funding received is a combination of all of the municipal populations. Unincorporated areas are also eligible and would need to find an agency to represent them. These applications would potentially be funded over the next three years. Keating thanked the entire Community Development staff for the incredible work this past year and Dave McDermott for his incredible work at his first year at the County. The funds were incredibility complex and took a huge amount of work to get the projects off the ground. With the HOME projects, an additional 200 units of senior housing was added.

After adjournment of the Community Development Commission, Keating reminded the individuals who were on the Executive Committee to stay for the HOME Advisory Group meeting.

Selmon wanted to pass along a very kind thank you from a constituent who had received information for services from Community Services for their aged mother and for the programs they qualified for as well, as well as vaccines. She said the way individual families were helped do not always get highlighted. She looked forward to all the innovative things that will be considered with new the federal funding.

7. OTHER BUSINESS

There was no other business.

8. ADJOURNMENT

The motion was made by Garcia, seconded by Renehan, to adjourn the meeting at 12:00 pm. On a Roll Call Vote, all Ayes, the meeting was adjourned.

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