Travis County Commssioners Court
July 22, 2003
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Corporations
Good afternoon. Let's call to order the Travis County housing finance corporation. And the Travis County facilities development corporation. One item, a and b, common to both corporations. And that item a is consider whether to lift moratorium on new contracts and take appropriate action, and b, consider and take appropriate action on request from foundation kpupbts for financial contribution toward construction costs of housing for homeless Travis County residents. We did receive a presentation from the representatives. From the foundation community a few weeks ago. And I think I recognize two of the ones who came down. And I think we told them that we would get back to them sooner or later. They phoned me several times wondering when we would do that soy put it back on the court's skwrepbt. I did ask mr. Davis to bring us a refresher on the balances in those two corporations. And you have that?
>> yes, sir. At this time if, for example, the corporation, if I were making a recommendation of what to be transferred in f.y. '04 from the corporation, I would recommend $350,000. And my estimate of the balances for -- of available funds from the housing finance corporation is a little over 250,000, and from the health facilities development corporation is a little over $380,000.
>> so those two numbers, the balances in those corporation accounts today?
>> no, sir. No, the balances today are much larger, but we do have the transfer that the corporations are committed to Travis County for this -- for the f.y. '03 year, which is a little over a million dollars. So that money is waiting to be transferred to the county.
>> those would be available funds after the corporations have met other outstanding commitments.
>> yes, sir. We have plat fee reimbursement commitments, the any baby can commitments, other smaller commitments.
>> okay.
>> what, if anything, have you included in your projections for next year related to a transfer into the Travis County general fund, which is a pretty standard request of the correspondence?
>> right. In this estimate i've not made any estimate of that because that is a decision of the board and, you know, of course it varies from year to year.
>> speaking of varying from year to year, can you give us a sense of how much the corporations, in a sense, have transferred into the general fund for purposes of budget deliberations?
>> well, of course for f.y. '03, the amount is a million and $50,000, the average over the last five or six years has been in excess of 500,000.
>> so we've looked to the corporation to help offset some of the expenditures on the general fund side.
>> yes.
>> and at this point you have zero in for a transfer in for purposes during the budget process.
>> that's right. And if you are asking me to make a recommendation today, it would be about $350,000.
>> [inaudible] unfortunately [inaudible].
>> i've always thought we ought to take the corporation money and spend it on direct services rather than putting it into the general fund. In fact, even last year one of us made a motion to take a sizable amount of that corporation money, transfer it into health and human services thinking that would be more direct. And historically we transferred money from corporations because money was plentiful. In my view, there is a serious question about what benefit this money would have to this project for the homeless, and it seems to me it would be substantial. You know, there's a 50-unit federal commitment that covers half of the housing available, and the other 50% would be basically lease to do homeless persons -- leased to homeless persons on a sort of income-based formula. That provides that the most you pay is 30% of what you earn. The less you make, the less you pay. The more you make, the more you pay. Up to a certain amount. And our goal is to transition out of this facility on your own. So when I look and ask myself which one is better, this really is the kind of project, kind of like a sobriety center that we talk about day in and day out and at some point we have to move out. In my own view, if there is 300,000 available and we transfer 100,000 to help with this project, that leaves $200,000. I'm not sure that I would recommend --
>> 250.
>> so we just picked up $50,000? We have 250 available?
>> yes, sir.
>> so 100,000 from that will leave 150.
>> we have 350 total is what he is telling us.
>> then my --
>> I'm sorry, 350. [inaudible] would be 250.
>> is this a one-time -- I'm sorry, go ahead, judge. I didn't mean to cut you off.
>> it would be a one-time deal.
>> that's what I was trying to drive at. A one-time deal or do we have to come back again repetitively for the same item because some of this looks like it's going to generate some revenue by some shape or form or fashion. And if it's a one-time thing it's one thing, but if --
>> are you talking about the requests from foundation, the community.
>> yes.
>> this is a one-time request, yes. That's my understanding.
>> well --
>> well, the other thing is that health and human services requests costs are going up as well and we haven't seen the end of that, and those, I think, we're committed to also.
>> I agree.
>> to provide funds for. And I can see us, you know, needing to transfer from here.
>> well, I guess -- my question, though, and let me ask the applicant, I need to ask some specific questions. I am not going to belabor it, but we have several dollars that are being -- or is a part of this here. Is there any -- anybody else other than the federal dollars for leverage of this project? Especially if 50% of this is to address the homeless needs of the community, is there anybody else that's coming on board other than the federal government and hopefully the housing finance corporation of Travis County?
>> yes.
>> can you give me those specifics?
>> the project has federal, state and city funding.
>> federal state and city?
>> approximately a million dollars from the state. Texas department of housing and community affairs. $1.8 million from the city of Austin. Then we have a long-term commitment from the department of housing and urban development for the feds to subsidize the rents of the individuals.
>> okay.
>> the individuals sign a lease just like an apartment and they pay some rent, but the rent is based on amount of income. That's for 50 of the 85 units. The other 35 units are available to any low-income person with a rent of $300 a month.
>> okay.
>> [inaudible].
>> could you come up, please? And just state who you are.
>> this is helen with [inaudible]. This project is a partnership between foundation [inaudible] and the capital area homeless.
>> can you state --
>> we also have private funding from individuals and foundations and corporations.
>> it's approximately $4.2 million project and we have a $300,000 gap right now. All of it is funded except for $300,000.
>> and you are asking for at this time Travis County --
>> we're asking for whatever help you can provide us. We would love to have 300,000. We would be happy to have 100,000. It's a wonderful project. Very well received. The phone is ringing off the wall for this project.
>> and it is a really wonderful project, and the only thing is that we have some really wonderful things that we're doing at Travis County right now to meet the medical needs, the health needs, the basic needs of some of the folks that we serve. And it's really kind of a heartache to kind of have -- the two needs kind of tugging at each other, but I -- I see us kind of really, you know, just trying to pull moneys together when the bill comes in for what we need in health and human services to provide our clients, and that's what's tugging in opposite directions for me.
>> I think that's a really -- I think we understand that. One thing -- and that makes sense. I think one thing to consider is there a decrease and they've done lots of these in other cities and done studies on them and there's a significant percent decrease in tenants' use of emergency rooms. There's a 50% increase in earned incomes. So it's really cost effective to do these things, which is one of the reasons why the federal government has listed this kind of housing, permanent supportive housing as top priority because it's really cost effective.
>> and the good thing about them is I guess they are in good enough health to where they can get a job. Whereas some of our clients are not.
>> we take people with disabilities.
>> children, disabled, you know. So I mean it's a real --
>> I think this project will save the county long term. The only issue for you is you make a one-time investment of a few hundred thousand dollars or so for a project that saves on the health and human services side for every year for the life of the project for a long-term owner we'll have this for 30 years.
>> unfortunately what we found in previous example on this is that we thought in terms of doing some things with seton that we thought we were saving dollars on the health and human services side and it turns out we were saving money for the city of Austin in their hult health and human services budget. That doesn't mean that's not a good thing, but it did not translate into good things related to this budget. And unfortunately we are very much dependent on property taxes. And i've heard up and down this dais about folks wanting to cut expenses or find more dollars. Well, this is a way to find more dollars if these dollars go into the general fund, and I don't even have a problem with it going into the health and human services budget. But I think our own budget is going to need assistance, and I think your project is terrific, but its timing is not good. If this were two years ago, we would be in a different situation. But I have to be looking out for the discussions we're having related to our general fund, property tax burdens on folks. We have $350,000 to transfer, that's where I'm going to put it. That's one person.
>> well, because I think this program provides comprehensive relief that we talk about quite a bit instead of band-aid approach, my guess if we were to help the same 75, 85 homeless individuals, it would not be the comprehensive systemic approach that's provided here. In addition to the housing component, there are also wrap-around services that are provided residents, and the goal is basically to help these residents achieve some sort of independent lifestyles so they would move out on their own. This homeless issue has been with us a long time. I think we have been trying to do what we could to address it. I don't know that we have had any program, though, that has been as comprehensive as this one and it has been shown to be effective in other places, and seems to me it ought to be effective here. And in my view, it is a better expenditure of $100,000 of corporation money to fund a program like this than any of the other programs acknowledge and projects that I know of. Commissioner Davis.
>> I think also it would be very important for me to see the meat of it, meaning that if the county, housing finance corporation, would like to possibly be in favor of transferring $100,000 to this particular project, it appears to me that there ought to be some measurement that will be employed by your organization to see what you get for the investment. In other words, if you have 85 units, 35 of these units will be for low income, then the other 50 would be for the homeless persons, and of course we're looking at the wrap-around services throughout health and human services department, and it just appears to me there ought to be a measure in tune with the amount of money that's invested not only by the state, by the city and by the county of what we're getting for the dollars that you are requesting for investment. When would those measurements be available and on what time frame? On a quarterly basis or a semiannual basis, on an annual basis? Some [inaudible] that reflect the investment that would be made and has been made by others and hopefully by the Travis County housing authority we could actually see those numbers.
>> the first thing, the wrap-around services, we provide those on site. And we've provided those from the income out of the property. So all the services that those people might be needing on a regular basis, we actually provide. We're not referring them to somebody else to provide them. So as far as calculating the numbers, you know, the question is for those particular 85 individuals that live in these units, could you predict from them or could you measure what their expenses would be for health and human services side, I'm not sure if there's a way to measure what doesn't happen. But what we can say is that all those kinds of services that might have gotten off site for -- if they were homeless, for example, you can take the average cost per homeless person, those go to zero.
>> I think I can address that as well.
>> thank you.
>> go ahead.
>> we can follow suit with some of the other studies that have been done. I'm the director of the homeless shelt -r and we serve the conicly long-term homeless people. All the chronically long-term homeless people have a mental illness. Some of it is the obvious mental illness like schizophrenia or psychosis, but a lot of it is axis 2 diagnose which is less obvious, but still severe enough to keep your life time going around in a circle like you don't have some support. I mention that because they are the really high users of public services both mental hospitals, regular hospitals, jails and whatnot. And according to studies that have been done nationally on that, and there has been a lot of work on this, the savings, I think -- well, of course it depends on the cities she but in an afternoon city it spends $16,000 a year. So what we have to do is follow suit with these other studies and they generally give it two or three years so that they can, you know, have some data to base it on.
>> right. Well, that's -- go ahead. I'm sorry.
>> and we would be happy to do that.
>> I really feel comfortable because I think if we had some numbers to go by, I think we would know what you are getting per investment and performance and a whole bunch of other things I think is critical when you are spending dollars as for as performance. But not only that is correct I feel that all of that, any of us in here could be a homeless person. We may just be a paycheck from being homeless. All of us. I don't think anybody is immune from being homeless and it is a problem. But I would support -- I think I could support the judge's position as far as in looking at what he had brought up with the [inaudible] we have here for transferable reasons for -- that could be transferred to general fund, but take $100,000 from that to use for this particular cause. But I would like to have some assurance that this money, wherever it's going, is being well spent and we do address the needs and the concerns of the community as far as social services is concerned. But I think it's an appropriate question to be satisfied with what we're doing here.
>> it is. Jennifer? We have a hard time staying on that row.
>> I'm jennifer with foundation communities. Just to speak to your earlier question about seeing where your money is going, we have a strict compliance regulations with the money we are receiving from the federal government, from the state and from the city. There will be quarterly compliance reports that we have to send in for the state and the city. We're audited every year on an annual basis by the federal government through the state and the city. And when we throw up 100% occupancy that building, we will have the services each person uses in that building, the money, the income if they are on a fixed income, what services they do use, so we would be able to give you a -- some kind of report this percentage of the population uses this agency, things like that. That's very accessible information that we could provide you.
>> I would appreciate that very much.
>> and you compare that to people not housed. You compare it to similar homeless people.
>> right.
>> you think you would be able to keep records that show the residents who progress to the point where they move out?
>> oh, sure.
>> move on with their lives?
>> sure.
>> [inaudible]. We have programs designed to help people, for example, move out of our other properties and purchase homes or expand a small business or go to college and we track that.
>> what services do you now provide homeless people at your agency?
>> we provide case management service. We provide the cold weather shelter services in conjunction with the churches. They all open up on cold weather nights because the population is so much greater. We provide rental assistance, first month rent and security deposits, and we provide job training.
>> so the housing you have is temporary housing.
>> the housing that I have at the shelter, I don't have housing, I provide first month's rent and security deposit to get into at-market housing. And those are for transitionly homeless or the economically homeless who are living one paycheck away and something has happened and so they've fallen into homelessness. I separate that from the conicly homeless who tend to have disabilities.
>> this program, though, will attempt to collaborate with the other agencies that serve homeless persons.
>> oh, it definitely will. We've done training sessions for the other homeless service providers. They are lined up waiting to get their clients in. There's lots more people that need it than there will be room.
>> and we'll be providing office for visiting caseworkers.
>> I know we have housing services like salvation army that is supposed to provide temporary housing. But do we have programs that really provide permanent housing for homeless folk where the [inaudible] to progress to the point they are no longer homeless?
>> this is permanent housing.
>> I know. Is there another one in addition to this?
>> no. This is the only one.
>> that's -- that was my recollection, but I wasn't sure.
>> right. This would be the first one. Austin is a little kind of behind the wave on this. Most cities this size would have several.
>> well, you are working on the cottagees.
>> yes.
>> there's more in the corks.
>> as you can tell from my comments, this is a sort of tough year for us budget-wise and I don't know if there is any black or white here n my view, if we take $100,000 from the corporations with this program it's a better expenditure than taking the same $100,000 and providing the kind of temporary relief we have done historically. Therefore my motion is we take $50,000 from each of these two corporations for a total of 100,000 to help with this program.
>> second.
>> seconded by Commissioner Davis. Any more discussion? Commissioner Daugherty.
>> I take it you don't have to get the whole $285,000 to start the program.
>> that's correct.
>> you are going to -- you know, limp along, I mean, and continue to raise the dollars.
>> we're funding it out of our own reserves.
>> I mean I would be inclined -- I know there's a motion on the table, but, you know, to sort of do something in more of a piecemeal -- I mean if we were to cover 10% of this and look -- I mean come in and see the program. I mean that's what I'm always more afraid of is everybody's got -- there's so many needs in this community and there are so limited -- there's such a limited amount of dollars. Is that something that have any of the people you've gone to said maybe we'll give you some, we'll come back -- come back in six months, tell us where you are, what you are short, let's see if we can give some money, give some additional moneys if you hadn't? Because obviously you are going to go out and continue to cover this 285.
>> right. Well, no one said that yet. But certainly we'll -- certainly we would do that.
>> I mean would --
>> are you asking them to come back?
>> well, is the way this is done is ask for a friendly amendment to give 10% of this money, which would give 28 five and in six months us look and see where they would be. They may go out and raise this money. If they can't, then we would take a look at issuing an additional 10%.
>> 10% of 100,000 or 10% of 300,000?
>> well, I mean obviously they came in looking for -- you know, we immediately went to 100,000, which is what we -- what is kind of circling around. I'm trying to get them to the 285. Since we're not going to do the 300, I know 100 is on the table, but I would be more comfortable covering 10% of the 285. In six months if they haven't covered it and they can show us this is where we've gotten at this point and we have the ability to give them more, that's something I would consider.
>> and what if we do 18% now, another 18% December 31st subjected to need?
>> I mean, I would -- I would be for that, judge.
>> it basically commits us to making sure that we have 50,000 available December 31st. The substitute motion by Commissioner Daugherty is to basically fund 50,000 now and look at, based on need and effectiveness of the program six months from now the other $50,000.
>> if they hadn't raised it because they will continue to try to raise it knowing we may not have -- there's a big line -- after you all leave here that you all know that we are going to be faced with. Because it wouldn't take us that long to spend our whole $350,000. So we may not have it.
>> I can promise you the fundraising efforts will not slow down.
>> can I ask a technical question? If this were to pass, how would you handle that in the budget. I'll hear 50,000 and we'll see where we're at. Are you going to handle that as even come branson or not because we have to make a decision related to the general fund and I hate to keep harping on it, but every dollar is going to be needed and where we don't have dollars it's all out of property taxes? Taxes.
>> well, okay. Let me try to answer that and then I have a question.
>> the real question is you will do what we ask you to do.
>> what are you going directed to? [laughter]
>> while you are thinking about that, I withdraw my motion. Which was 100,000. Commissioner Davis, what about your second? I withdraw my motion, I guess you wait. $50,000 now, looking at $50,000 in six months. Also looking at the needs and effectiveness of the program when it opens and six months from today. We make the call then. Now, this court has always lived up to its commitments.
>> right, that's the problem.
>> in my view, we will have 50,000 available in six months if we determine that we should provide the funding.
>> but [inaudible] voted $100,000.
>> if we said -- I might be for the motion if we said 50,000 and that's it.
>> I would probably be more for that motion than be -- if i've got to commit to 100,000 now, I'm not comfortable doing it. [multiple voices]
>> I would go to a substitute motion then please for 50,000, that's it.
>> and since we can't do the conditional [inaudible].
>> we may not have it. If we have a need, we're going to have to raise property taxes to meet that need.
>> since the original motion went away, I would move a substitute motion of $50,000 to be split between the two corporations and that's it.
>> second.
>> any discussion of the substitute motion?
>> yes, judge, let me just ask a couple of questions, I think. When I was asking you earlier about the timing and having enough adequate time to come back before us to provide necessary data to ensure that what you are doing we're getting the bang for the buck. And I think the young lady had mentioned that there were some surveys that have been done and a lot of the things, but as far as Austin, Texas, Travis County is concerned, the question is would that be enough time looking at the six-month scenario or looking at all this information then to come back to the court in the time frame to provide performance information to suggest that the data would be available to do what you are doing.
>> and as I understand it, the data you are interested in compares the cost of homeless people using public services when they are not housed compared to the cost of homeless people using public services when they are housed is largely what you are interested in the cost savings to hospitals, to jails, to things like that. I'm just kind of confirming, I think I heard earlier that was your interest.
>> right.
>> and you know the truthful answer is I'm not sure that six months would give us enough time.
>> to come back with that kind of information.
>> I don't know enough about how to conduct those studies to even might -- it might. I don't know the answer.
>> that's what my concern was. And not knocking your motion, Commissioner Daugherty, I want to make sure whatever we're asking them they have enough time to present the accurate information. That's why I asked the question would it be enough time for them to come back to see if we could go and --
>> that's why there's not that motion. [multiple voices]
>> that's right, Commissioner. That's the reason that i've gone to the 50.
>> so you changed -- I would love to see in a year -- as far as I'm concerned, this is a health and human services. Whether we deal with them through this matter or whether we deal with them through steven, we have a finite amount of money that we are going to be comfortable spending, and I recognize that taking $50,000, you know, out of the pot is telling h.h.s. When they come to us because their needs are going to be so much greater. All of us understand the needs are so much greater than what we have to deal with. But I like the fact that this is highly leveraged. You all have done lots of great, you know, homework, going out and collecting lots of funds, and if I could get everybody, you know, or if all of us could get everybody to do that, that's really where we would like to be. So Commissioner, that's the reason I'm comfortable with putting in 50, leaving it at that and in a year --
>> so you withdrew your motion.
>> no, there was a substitute motion.
>> but is your motion still on the floor?
>> no.
>> you are withdrawing it?
>> I withdraw my motion.
>> and I still have my motion I put out there which is 50,000 one time splitting between the two corporations. That's it.
>> and we would come back in December and talk to you again. If you do happen to have money there's no commitment at this time. Just tell you where we are and give you an update.
>> probably in a year.
>> but I would be open -- [multiple voices]
>> all in favor of the motion.
>> it passes unanimously. Thank you.
>> thank you.
>> $50,000, 25 from each corporation.
>> judge, I have a quick question related to this particular item. Do we need to incorporate whether we need to do the a portion of this related to a moratorium?
>> not to me.
>> what instructions do we give to mr. Davis related to the timing of this check? Is this after October 1?
>> and do you want a contract?
>> yes, I do. Like we've done with everybody else.
>> my position on the first is as soon as you can write it.
>> but not this fiscal year.
>> I don't know why not.
>> [inaudible].
>> there would be that much -- 50,000 there would be available so it could be paid.
>> we would lose out on the interest.
>> what the corporation pledged is a contribution sometime next year. We typically make the transfer in the summer. The year ending fund balance for the corporations have nothing to do with what we do in the budget process. Is there a motion on -- do you have a motion on when you will make the transfer? Maybe it ought to be made asap.
>> we usually do it in August.
>> you feel comfortable with it being immediate?
>> yes, I would come back to the cord with a contract, request the board to amend as we do have a budget request that we amend the budget to provide the funds to make this payment.
>> based on mr. Davis' assurances, as soon as it can be brought back to court with the appropriate contract.
>> may I suggest that you take a look at the contracts for the city, state, federal government to avoid duplication where possible?
>> yes, I will.
>> or even any baby can.
>> don't make the agency spend $50,000 [inaudible].
>> okay.
>> move adjournment of the corporations.
>> second.
>> all in favor? Passes unanimously. Thank you all very much.
Last Modified: Wednesday, July 23, 2003 6:51 PM