Housing environment isnt always as easy to obtain as we first might imagine. The issue of Affordable Housing in cedar rapids is a perennial one, but this summer it came to a head with a controversy surrounding the Crestwood Ridge mixed Income Development proposed for some land along edgewood road. Here with me this morning to untangle some member of our city council. Thank you for joining us, scott. Scott my pleasure. Heather phoebe trepp who is the executive director of willis dady shelter. Phoebe thanks for having me. Heather welcome phoebe. And lynda waddington, a columnist for the gazette. Lynda good morning. Heather good morning, lynda. Thank you all so much for joining us. I thought we would begin very quickly with a little bit of an overview of how has shifted over the years. Many years ago when i was in school in chicago, i used to do a lot of volunteer work with what was at the time called the projects, cabrinigreen. That kind of concentrated, lowincome housing is a model that over the years there has been a shift away from. I thought wed talk a little bit about what Affordable Housing looks like in the cedar rapids area today. Does somebody want to jump in with that . Phoebe i can start by giving a little explanation about what that means, what the words mean. Often when people are talking about Affordable Housing that someone can live in without paying more than 30 of their own income on that housing. That would change, obviously, if your income goes up. You may be able to pay more for your mortgage or your rent. If it goes down, you would have to pay less to make that affordable to you. What we know in cedar rapids is that many of our citizens are cost burdened, meaning theyre paying more than 30 of their income just to pay people that are called extremely costburdened, which mean theyre paying over 50 of their income just to pay the rent each month. I think its over 40 of renters are cost burdened in cedar rapids. When you think about if youre spending that much on housing, whats left for you to put getting them new shoes for gym, whatever those things are that you might do with your extra money . There is no extra money especially with a health hardship, if something comes up. All of sudden you cant make the rent because you had to pay an unusually large bill. Thats kind of what Affordable Housing means. Theres different forms, as you mentioned. People think often of the projects, as this Public Housing institution that used to be around isnt so much. A lot of funding was shifted into section 8 Housing Private landlords to be a part of that housing solution. What we know today just from a recent survey i saw today that was done in cedar rapids and linn county in july is that one in five of the people that are eligible for those vouchers can actually get a voucher. That means over 80 of people that would qualify cant get one, so theyre stuck in the average market rate rental units when theyre having to all of a sudden pay that 40, 50 of their income. Hopefully, that helps. Lynda i think when we were issue at the gazette of part of the editorial board, one of the statistics that really stuck out to me is that Cedar Rapids School district has a homeless liaison that works with families who are experiencing homeless. Last year in the Cedar Rapids School district, there were over 600 students that were homeless. I dont think thats something that we always see in our community. Its not in your face as it is in some other areas of the country, but it is an issue here bit. Could speak a little bit more so our listeners can understand when youre talking about 600 homeless, what that looks like in a childs life . Lynda you have, honestly, families who are on the street. You have families that might be in shelters, Emergency Services shelters. You have families that might be living in hotels. You have families that might be couch surfing, going from a relatives home to another friends home and sleeping they find to sleep on. What we know is that when students are going through school like that, they perform much worse than their peers, even their peers that are also in poverty, so they are really scraping the bottom of that academic barrel. I find that unacceptable to think that we have that many kids here in cedar rapids with all the wealth that we have in having reached their potential. Phoebe if i can add a little to those numbers, lynda mentioned the school numbers, but when you look at just the general Homeless Population in linn county, well over 1,000 people were in shelters last year. Thats just looking at the emergency shelters. A lot of families often dont come to shelter because they are doubled moving next to next to next. In the shelters, we saw more than 1,000 people that were literally homeless, nowhere to go on a given night in the last year here in cedar rapids, linn county. Heather thank you for those. I guess i dont know if i want to say thank you for those statistics. Scott yeah, statistics, yes. Heather . Because those are not very good statistics for us to be learning about, but hopefully that will help us know what a pressing issue this is. Lets talk a little more about guess. You said only one in five. Is that a bottleneck due to the amount of money thats available, or is the a bottleneck maybe with the amount of Housing Available . Phoebe thats a great question. The one in five refers to how many section 8 vouchers are available so how much funding has come in to cedar rapids to be designated for section 8 vouchers. The Affordable Housing process. Often whe come to shelter or call for services. We have people that might not want to leave that couch that theyre on but are calling because they really need a different alternative. When they come to us, we meet with them to identify their immediate barriers, whether that is that they lost a job, healthcare issue, whatever is going on so we know how to best fill that gap. We work very closely with all the other shelters in the community. We work with Shelter Services to coordinate whats the best service for each individual. Once theyve met with Shelter Services and done an application, they would go forward with rapid get all caught up in. Its shortterm Financial Assistance that can help a family typically from one to there months pay for rent just to get them out of the shelter and back into housing. Often were using market rate units and not affordable units, so were working with landlords, private landlords, some Public Housing facilities, senior housing, anywhere that we ca goal is lets get you housing as soon as possible regardless of the situation because we know that homelessness causes more crisis, more instability, some of the educational problems you mentioned. Often we end up, admittedly, putting someone in a situation that really isnt really ideal longterm, but it gets them out the shelter, which is better than being in a shelter. Does that help explain where were at . The lucky few, less than 1 of our clients had can actually find this person housing where they can stay for years to come. One of the biggest gaps is really the deposit and first months rent you have to pay, so youre looking at two months of rent up front. If youre already paying over 50 of your income, theres no way you can come up with another 50 for the deposit. Lynda scott might be able to speak to this as well be survey. One of the things that it said is that cedar rapids by the year 2020 is going to need another 4,100, i think, units of housing. Heather wow. Scott i think whats happening is that ive had the opportunity over the years, both as an architect and in the real estate business, i chaired the Affordable Housing commission for nine out of the ten years we had one. We dont have one now, which is unfortunate. We worked together because the resources have vouchers, all the different types of programs have dwindled. In the reverse side, if you look at the current housing studies across the board, we have a very low vacancy rate, and so landlords can find market rate. Heather market rate. Scott . And our apartment rents are climbing. Now, theyre starting to climb because more people want apartments than buy homes. Thats the millennium trend. They want to try it out before they make a commitment. They want to try out a job. They want to rent. Whats happening is we have this demand for apartment living, and its driving the pric less and less affordable for people that are on that lower tier that are struggling with the 30 to 50 , and there are some people with a much higher percent than that. The Government Programs are shrinking, and the new programs are such is that the government is not building, whether its city, state, or federal, theyre not Building People at lower brackets. I was president of geneva tower. That was a hud project that has kept the rents low, but thats a very unique project in todays markets. It was built in the 70s and has been remodeled since to bring it up to more current standards. The problem is were seeing a positive economy in our cedar rapids area thats driving rents up, which makes it more and m Affordable Housing. What is a positive for the community has become a negative for what i think is a growing trend of lack of Affordable Housing. Its a very difficult issue to address and who is the lead . Is it nonprofits . As a member of four oaks, we have several programs through our housing, cedar valley housing, hawthorne, other programs that weve jumped back into that business because a lot stress points is housing. Heather is housing. Scott weve determined that for us to have successful kids, we have to be able to find them housing. Weve addressed it through creating facilities to serve our clients. Its a catch22 a Strong Economy which makes it, then, more difficult for those people in need. Lynda i think at any given time in cedar ra just affordable, but all vacancy rates is between 2 and 3 of our Housing Stock at any moment, so were not having turnover. We dont have a vacancy rate that encourages lower rents, so everyone is paying top tier if youre paying market rent. Heather that was one of things i was going to bring up. We heard a lot about that Affordable Housing stock that was wiped out in the flood, a lot of the smaller, lower rental places. We do have a lot of development now. You see it popping up all over the downtown and the newbo area. How does that impact. . Because i know some of those are mixed bit . Scott what we have done is we have definitely replaced all of the housing lost in the flood, but the difference is the type of housing thats replaced it. We have quite a few units that have used special tax credit programs where a certain percentage of their units, 50 normally, have to be rented to individuals at 80 of the Median Income or less. That means you have to have a job. You have to have good credit. You cant have a criminal record. You have to be a good citizen. We are filling the gap there but thats. Heather but not across the board. Scott . Not across the board, not at that lower tier of housing. So weve replaced it. Weve got lots of new housing. Weve gotten lots of new apartment complexes. Weve got lots of new theres not a lot of them designed around those people transitioning from homelessness into a lower level of housing rental because you cant just build new and rent it for those numbers. We lost a lot of the old rental housing that was at those lower numbers, and it was lost in the flood. Lynda i think another piece thats missing from cedar rapids that marion has is, in their civil rights code, they use lawful source of income, which means you cant refuse a renter that comes to you with a section 8 voucher, you can. Scott thats correct. Lynda you can ask them on the phone before they even apply, are you doing section 8 . You can say, well, i just dont take section 8. Thats illegal in marion but allowed in cedar rapids. Heather allowed in cedar rapids. Phoebe if i could jump in, those numbers are also important to look at things like 60 ami or area Median Income. We have a lot of people we work with, some of my employees are at that level. Scott 60, yeah. Phoebe professionals, people who can make 14, 15 an hour but they have a child would qualify for a 60 ami because theyre earning 60 of area Median Income, but thats still well under those 80 ami rent levels. Thats where, as scott mentioned, those lower levels but it could range from minimum wage up to a 15 an hour job. A lot of the people working in the service industry, people who might take care of your are people that are would qualify based on their income for these units. Heather lets now segue into the Crestwood Ridge development. That had a lot of News Coverage this summer, quite a bit in the gazette, as i was. Lynda just a little. Heather just a little in the gazette. Can you tell us a little bit about how this particular development came into being . What was the process for that . Phoebe officially willis dady is a partner on the project. Heather is a contractual member of the project but commonbond approached us last fall, so a year ago now, because they had heard that Iowa Finance Authority was going to be doing a demonstration project for the state of iowa to do a unit of housing that would set aside five units for formerly homeless families. Part of the stipulation that they put in place was that the developer had to work with a Service Provide in the area, which i thought was a great way to do it. Commonbond h years theyve been in existence. They primarily have their projects in minnesota, but they also have some in iowa including some in cedar rapids and des moines, marshalltown , but many of those have been renovation projects so not new. However, they run similar from the ground up in minnesota, illinois, and have over 100 projects. When they approached us, i was pretty excited. They know what theyre doing. Beyond that, they also invest back into the not looking to sell it in 10 years and to heck with it. They really want to make it last for those tenants. So they approached us. We began working on what would be a framework for services for those five units. Then they approached the city to look for sites that would be appropriate. Really wanted a site that was in a nice neighborhood, residential, on a bus stop, close to schools, so the Crestwood Ridge site was identified as a. Future lan be multifamily, so it really fit in to the scheme of what this project was intended for. We put in a joint application right after the 1st of the year, very close to the 1st of the year. At that time i collected all the applications, and then we were just waiting. We had a wait period to see who would be awarded an 8 million tax credit to build this project. 10 of the units had to be set aside, so commonbond proposed a 45unit building, five of which would be the units are mixed, so theres four market rate, and then a mix of 40 area Median Income and 60 . Theres a lot of numbers coming at you but a lot of Affordable Housing would be created through the 45units. Heather it sounds like it really goes from one end of the spectrum to the other. Phoebe exactly, all the way up to the market rate. At that time we held a neighborhood meeting to see what the thoughts would be. I attended that. There were some questions about tra that point if the money would be awarded, so at this point we were all just putting our time in and hoping we would get this funding. We found out in may that the project was funded. Only one project could be chosen for the whole state, and the project was funded because the site worked, the services provider, willis dady, had a good reputation. Commonbond has an excellent reputation. At that time we went back to the neighborhood and tried to water, traffic, and some questions about who would go to the school. In the meantime, they had approached planning and zoning because they had to get it rezoned in order to build. That was prior to being awarded the funding. We found out about the funding and went back to the neighborhood, and now well approach city council on the 25th so coming up on tuesday. Heather right around the corner. Phoebe yes. Heather right around the corner. Phoebe hopefully that gives you some timeline. There are questions and concerns. It sounds like youve begun that process in the neighborhood. One of the concerns that got some was concerns about what it meant to have those five formerly homeless families or individuals in those apartments, and what it meant to have the support of housing versus just an Affordable Housing situation. Can you speak to a little bit about that . Phoebe project is that the five formerly homeless households would have access to an onsite case manager. One of our staff, thats where willis dady comes in. We dont own any of the property. We dont manage the property, but we would provide a case manager on site through the week to work directly with those families. The goal is just stabilization, so its really working with whatever needs you might have. It might be that youve always never quite knew how to navigate that, so we work with you on that. It might be that you havent been a leaseholder for a long time. You dont quite understand how your lease works, when you have to pay rent, how to maintain your unit, what you do versus the property manager. We would help you with that. Anything that would help you stabilize in housing, we would be there to provide services at no cost to those families. Thats these Holistic Services without charging or asking the city for funding to do it. As scott mentioned, its difficult. Sorry, youre. Scott yes. May have to change. Lynda maybe it isnt as well known locally, but thats been a national push. We used to put people in housing only after they had been able to do certain things in their life. We want you to have your children in school or whatever stipulations we might put out there and only then are we going to help you get into housing. What we found out is that it doesnt work. Now the switch is put them in housing first. Heather . Lynda . Then we can deal with any of these other challenges, but lets get them stabilized. Let them calm down into a certain place so that we can help them better themselves. Heather i have a couple of questions. You have two what, in your opinion, would be the responsibility that our community has to listen to those current neighbors of this complex in terms of addressing their concerns . Are there different ways in which you can envision that being a shared process amongst the neighborhood . Phoebe i think thats a really valid concern. Obviously are not excited about this project. Dont want it in their neighborhood. I think whats really important is to really listen to what theyre saying and try to address those things because thats all we can do. We cant really dig under Everything Else that might be meant or anything like that. If people are concerned about the traffic, we have really good information about traffic. If people are concerned about water runoff, to talk about water runoff. If theyre worried about lowering Property Values, we have a lot of information that shows Property Values will not go down. All we can do, i think, is really listen to the concerns and provide the best information possible back. I will say ive had neighbors approach me and say, i will not welcome those people in my neighbor so why would you want to put them here . I guess i dont want to operate based on fear. I think what i can say is i think if im working with they choose to live in Crestwood Ridge if it gets built, then theyve made that choice. I believe that the neighbors will see that theyre not scary people. They earn less income than the average person, but theres a lot of people on that side of the fence that earn less income than the average half of them earn. I definitely have hope that if the project gets built, i do believe the neighbors will see these are not scary people. Their kids attend the school i attend. If somebody feels, i just can win. All i can say is heres the data we have. Heres the excellent reputation. If youre going to have a builder in your neighborhood, you probably want it to be commonbond because theyre excellent. Lynda i can say at the gazette when we did research on it, we looked into commonbond. I called des moines, i called waterloo, i called st. Paul, i called milwaukee, i called marshalltown, all of these different communities, and nobody had a bad actually kept expanding that circle because nobody would tell me anything bad about commonbond. When we pulled emails that were sent to the city before the planning and Zoning Commission meeting, we actually found one email from a local resident. The gist of that email we actually printed in the paper was, i do not want lowincome and Homeless People outside my front door. I agree with phoebe. How do you counteract issue. We know Emergency Services are not going to be an issue. We know the water runoff is actually going to end up being better than it is now. When all of these very valid and legitimate concerns have been answered, youre basically left with a bunch of people who say, i dont want this in my backyard. Thats when you look to maybe the city council to show leadership. Scott well, here. Heather go. Scott here we go. Heather actually, i think youre going to get off the hook here because were running out of time. Scott were out of time. I think the issue. Heather four minte has happened is the project got off on the wrong foot, in my mind, with that negative vote from the Zoning Commission. The reason they did was they went forward before all the information was put together. Then information started getting out that was not correct. A lot of that information has been corrected. In other words, they have addressed all of the issues that were requested, but the momentum has were now talking supersized petitions. When you get petitions that total over 500 signatures, ive never had that on my time in the city council where you have petitions with those numbers of signatures, number one. In my case that property is my district and the majority of those signatures are in my district, so i have a catch22. I believe in the project, but yet i have a responsibility to represent the views of the neighbors. Even with all the answers. I think the local groups and information out that they can solve all the issues and that this is not a project. Its a mixed used project. It is not like some of the oldstyle projects where they packed a whole series of people into these areas. Theres support services there. Theres all the things necessary, and its mixed income. Thats what happening across the country. In some cities they pass laws that mandate that for any new housing project. So were going to project built. The shame of it is we have two things occurring at the level. In other words, there was a lot of misinformation. Most of that has been answered, but the neighbors are still very concerned. Weve not built a bond between the project and the neighbors. Secondly, whats happened is that weve run to the point where we have a situation where we have two Council People that have abstained thus making it very difficult to get whats now required as a super majri not sure; ive not talked to all the Council People. Were going to find out here next week is there more than one or two people that might vote against this project . Because it only takes one no vote with the remaining Council People for the project to move forward. If it gets two no votes, the project is defeated. Its going to be a very interesting vote coming here next week as to whether this project proceeds or not. Not because it isnt a good project. Its because in my mind neighborhood support group built thats opposed to the project, thats the question that comes up. Is the project good for the city . No question. Is the project good for the neighborhood . Thats where the question is, and that has not been overcome so far. We are getting positive letters supporting the project from neighbors, but they are small in comparison to the signed the petition. Scott . Signed the petition opposed to the project. Thats the debate thats going to occur at the city council level. Its going to be a very tight decision. There is a good chance that it will not receive enough yes votes as to get it through this super majority and with two members abstaining already. Heather well have been looking in the gazette on wednesday following. This particular issue, obviously, has yet to be resolved. Next week issue that will crop up in cedar rapids. The issue of housing in cedar rapids, obviously, is not one that is going to be quickly or easily resolved. Its a balance. Its between the need for housing and the desires and concerns of current homow you all for your time and for your very insightful discussion here this morning as well as thanking you, our listeners and audience. On behalf of the Inter Religious Council of linn county, this is heather hayes. I invite you to come back next week when we will continue our discussion of issuesbased ideas. Thank you and have a and personal for many years. Donald trump says the election is rigged if he doesnt win next month. Thats concerning for for his democratic opponent, hillary clinton. An eastern iowa toddler who is consistently sick is waiting on a miracle to get back to full health. And after 71 years, the chicago cubs are heading back to world series. From your 24 hour news source, this is the kcrgtv9 saturday morning news. Good morning and thanks for joining us. We begin with First Alert Storm Team meteorologis t justin gehrts. A cold front will pass through early today, but itll hardly live up to its name just yet. Something you may notice is the wind switching around to the northwest, and itll be a bit breezy at times with