Chambana Sun

Urbana Community Development Commission met Tuesday, Jan. 24.

Here are the minutes as provided by Urbana:

UNAPPROVED

MINUTES

COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION MEETING

Tuesday, January 24, 2017, City Council Chambers

400 South Vine Street, Urbana, IL 61801

Call to Order: Chairperson Cobb called the regular meeting to order at 7:03pm.

Roll Call: Kelly Mierkowski called the roll. A quorum was present.

Commission Members Present: Fred Cobb, Anne Heinze Silvis, Chris Diana, Karin Hodgin Jones, and Abdulhakeem Saalam

Commission Members Excused/Absent: Jerry Moreland, Janice Bengston, Lauren Karplus

Others Present: Kelly Mierkowski, Matt Rejc and Don Ho, Community Development Services

Approval of Minutes: Chairperson Cobb asked for approval or corrections to the November 22, 2016 minutes. Commissioner Chris moved to approve the minutes as written and Commissioner Silvis seconded the motion. The motion carried unanimously.

Petitions and Communications: Chairperson Cobb asked if there was any written communication to the Commission, there were none.

Audience Participation: Chairperson Cobb stated that audience members could speak if they so wished, no one from the audience stepped forward to speak.

Staff Report: Kelly Mierkowski, Grants Management Manager, provided a brief overview of the staff report provided to the Commissioners that evening, which included HUD activities, staff activities, meetings attended, and various projects and programs.

Old Business: None.

New Business:

A RESOLUTION APPROVING AN INTERGOVERNMENTAL COLLABORATION AGREEMENT (ASSESSMENT OF FAIR HOUSING PY2020)

Ms. Mierkowski mentioned that the Grants Management Division (GMD) is required by HUD to do an assessment of fair housing. Regulations require that an analysis of impediments to fair housing to be completed. HUD has now clarified and updated the regulations regarding fair housing so it is no longer the analysis of impediments to fair housing. It is now an assessment of fair housing. The regulations also call for, if possible and recommended, the City to do a regional collaboration so that it can have a broader scope and more information regarding housing in the community.

Last summer, HUD Director Ray Willis came down from Chicago along with the Public and Indian Housing side, and the Community Planning and Development side. They discussed about a possibility of doing collaboration. The Village of Rantoul and another community in the state would have been the first two that would have to do this assessment. By doing the collaboration and being involved, they are now on Urbana timetable and not their timetable. As a result, they now have more time to work on gathering all the information that they need for the assessment.

HUD provided a template for the agreement in which GMD has been working with the Legal Department to come up with a governmental collaboration agreement. In talking with different housing authorities in the area as well entitlement and counties, all the entities are on board with the agreement. Knowing that the assessment will take quite a while, GMD is working on this agreement and will send the agreement to all the potential partners. The next step is to set up the first meeting to discuss and start the process. The City has done other intergovernmental agreements in the past. This agreement also falls along the City’s consolidated plan.

To make sure the goals are consistent and collaborative, the City of Urbana will be the lead entity. Each entity will work according to the agreement. The types of collaborations can be between consolidated plan jurisdictions, between public housing agencies, or between consolidated plan jurisdictions and public housings. Ms. Mierkowski said that she had contacted all the public housing agencies in the area, including Pike County Housing Authority, Ford County Housing Authority, Champaign County Housing Authority, Vermillion County Housing Authority and Danville Housing Authority. They are very excited for this collaboration because most of them have limited staff. The key communities include the City of Champaign, the City of Urbana, Village of Rantoul, City of Danville, and the Regional Planning Commission.

GMD is working towards the first meeting in order to formalize the collaboration and divide all the parts for this assessment. All the program participants are responsible for assigning at least a person or two to serve on this committee so GMD can prepare this assessment and establish goals. Each entity is going to have its own goals as well as collaborating goals. There will be no impact on the City budget or federal funding. Ms. Mierkowski recommended the commission to forward this resolution to Council with a recommendation for approval. Chairperson Cobb asked about the timetable for this assessment. Ms. Mierkowski said it would be due when the next consolidated plan is due, but she would need to look at the regulations more to make sure. There is no timetable for the assessment yet because the first meeting has not occurred. Chairperson Cobb asked if there is any impact on the GMD staff time even though the City budget would not be impacted. Ms. Mierkowski said that the impact on staff time would be minimal.

Chairperson Cobb entertained a motion to either forward the Resolutions to Council with a recommendation for approval, forward the resolutions to Council with a recommendation for approval with changes, or to not forward for approval. Commissioner Silvis motioned for the approval of the Resolution, Commissioner Saalam seconded the motion; the motion carried

Study Session: No items for this agenda.

Adjournment: Seeing no further business, Chairperson Cobb adjourned the meeting at 7:33 p.m.

Recorded by

Don Ho

Grants Compliance Specialist, Grants Management Division

Don Ho

UNAPPROVED