This might be a first: Someone has asked to pay more for municipal services.
Morristown’s council voted unanimously on Tuesday to accept the offer.
The Morristown Housing Authority (MHA), a federal entity that oversees 470 units of seniors and public housing, has been paying Morristown around $70,000 yearly in lieu of taxes, for police, fire, trash collection and other services.
That’s jumping to $160,000 next June, and increasing by 2.5 percent annually until the payment reaches $328,000 in year 30, under the agreement approved by the council via Zoom.
The voluntary hikes reflect the housing authority’s improved fortunes under a new public-private partnership, a restructuring intended to finance up to $60 million in improvements to seniors buildings on Early and Ann streets and public housing in Manahan Village.
“We have a true belief that everybody should win here…we believe we should pay a fair share to the town,” MHA Executive Director Keith Kinard said in an interview with Morristown Green.
The MHA’s partnership with Orbach Affordable Housing Solutions LLC of Englewood Cliffs is made possible by a controversial federal program called RAD, short for Rental Assistance Demonstration.
Established in 2012, RAD enables public housing agencies to work with developers and borrow money to renovate housing, using elaborate tax credits and other incentives, Kinard explained.
Agencies such as the MHA otherwise are barred from borrowing by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). They must rely on shrinking allocations from Congress to maintain aging buildings for low-income residents, Kinard said.
The MHA gets about $800,000 a year from Washington for capital improvements, Kinard said. He estimates at least $40 million of renovations are needed at MHA facilities, some of which date to the 1960s.
Under RAD, these buildings will get new roofs, walls, pipes, windows, boilers and community rooms, Kinard said. Each apartment is scheduled to receive new floors, cabinets and counter tops.
“You’re talking rehabbing to the point of almost brand new,” Kinard said.
He anticipates 18 months of work starting this summer at the three seniors buildings. Manahan Village should start by early 2022 and finish in about 20 months. In isolated cases, residents may be relocated to vacant units or hotels while their apartments are renovated, Kinard said.
Orbach Affordable Housing will oversee construction and management of the Morristown properties, while the MHA will retain oversight of funds, inspections and social services, Kinard said.
RAD involves a conversion from one federal funding source to another. MHA residents whose rents have been subsidized with public housing dollars now will come under the Section 8 program. The MHA already oversees about 180 recipients of Section 8 housing vouchers.
People who qualify for subsidies pay 30 percent of their incomes for housing. The government pays the rest. That won’t change, according to Kinard.
DIRECTOR: NO RENT HIKES OR EVICTIONS
Nationally, RAD has stirred concerns about tenant displacement.
A 2019 Urban Institute survey of residents in RAD projects found the “impact on tenants has been mostly positive.”
But the National Low Income Housing Coalition asserts residents routinely are re-screened during Section 8 conversions for “income, credit history, criminal history, and other requirements, especially at properties that will be utilizing Low Income Housing Tax Credits.
“This has resulted in evictions and monetary buy-out packages that force residents to move from the property, despite their right to remain after conversion,” the coalition said in 2017.
Low Income Housing Tax Credits will help finance the MHA’s makeover. And a handful of MHA residents with incomes exceeding eligibility guidelines “could run into a problem,” acknowledged Kinard.
But he insisted RAD rules prevent jacking up tenants’ rents or forcing evictions.
“There’s no possibility, even if someone got slick, to raise the rents,” Kinard said, adding, “we are prohibited from evicting people because of RAD.”
Aside from construction inconveniences, tenants should benefit from the renovations, said Council President Stefan Armington.
“I think it’s a good thing thing to renew the interiors of their apartments. It will greatly improve their quality of life,” Armington told Morristown Green.
So far, 58 New Jersey projects — covering 7,593 housing units and more than 19,000 people — have undergone RAD conversions. More than $10 billion has been invested nationwide in public housing improvements under RAD, according to HUD.
RAD has been discussed at a half-dozen meetings with Morristown seniors, Kinard said. He told council Vice President Toshiba Foster he plans talks in Manahan Village within a month; he said he’s exploring COVID-safe ways to do so.
Regarding the payments in lieu of taxes, Kinard said the new, higher schedule will increase at a stable rate. Morristown will reap $4.6 million more over the agreement’s 30 years than the town would have received under the existing formula of fluctuating payments, said the executive director, who has run housing authorities in Newark and Pittsburgh.
He was hired in 2018 to stabilize a Morristown Housing Authority in turmoil.
Kinard’s predecessor, Roy Rogers, filed for whistleblower protection after questioning commissioners’ travel expenses, and after taking suspicions to HUD about individuals getting preferential treatment for subsidized housing.
Rogers was fired, ostensibly for chronic absences, and he died soon after. In a lawsuit, his estate accuses the MHA of intimidation that inflicted “anxiety, emotional distress, humiliation, and death” on Rogers.
Separately, HUD imposed purchasing restrictions on the MHA over alleged procurement improprieties that pre-dated Kinard’s arrival.
IN OTHER BUSINESS…
Morris County Administrator John Bonanni asked town officials for special designations to help the county proceed with plans for a new courthouse between Court Street and Schuyler Place, on a county lot near the 194-year-old Morris County Courthouse.
Bonnani requested the town classify the property as an “area in need of rehabilitation,” and the county, as the redevelopment agency. He said these moves will help the county secure economical financing and qualified bidders for “the largest single project the county will ever do.”
The courthouse may be the rarest project, too.
“We only ask for one every 200 years,” Bonanni said.
And Mayor Tim Dougherty said he’s mending a broken fibula, injured in a spill while walking his dog after last week’s snowstorm.
“Go figure,” he said. “And the joke is, I fell in front of my home. So there will be no lawsuits.”
