Town of Georgetown
Affordable Housing Trust
Minutes (approved 12-Apr-11)
Date: 22-Mar-11 7:00pm Town Hall basement meeting room
Attendance: Chas Waters; Tim Gerraughty; Paul Nelson; David Surface (late & left early)
Meeting opened (7:00 pm)
Monitoring Agreement
PN updated the Trust as to his meeting with…
AFFORDABLE HOUSING ASSISTANCE MEETING for the SALE of 201 CENTRAL – GEORGETOWN & TEWKSBURY PARTICIPATING
ATTENDEES:
Georgetown: Diane Jodain - GHA, Paul Nelson – AHT Trustee, Phil Trapani – AHT Trustee
Tewksbury: Corinne Delaney – Exec Director THA, Melissa Maniscalco – THA Affordable Housing Coordinator
OVERVIEW of MEETING:
Our goal for the meeting was to determine the feasibility of using Melissa as the 'monitoring agent' (MA) for assistance in the sale of the 201 Central property – from both our perspective and hers. The meeting was hosted by Corinne Delaney, Director of the THA (Tewksbury Housing Authority). She provided some excellent insight into the wide range of projects being run or administered by the THA. Their organization's activities run the gamut from creating affordable housing to collecting rents from THA owned affordable properties.
Tewksbury has an Affordable Housing Trust, along with another organization called the Local Housing Partnership (LHP) as well as the Housing Authority. Simplistically, the Trust functions like the bank, the LHP as the 'affordable housing' operational arm and the THA as the monitoring and maintenance component. These entities appear to be highly functional and have a number of projects in the planning and execution stages. This could be considered analogous to Georgetown's AHT, AHTF and HA if all were fully functional. Note that Tewksbury has a population of 28,000 and Georgetown, a population of about of about 9,000. Further, Tewksbury has been pro-active in the affordable housing area; therefore its players and processes are significantly more experienced than we are in
Georgetown.
Corinne and Melissa provided an in-depth analysis of what is required to sell a property, such as 201 Central, which requires a buy-down to retain its 'affordability'. Some points as well as the basic 'dos and don'ts' were:
- Developing the Georgetown Housing Authority as the operational entity was recommended.
- a THA buy-down was partially funded by the state AHT – also a possibility for 201 Central.
- DO NOT use a realtor as they only add to the cost of the sale.
- On 201 Central, ensure the seller is aware of and involved in the selling process.
- Devise a 'marketing plan' – which is simply where and how to advertise the property.
- Create what the THA calls an 'outreach list' – this is a list of qualified buyers/renters who respond to the 'marketing plan'.
- Establish financial accounts which will allow THA and GHA work to be funded.
One of my goals that I did not accomplish was to achieve commitment from the THA and the GHA on a) per hour costs and b) available time.
Another item of interest that came to the fore was that the developer of a 40B complex is supposed to provide yearly information on '40B Compliance Monitoring' to the town and to Mass Housing. There is a form which provided for this activity, but neither the Town Administrator nor the Planning Board has seen such a form.
ACTION ITEMS:
- Corinne to provide Georgetown with sample 'management agreements'
- Paul to investigate 'buy-down' help from DHCD - Done – Elsa, from DHCD, indicated program no longer available.
- Melissa to provide Georgetown with sample 'marketing' checklist - Done
- Paul to set up conference call with seller, GHA and THA
- Diane to present a proposal to the BHA that she become involved in AHT activities – both the short term 201 Central sale and future activities.
- Melissa and Diane to provide AHT with availability commitments
- Corinne to provide W-9 information/requirements on a buy-down transaction
NEXT STEPS:
- Pull together the Conference Call to put together our Marketing Strategy based on the check list (attached) which was provided by Melissa. Minimum participants of call are Melissa, Diane, Lorie Nickerson (seller) and Paul.
- Use Conference Call to establish action items and owners for activities required to move the Marketing Strategy for 201 Central forward.
- Concurrently, draw up and have validated management agreements with Melissa and Diane.
- Begin the Marketing effort. Proposals would be sent to Diane who would share them with Melissa – together they would validate the applications.
- Establish an Outreach (Potential Buyer) List from validated applications
There was further discussion regarding the need of talking with the Georgetown Housing Authority and getting their approval prior to any agreement with Diane Jodain as well as talking with the Personnel Board to see if a new hire or addition of hours would impact the overall town budget especially during this tight budget cycle.
Update on HPP
CW stated that the contract proposed by LDS Consulting Group LLC was what he believed to be a very poor document that could leave the town open for possible future liability. When he spoke with LS regarding some of the wording pertaining to caps of liability and termination agreements she got defensive and questioned the Trusts’ commitment to work together and she thought that if it was forwarded to Georgetown Council that they would not find an issue with the language at all.
TG discussed the possibility of having Mr. Scanlon in regarding his response to the RFP.
It was decided that CW would forward off the contract to K&P for review and see their opinion regarding the matter and the response from LDS would determine any future actions.
CPC Town Meeting Warrant Articles
The Trustees were informed that all of our suggested articles were voted down unanimously by the CPC. The discussion revolved around the meeting in which CW and PN presented the requests which seemed to go well and the follow up email requesting further explanation that was replied to in a timely manner and the lack of any further contact between the Trust and the CPC.
The conversation moved to possibly restructuring the Trust and TG pointed out that is required annually after the annual appointments are made by the BOS (around June) and it should be tabled till then.
Minutes
Minutes were not available for review continued to next meeting
Recording with Registry of Deeds / Land Registration Office
Passed over
Affordable Housing SOP
Passed Over
PN made a motion to adjourn 8:35pm (TG 2nd) Vote 3-0 in favor
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