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Council approves $6.0M in HUD program awards despite legal concerns from one member
Summary
Council accepted fiscal year 2024 HUD program awards and authorized subrecipient agreements totaling $6,001,535, passing 4-2 after Councilmember Cathcart said she would vote no pending legal review related to a recent executive order affecting HUD funds.
The Spokane City Council on the consent agenda approved acceptance of fiscal year 2024 program awards from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and authorized subrecipient agreements totaling $6,001,535. The motion passed 4-2.
Miss Farnsworth read the item into the record as "Acceptance of fiscal year 2024 program awards from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development and approval to enter into subrecipient agreements with the awarded grantees $6,001,535."
Councilmember Cathcart announced she planned to vote against the item, saying she had questions about how the awards interact with a recent executive order that specifically affects HUD funding. "These are HUD dollars and that executive order very specifically, affects HUD. And so I would I would rather take a couple extra weeks and allow our legal counsel to take a look, give us their analysis and any recommendations before we take this on," Cathcart said.
After brief roll call, the council approved the awards. The consent agenda vote recorded the passage of the HUD award acceptance along with other consent items.
Public comment earlier in the meeting raised questions about nonprofit funding allocations in the mayor's budget; public commenter Derek Azaro listed multiple nonprofit awards to illustrate perceived imbalances and urged more funding to Carl Maxey Center. Those comments were part of public testimony on the consent agenda but not tied to any specific subrecipient agreement text in the council packet.
The record does not show the legal analysis Cathcart requested was completed before the vote. The item authorizes the administration to enter into subrecipient agreements with awarded grantees; it does not adopt spending beyond accepting the awards and approving the agreements.
