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Consultants urge Live Oak to apply for CDBG housing-rehab funds; offer free application help
Summary
Jeffrey Winter of Cornerstone Community Partners told the council the city has a competitive chance in the upcoming CDBG cycle and offered to prepare an application at no charge; if awarded, consultants asked for an opportunity to bid on program administration through a normal RFP process.
Jeffrey Winter of Cornerstone Community Partners told the City of Live Oak City Council the city should apply for Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funding for a housing rehabilitation program and that his firm would prepare and submit an application at no cost to the city.
"We've been referred to the council specifically...to discuss prospective CDBG application," Winter said, asking the council to consider a motion authorizing Cornerstone to work with city staff on a submission. Winter said the upcoming CDBG funding cycle will open March 5 and close May 2 and that his team had prepared scoring projections for the city.
Winter presented a projected competitive score for the application and told the council the award would fund approximately $700,000 in housing rehabilitation activities for eligible residents. "Effectively, every year the city chooses not to pursue the funding, you're passing up on the top $700,000 in funding that could be made available to the city residents," Winter said.
Winter said his firm charges no fee to help prepare the application. He asked only that if the city receives an award, Cornerstone be allowed to participate in the later request-for-proposals process to provide program administration services. He noted that administrative funds to pay consultants are included within the grant program: "So, effectively, we're talking about no out of pocket expense to the city," Winter said.
Council members asked clarifying questions about what the housing rehabilitation program would deliver and how applications would be handled. Winter said the scope would include an open application intake and that a consultant would typically manage intake and present a list of qualified residents to the council for approval. "We would present to the council a list of qualified residents, for approval," he said.
No vote authorizing Cornerstone to prepare the CDBG application was recorded in the meeting. Winter left the council with submitted scoring pages and an offer to help if the council chooses to proceed with an application.
