Cook County HRA extends 1 Roof loan deadline, allows flexibility for The Heights subsidies and approves consent items

At its July 2025 monthly meeting, the Cook County Health and Redevelopment Authority voted to extend the deadline for a deferred loan tied to 1 Roof Community Housing’s planned purchase of Birchwood Terrace and approved a request from partners on The Heights to adjust the mix of subsidized units while staying under an earlier $40,000-per-year cap.

The extension request from 1 Roof Community Housing asks the authority to allow closing on Birchwood Terrace through the end of the year so the nonprofit can complete financing and related closing steps. The HRA approved the change after staff described continuing delays with federal rural development paperwork and noted Minnesota Housing is also a project partner. The deferred loan at issue is $250,000 and would be repaid to the HRA on closing, restoring those funds for future use.

Why it matters: the extension preserves the HRA’s contractual relationship with a longtime partner while the nonprofit seeks to finalize external financing. HRA staff said the item also emerged because 1 Roof’s auditors flagged the original contract deadline in the organization’s audit workpapers.

In the same meeting the authority approved allowing The Heights and its local real-estate partners to change the mix of units supported under a previously authorized subsidy program so long as total per-building subsidies remain under the $40,000 limit approved in May. Staff said the alternative unit mix would increase two-bedroom subsidies relative to efficiencies and one-bedrooms to better serve families and households that cannot afford market-rate two-bedroom units. The example amounts discussed in the meeting compared $37,360 to $39,236 across scenarios; staff said both figures remain under the $40,000 cap.

Consent agenda and other approvals: the board approved the consent agenda, which staff summarized as including four items: a payment to JSK Contracting LLC related to the energy-and-envelope grant program, a $200,000 local matching payment tied to a larger external award (identified in the meeting as "I triple R B"), a $2,000 contract with Raven Marketing to redesign the HRA website and improve public access to forms, and a routine travel reimbursement for attendance at a Minnesota housing-industry conference. Each consent item was moved, seconded and approved by voice vote.

Program updates and planning: staff reported the energy-and-envelope grant program has roughly $11,000 remaining of an original ~$36,000 allocation from ARPA funds; four projects are complete, five more have signed agreements and three have approved bids. Staff said the HRA intends to drop "pilot" from the program name and seek a more permanent funding source so the program can continue beyond the current allocation.

The board also received progress reports on The Heights construction (footings installed; some modular units to be stored at the county's old airport site with FAA sign-off), Temperance Trails (final plat work and required stormwater/retention work ongoing; county land sale not finalized), and early strategic-planning work. Staff said the HRA will seek approval of a strategic plan at the August meeting and will hold future town-hall meetings to solicit public input. A board member noted a letter from the local school superintendent thanking the HRA because, the superintendent wrote, they have been able to hire and house all teachers for the coming school year.

Votes at a glance: the meeting recorded voice votes approving the agenda, approving minutes from the June meeting, passing the consent agenda (four consent items), approving the 1 Roof extension request (resolution referenced in the meeting as 25-09), and approving the subsidy-unit-mix flexibility for The Heights (motion carried by voice vote). No roll-call tallies with named votes were recorded in the transcript; all recorded voice votes were taken as "aye" with no recorded opposing votes.