Brenda Lopez, director of the City of Oxnard housing department, gave City Council members an overview of the departments seven divisions and the programs they operate, saying the agency administers Section 8 vouchers and public housing, runs resident services and homeless-response efforts, manages entitlement grants, and monitors dozens of affordable housing developments.

"Something that is a little bit unique to the City of Oxnard is that our local housing authority is actually embedded or part of the housing department," Lopez said, explaining the housing authority maintains a separate budget but works closely with department staff. She said the department has 68 employees across seven divisions.

Lopez described the Housing Choice Voucher program and specialty vouchers (including emergency housing vouchers and VASH for veterans). She said the department distributes roughly $30,000,000 in housing-assistance payments on behalf of tenants, with tenants typically paying 30% of their gross income toward rent. On inspections and eligibility, Lopez said units in assisted programs are inspected regularly and the department verifies and recertifies household eligibility.

On public housing, Lopez told council members the housing authority manages 523 public-housing units and serves as landlord for those properties. The authority also operates a capital fund program supported by HUD grants to finance property improvements; HUDs independent inspections and audit results affect future program participation and oversight, she said.

Lopez highlighted resident-focused services at the multi-service center (1500 Camino Del Sol) and the ROSS resident-services initiative that connects tenants to local nonprofits for services ranging from citizenship workshops to job fairs. She outlined the Financial Self-Sufficiency (FSS) programan escrow-style account that holds rent increases when participant incomes rise; the department currently has 126 households in FSS. "When a family's income goes up, their portion of the rent goes up right and that funding goes back to the housing authority for operations," Lopez said, adding that forfeited FSS funds are placed in an FSS forfeiture account and reallocated to programs that benefit other participants.

On homelessness work, Lopez said the small homeless-services team used a state grant nearing $4,000,000 to conduct encampment response and outreach and to place 44 participants into non-congregate shelter sites such as Casa De Carmen, Centro Terrace and Casa Liento. The department leads fall weather-shelter activations and notifies the public when shelters are open; Lopez said the city typically activates shelter when temperatures will drop below 40 degrees Fahrenheit or when heavy rain is expected.

The grants management team oversees entitlement funding streams (CDBG, HOME and ESG), monitors subrecipients and reports to the state housing agency (HCD). Lopez also summarized rent-stabilization work: the city enforces just-cause eviction and rent-stabilization rules, limits non-exempt rent increases to 4%, and is recruiting staff to implement a recently adopted anti-harassment ordinance.

Lopez described the affordable-housing portfolio the department monitors (642 assisted units subject to long-term deed restrictions and 3,603 apartment units across 47 developments) and listed several developments that currently have project-based vouchers attached. She also described a Choice Neighborhoods planning effort funded with $500,000 to prepare a transformation plan for five neighborhoods and to pursue a larger implementation grant in the coming year.

Lopez closed by listing operational challenges: changes in federal eligibility rules for mixed-status families, administrative burden from the Housing Opportunity Through Modernization Act (HOPMA) implementation, the risk of HUD funding shortfalls that can force a housing authority into "shortfall" status and limit new admissions, rising per-unit costs that reduce the number of households the program can serve, and staffing vacancies that can take considerable time to fill. She said the department will pursue the Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD) conversion to generate revenue for deferred maintenance and will return to council with a proposed PHA plan and program preferences in the coming months.

Council members thanked Lopez and her staff, asked detailed questions about FSS escrow rules, emergency housing vouchers and wait-list sizes, and requested follow-up reports with metrics on anti-harassment outreach and rent-stabilization contacts. Lopez said the city manages 11 waiting lists (four directly administered by the authority) and that the four core lists include roughly 1,500 applicants; she confirmed HUD audits housing programs and that audit frequency depends on program performance.

The director said she and staff will continue outreach and return to council with the housing authoritys PHA plan and other next steps.