development or HUD grants into a single document the grants covered are the Community Development block grant which is cdbg just to get all of our terminology and acronyms down the home investment Partnerships also referred to as home the emergency Solutions Grant or ESG and housing opportunities for persons with AIDS or hapwa as a condition of receiving these Federal grant dollars the city is required by the feds to submit a five-year Consolidated plan with an annual plan to allocate funding submitted in each of the program years this 2023 action plan is the fourth year of the 2020 to 2024 Consolidated plan these dollars represent important investments in our neighborhoods that focus on Housing Development and infrastructure for low to moderate income households this hearing and the public comment period are opportunities to let us know how these grants can have the greatest impact in our neighborhoods the public comment period remains open until November 28th the plan can be viewed at columbus.gov backslash Finance under the grants management section and comments can be submitted to Grants MGMT at columbus.gov our finance department here at the city of Columbus has been working tirelessly with all of the Departments and our Community Partners on putting forth a really excellent annual action plan that will be the subject of this hearing I want to thank them and without further Ado turn it over to our finance team we will first hear an overview from Finance deputy director Chris long before moving into presentations from Community organizations and departments who manage these grants so with that I will turn it over to deputy director long first well first off president pro tem Brown thank you for this opportunity to present the 2023 HUD action plan to you for your consideration and for councils as well as you mentioned uh our goal for tonight is to provide you with an overview of the 2023 HUD action plan for both your benefit and councils and the community at large as you mentioned this will constitute a range of federal HUD programs cdbj hopwa home ESG as you mentioned we're proposing a plan that's 18.7 million dollars in totality but it is composed of 10.1 million dollars of cdbg proceeds uh 2.3 million dollars of hopwa proceeds 5.7 million dollars of Home proceeds and 600 000 of ESG proceeds as you mentioned this plan does conform with the city's 2020 to 2024 Consolidated plan um which is as you stated outlines the city's strategic goals for HUD funds um 2023 huddle allocations are not yet finalized but these amounts are based on the city's anticipated Awards as well as anticipated carryover funds from prior years future legislation will of course be Advanced once we know what those final award amounts are um tonight you will hear from our external Community Partners as well as internal City agencies about their respective programs um and in closing I would just like to thank director Kathy Owens for her guidance and Leadership during this whole process certainly your guidance and assistance as well and of course Lucy uh McMahon and the entire grants team for the incredible work that they put in on this entire process so with that I'll actually turn things over to Lucy who'll provide a more detailed explanation of that thank you financing management has proposed for inclusion in the city's final annualization programs budgets are estimated based on previous year's funding typically but does not survive the city with funding allocations the city will revise the draft criminal action plan to include the total application amounts prior to the submission of the final plan once we get those five numbers also on October 26th we'll see [Music] um email address so we actually want to start today with the video that highlights some of our current successes [Music] hi I am Kathy Owens director of the city of Columbus Department of Finance and management hi I am Kathy Owens director of the city of Columbus Department of Finance and management each year the city's grants management team administers funding from the U.S Department of Housing and Urban Development including the Community Development block grant home investment partnership program housing opportunities for persons with AIDS in the emergency Solutions Grant through these HUD grants the city promotes integrated approaches that create and improve affordable housing enhance quality of life for Columbus residents and generate economic opportunities for low to moderate income people in the neighborhoods of Columbus most in need including London the neighborhood I grew up in the city of Columbus Department of Finance and management is exciting related to highlight five HUD funded Community Development projects driving positive change in Columbus the city's grants management section works together with City staff across departments and Community Partners to cultivate these projects with the collective goal of revitalizing neighborhoods and to ensure Equitable access to housing and supportive services for all citizens of Columbus the hilltop Early Learning Center is a pre-kindergarten Center currently being constructed by the city which will provide free child care and education for families in the hilltop this will be the main front entrance so the kids will walk in here every day this will be a reception area there will be a reception desk back there we'll have doors here that they'll be buzzed in and this will be the main entrance into the building an industrial professional Chef's Kitchen here it'll be a full cafeteria the cafeteria is right through there the center will also include a state-of-the-art full-service Healthcare facility operated by Nationwide Children's Hospital an on-site food pantry and counseling services available to the entire Hilltop community no matter whether or not they have a child enrolled at the center the city of Columbus is investing over 20 million dollars in the Project's construction with 1.78 million dollars contributed from cdbg for the Design Services associated with the center [Music] Warner Junction is an affordable housing complex in the Franklinton neighborhood we didn't start marketing this project until about a month ago and since that time we got over 800 applicants for the units and will be fully leased the day we open so the need for more affordable housing is very evidence consisting of 41 and two bedroom units in on-site community space Fitness room and Healthcare space Warner Junction will be HUD to find affordable for incomes between 50 and 70 percent of the area median income for the next 30 years we did a blue roof on this project which as far as I know is the only one that's been designed like that in Columbus as for storm water management so typically you have all your storm water in the ground and as it rains it slowly collects there and then drains into the system to save significant amount of time and money we designed a Blue Roof where the water is actually retain on the roof intentionally and then drains slowly from there Into the Storm sewer that was a significant time saving design as well as I want to say it was like three to four hundred thousand dollars of civil and site work that we avoided by doing that the home investment partnership program provided four hundred thousand dollars for the construction of the complex [Music] the Linden Fresh Market and charitable Pharmacy provides free nutritious Fresh Food and pharmacy services to the Linden Community which previously had limited access to healthy food choices so we purchased a building for about a little less than three hundred thousand dollars in 2017 and then the department of neighborhood said hey we have some funding that we could do some federal funding and so the city stepped into Department of neighborhoods and they gave us about 1.5 million towards the building the market also offers free health and wellness classes patient medication counseling and pharmaceutical Services 1.5 million dollars in cdbg funds contributed to the rehabilitation of a shuttered corner store the Linden Early Childhood playground is dedicated to children ages 2 to 5 to accommodate the child care facility within the Linden Park Recreation Center we have access for our camp if we have younger campers but if you know if we're doing programming like for example our gymnastics class that last five minutes that they want to come out and play we're able to get them over here and play so it's pretty neat but there's a lot of components to it where kids are able to learn music they can put a tricycles out ride the tricycle track there's a lot of shapes and things of that nature a lot of working on motor sensory skills all type of good stuff the installation of the playground was funded with more than 360 thousand dollars from cdbg [Music] the South End Cafe will offer affordable healthy meals in a neighborhood where access to healthy foods is limited and will provide jobs to individuals experiencing barriers and finding employment the reason that we wanted to do this was to give employment opportunities for people who have been out of the workforce for an extended period of time and who are having difficulty re-entering it especially people who have been previously incarcerated so the idea is they'll come work for us part-time or full-time for six months a year and then will help them transition that into full-time career track employment with another employer such as Children's Hospital thank you to everyone who has contributed to the success of these projects we look forward to continuing to work alongside you on future transformational HUD funded projects in our vibrant neighborhoods throughout Columbus before you keep going I want to acknowledge acknowledge Vice chair um Nick Bankston who is here um and thank him for uh joining in the process of reviewing this annual action plan which as you know is is very important to our city so thank you sure back to you Lucy so I just want to say thank you to Alex Brown from CTV for putting that together um I love that video and thanks to everybody in the video and who worked on all those awesome projects um the first 2023 HUD program on the agenda is the Community Development block grant or cdbg the estimated cdbg budget for 2023 is 10 million 143 940 dollars the estimated total budget includes program income and unspent previous year's funding this is the second year that grants management has accepted applications for external partners for cdbg funding in total we actually received over 25 million dollars in Project proposals 10 external organizations projects are included in the draft annual action plan I want to thank all these organizations that are here with me today for for being here and I'm looking forward to hearing from you but also just for all the collaboration thus far and I'm really looking forward to seeing what you guys do this year I also want to thank the Department of Public Service recreation and parks department and the department of development thank you to deputy director Steve winsel deputy director Hannah Jones Morgan Wade Elaine hosteller Adam wheeler everyone else from Recreation and Parks without you all we can't spend these cdpg dollars on these impactful programs in the city of Columbus the first 2023 cdbg project included in the draft action plan is fair housing with an estimated budget of two hundred thousand dollars we'll use cdbg funding for activities that will affirmatively further fair housing in Columbus in 2023 grants management has published a competitive grants application for fair housing projects applications for fair housing grants are due on November 18th if you have any questions about the fair housing Grant application please email grants management next the action plans housing repair and homeowner assistance project includes three activities with an estimated combined budget of nine hundred and ten thousand dollars the budget includes two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the Department of development's chores program the housing division manages sub-recipient agreements with non-profits for this minor home repair program the housing repair and home owner assistance project budget also includes three hundred and sixty thousand dollars for Grants management to award funding to external agencies for Homeowner roof repair programs the housing repair and homeowner assistance project budget also includes three hundred thousand dollars for renew homes Ohio for a home maintenance program Janine Parham is here to talk about her work that she plans um to do in 2023 with this funding Jane there we go hello I'd like to thank everybody from the members of the Columbus city council and the Community Development block grant for helping this funding with your new homes I am Janine Parham the CEO of renew homes Ohio and we are truly grateful to be able to help homeowners in our community low-income homeowners in Columbus Ohio face a variety of obstacles to preserving home ownership in their homes and being able to use that investment to build intergenerational wealth in their families it is more cost effective to assist homeowners and preservation than relocation renew homes Ohio has identified an additional predatory practice that will it will help seek to eliminate with this grant many low home low-income homeowners struggle to afford routine maintenance costs like cutting grass fixing gutters external painting and broken windows these issues can be relatively inexpensive to fix but nevertheless can lead to city code violations where they go unaddressed navigating Franklin County Environmental Court can be intimidating for low-income homeowners radical Moore and myself the principal staff for renew homes Ohio have witnessed low-income communities consistently being taken advantage of creating fears by threatening homeowners that they are in danger of losing their home or offering to quickly purchase them at a low at a below market rate for minor home repairs many homeowners that agreed to use that agree to those offers not only lose their home but they also lose a significant amount of values to their properties not to mention the value for the children's in the future renew homes Ohio's objective is to helping at least 30 to 50 homeowners in these communities in 2023 by providing free Home maintenance services to low-income Columbus residents who are unable to afford such services and who have reached the city code violation are in danger of receiving one and again we'd like to thank you for funding to helping provide funding to assist renew homes Ohio achieve all our obligations thank you again the next project budget is for housing and Family Services the Project's total budget estimate is 436 500 and includes one hundred and twenty thousand dollars for the Department of development's Housing division to award non-profits funding for housing counseling services the housing and Family Services budget also includes funding for modcon living Sorry mod con living Amy Flynn is here to talk about how the organization plans to utilize the funding hello and thank you so Macan living is very appreciative and excited to receive this award we have a tool lending library that interestingly enough was taken over from the city of Columbus back in 2004 and we've been operating it since and we found it to be a very important resource for low-income homeowners throughout the city of Columbus we provide over 4 800 hand and power tools available to our members to borrow as they need for DIY projects this is an important resource because oftentimes just as you mentioned Janine it's it's low income homeowners just being able to rent a tool that they might need or certainly hire a contractor to complete home repairs is just Out Of Reach so the tool lending library provides those tools at no cost for those homeowners um we also have a lot of gardening tools and so a lot of our homeowners utilize our gardening tools as well to have put in their Gardens and helps address food insecurity and some of our poor neighborhoods so we're very excited and blessed to receive this award thank you so much next Melissa lens is also here from The Legal Aid Society to discuss the organization's 2023 housing conditions project president pro tem Brown and councilmember Bankston thank you for this opportunity to share our work we appreciate that you are taking the time to hear about these important issues in our community my name is Melissa lens and I am the supervising attorney of the housing team at The Legal Aid Society of Columbus um can you hear me okay all right thank you um I started at The Legal Aid Society of Columbus as a law clerk in 2016 on our conditions project and now I supervise this project every tenant in Columbus has the right to save conditions in their home regardless of what neighborhood they live in or the amount of the rent that they pay legal aid began our conditions project when we realized that people were not successful in navigating the rent escrow process alone while the process to Escrow rent and thus asked a landlord to have a court order the landlord to make repairs in Ohio is specifically outlined in the landlord tenant statute it is not always intuitive or easy to follow that process for example I have spoken to dozens and dozens of people who do not know that the first step to get a landlord to make repairs is to ask that landlord in writing for those repairs I will talk to people who have said that they have the landlord has been in their home and has seen the issues with their own eyes and I have to unfortunately inform them that that's not enough and that they have to start with writing a letter or an email to the landlord because Ohio law specifically require requires written notice before they can start rent escrow just this year alone the conditions project at The Legal Aid Society of Columbus has served more than 220 tenants in Columbus because of the CDG cdbg funding you gave us last year we were able to represent one client and the rent escrow case to ensure that the landlord made repairs to make their stove functional and to eradicate pests she was then able to sign a new lease agreement with the landlord these repair efforts don't just help our present clients but if the client moves for Pearson can benefit future tenants uh so thank you for finding this project and helping our neighbors live in safe spaces Ashley Montana from Franklinton Development Association will speak next about the organization's Financial life skills program can you hear me thank you council members for this opportunity my name is Ashley Montana and I'm the community engagement director at Franklinton Development Association or FDA the program funded is our financial life skills program which launched in 2018 to help community members better navigate the complex worlds of Housing and finances approximately 70 percent make less than twenty thousand dollars for their household income we recently celebrated our 323rd graduate and have maintained a graduation rate of nearly 90 percent even while shifting to Virtual classes during the covid-19 pandemic the 12-hour program is broken up into six classes that review the participants relationship with money budgeting banking credits loans and debt management job training and Entrepreneurship and then taxes and risk management homework is assigned each week as well as creating a resume at the end of the program we connect participants with other organizations and resources in the neighborhood through guest speakers and handouts that guest speakers include organizations such as the Legal Aid Society of Columbus which addresses tenant rights and other legal issues ecdi which addresses starting a business homes on the hill which addresses becoming a homeowner upon completion of the program all participants receive a financial incentive of 252 dollars the program utilizes the curriculum provided by The National Financial Educators Council the classes are taught by myself and I also manage the program's planning Outreach marketing and scheduling and implementation the cdbg funding will allow us to serve an additional 90 graduates we'll bring our total number served to 120 and 2023. the additional funding will also allow us to hire an additional person which will be responsible for enrolling participants sending reminders scheduling guest speakers and eventually teaching the program this will allow me to focus on other areas of my role and increase the organization's overall capacity by allowing our two-person organization to hire a new staff person thank you again for this assistance foreign the 2023 draft annual action plan includes 723 440 dollars for the Columbus Recreation and Parks Department this funding will be used to continue to provide youth programming through the capital kids program and fitness camps that the department offers Citywide at recreational facilities the next bucket of funding for this 2023 cdbg program is for non-profit facility upgrades and acquisition finance and management received a variety and many proposals from non-profit Partners For assistance to improve space as they occupy the total estimated budget for non-profit facility upgrades and acquisition is 4 million two hundred and eighty thousand dollars the budget includes funding for improvements to the city's Reeb Avenue Center which houses Community Partners on the city's South Side as well as funding to address facility needs for five external Community organizations first danella Hicks from all that is here to discuss the organization's facility Improvement needs at the all that Center of Excellence on East Livingston Avenue good afternoon president pro tem Brown and other council members I'd like to say thank you and thank you to all of you all the others in the room my name is danella Hicks and I'm the founder and executive director of all that teams hopeful about tomorrow we've been serving teens on the east side of Columbus since 2010 we provide services we provide academic assistance for students who attend Independence Walnut Ridge and other charter schools in the 43227 in 43232 ZIP codes these are students who are at risk of not graduating many of them are involved in violent activity they're disengaged from school and so we really want to help them stay engaged so that they can graduate from high school we provide career exposure so we take them into the local community and show them what college and trade schools would look like we partner with Columbus with Columbus Health Department and also with Center for Family Safety and healing so that we can do drug and alcohol prevention and violence prevention programming um this project allows us to to renovate the facility the Shady Lane Presbyterian Church to be purchased in um in the fall of 2020 it's an older facility that needs a lot of work and so this will allow us to um to renovate the building to have secure doors windows um to pave the parking lot and things like that so that we can further help teens in our community so thank you guys um I really appreciate the funding next Barb E bright will detail the facility improvements needed at Star house located near Cleveland and fifth Avenues thank you president excuse me thank you president Brown for allowing starhorse to speak today star house deeply is deeply grateful for the support we've received past and present from the city of Columbus to support our mission thank you for the continuing continuing to join us in lifting youth out of homelessness and into a community of hope we appreciate the opportunity to apply for the 2023 Community Development block grant program Award Star house operates Central Ohio's only drop-in center for youth ages 14 to 24 who are experiencing homelessness we have provided crucial services to thousands of young people since 2006 offering immediate access to safety basic needs and crucial stabilizing Resources 24 7 365 days a year so far this year we have served more than a thousand individual youth at our drop-in center a gift of two hundred thousand dollars from the city of Columbus will be dedicated to the structural renovation of our drop-in Center's main entrance while there are several emergency exits at Star house our facility currently has one door through which all guests staff volunteers and Service Partners enter and exit through conversations with an architect advisor we have confirmed that this must be reconfigured to expand our main entrance given the constant flow of foot traffic on any given day star House's drop-in center serves roughly 100 youth employs more than 40 team members and hosts a large group of groups of volunteers and Social Service Partners currently the vestibules reception area can only accommodate one person at a time this results in a bottleneck effect as individuals must wait to enter and exit the building the current structure also presents a security concern as those exiting the building could inadvertently Grant entrants to an unapproved visitor support from the cdbg program will enable star house to ensure the main entrance to the center is modified for optimal safety and flow of All Guest thank you again for the opportunity to share this need with you Austin Hill from The Refuge is here to present about their housing facility upgrades cdbg project on the hilltop president pro Tim Brown council member Bankston good to see you back there uh thank you so much for the opportunity to share about the Refuge and how this funding is going to help us in the future The Refuge is a men's addiction recovery program that's based in the hilltop we offer three ways for men who are trapped by addiction to change their lives we have a 30-day Discovery program based in Lancaster a year follow-on program that's residential based in the hilltop in Franklinton and then long-term recovery housing that is also based on the west side with this cdbg funding does is it provides much needed funding to a repair that we were not prepared to uh to identify like we were not aware of this more than 18 months ago it became a crack and then it became something bigger and bigger and bigger so this funding has a cascading effect positively for us one it allows us to continue to seek to improve our our facilities Beyond just this this one facility that the funding is helping it also allows us to not have to put our fundraising money towards providing programming so there are programming will actually be strengthened because of the funding that you guys are providing which our results are Beyond fantastic so much so that we had to have a third party check our survey results we did a three year survey and something that really stood out the most to me two things one the guys who complete our total 13-month residential programming have a hundred percent job placement rate so they have a 100 employment rate once they complete our programming and the second one is 95 percent of the men who've completed a program say that they have a 95 percent increase in trust from those who they care about most so we're not just repairing individual men's lives repairing their relationships with their families which then in turn improves a relationship with their employer their neighborhood which improves the city so I appreciate your guys's consideration thank you for letting me be here today foreign from the finance fund is here to talk about the Carol Stewart Village improvements project located on West Broad Street thank you wow there we go thank you president protem Brown and council member Bankston for the opportunity to speak this afternoon Carol Stewart Village is a 62 unit permanent Supportive Housing project on the west edge of Franklinton it was the uh it was named after Carol Stewart who was the matriarch of that community and and really the life blood of so many of the organizations that still exist there um and so it's wonderful to to name that project after her this project is uh been in operation for two years it is for youth 18 to 24 years old who are coming out of homelessness most of them from the Foster system a study done in 2018 shows that more than 3 000 youth are at risk or face homelessness every year in Franklin County so 62 units is a drop in the bucket but it is a start so we we created this program from two lighted hotels from from two blighted hotels on the west edge of Franklinton remove that blight and uh have been operating as his permanent Supportive Housing project since the funds requested as part of the cbvg funds are for improvements to the parking lot and the storm water management for some beautification components related to what was a pool that was filled in 20 years ago to make that additional Green Space and garden space as well as some trash enclosures and primarily for security around providing steel doors to all 62 Apartments so that it's just one more level of safety and barrier for these resins as they uh call Carol Stewart Village home thank you next Sherry Neal from the maroon Arts group is here to discuss her project to acquire their space on Mount Vernon Avenue in the king Lincoln District good afternoon president pro tem and councilmember Nick Bankston my name is Sherry Neal board chair from Maroon Arts group our organization was founded in 2014 with a mission to build and provide a platform for community art and Learning Center in the cultivation celebration and promotion of black cultural production in Columbus we have grown over the years as an organization of creatives artists entrepreneurs and cultural leaders rallying to make a place in Columbus for bold ideas through ART the movement pursuing Arts Commerce and Community which is our impact box part a distinctive outdoor events venue built in Bronzeville uses repurposed shipping containers to construct a performance and art gallery it's the only known shipping container Gallery in the central Ohio area created and designed for the purpose of stimulating the community through ART there's also I'll deliver black dreams campaign a partnership between maroon Arts group the city of Columbus and the Greater Columbus Art Arts Council which uses public art as a launch point for sustained and future oriented approach to achieving racial equity in Columbus this also has a social Enterprise component that has significantly funded over 20 black Lair projects in the past 18 months this back story is important as we note the importance of cultural production taking a front seat to involve a historic Legacy in 2021 we set out to purchase the York Masons building for nearly 100 years the building had played a key role in the areas artistic and cultural life in early days it celebrated theater welcome dancers musicians and The Heirs most notable entertainers CBD cdbg dollars will help us complete this purchase of the four-story 27 000 square foot York Masons building saving historic lamb Arts landmark and establishing maroon Arts group's first ever permanent home the location of the building one block from the impact box Park naturally extends our footprint and in the heart of the king Lincoln Bronzeville AIDS Public Access contributes to the area's Prosperity while maintaining the neighborhood's Rich history at a time of increasing development and gentrification preserving this history is essential to the Columbus story our goal is to sustain the legacy of the York Masons building preserve the history of the surrounding King Lincoln Bronzeville Community equip maroon arts groups with the resources to achieve even greater impact and uplift black creativity in central Ohio cbdg funding is significant to obtaining this goal we look forward to the support of the city and and Council as we make our community more lovable not just livable because what is the space what is what is a City without culture without art and indeed the Arts energizes our cities they add brightness to daily life spur economic growth and buying communities maroon Arts group envisions a city where black creativity art and Ingenuity is celebrated a world where we can see dreams realized and sustaining this edifice will help us take steps towards revitalizing the future and securing that goal thank you the cdbg budget also includes four hundred and twenty thousand dollars for affordable housing development Tracy Taylor and Wesley Moore are here to talk about their unique partnership between the Columbus Next Generation Corporation and our Brother's Keeper and the cdbg transitional housing project they plan to develop on Fifth Avenue Bankston back there um first I would like to say thank you for all of your support over the years and your continued support next-gen renergen has been around for 10 years now it's been 10 years we were created by former mayor Michael Coleman to redevelop and help kind of move some of our Urban neighborhoods forward that got left behind in the process over the last 10 years our mission has kind of changed just a little bit we have done several developments which you guys are very familiar with the Linden Fresh Market in Linden we have the senior affordable housing going up on Cleveland and Myrtle we also had we started with the Fresh Market on Parsons Avenue the former bookstore that was on Parsons Avenue which is now a vegan restaurant we own several properties on the West Broad Street area and we're doing some things over there we've had the opportunity to grow and we realize that dealing in certain neighborhoods you can't just come in and just build new buildings without addressing the so social issues we've had to deal with a lot of those poor quality housing a lot of the drug activity so we partner with a lot of other non-profits to help qualify those issues and change them around we have also worked very strategically with minority contractors not only to make sure that they are involved with those projects but we also help them get all of the qualifications that they need in order to participate in getting government money out the door and helping them sustain that and understand how to manage that money one of the upcoming projects that we have is with our brothers Keepers on East Fifth Avenue in the crumb Park neighborhood one of those neighborhoods that's kind of been kind of left behind just a little bit they own several properties over there and they have quietly been doing things over there on their own and particularly helping with the youth and mentoring and dealing with some of the youth that have been picked up recently for stealing the cars and they are doing an excellent job with that we wanted to continue to help them grow next-gen has partnered with them and we will be serving as their fiscal management and we will also serve as a project coordinator and we're going to do the same process that we did with opening the Linden Market making sure there's minority participation making sure that the project stays in line and on budget and that it gets done and hopefully we'll be doing future projects with them and I would like to give them a few seconds to introduce themselves so you can get to know these guys thank you very much my name is Wesley Moore I represent ours Brothers Keepers and this is my brother Mark Moore like she said we've been going for this community for over five six years and we started purchasing in the houses over there and remodeling and rebuilding and stuff and basically start our own affordable housing program whatever they came in there with and said what they can afford to pay for the houses me and my brother agree with it some houses three bedrooms we only charge them 350 a month and we start noticing a lot of kids in the neighborhood would come and work for our business and would sit around after we close we'll be sitting at the building sleeping so we eventually started purchasing the building next door to us and pretty much been housing homeless teams and stuff and that's when we got with Tracy and she started helping us with our non-profit organization and stuff and like she said we've been housing a lot of teams mentoring them the ones who've been still in the cars and we also help them pay back the cars that they damaged to the people that they stole them from and we also just recently just helped three of them graduate from high school haven't been in school for about nine months and thank you for giving us the opportunity to reward to help us continue building on for our Legacy for our family and for our community foreign the cdbg budget also includes funding for infrastructure and public facility improvements we plan on spending one million five hundred and fifty thousand dollars for curbs and sidewalks which will be administered by the Department of Public Service and one million dollars will also be used for playground improvements and tree installation and that will be administered by the Columbus Recreation and park Department both of those Pro projects will be done throughout the city the last project funded by the city's Community Development block grant is for administration and planning which is currently estimated to cost 624 000 and includes City Staffing and Contracting costs for the management of the HUD funds thank you so much Lucy I want to acknowledge my colleague councilmember Emanuel rimi who is tuned in virtually um and uh expressed at the beginning how excited he was to see the list of organizations that we have here today thank you um Lucy for your very hard work um in getting this hearing together and getting this list of funding to present to council I want to thank all the presenters too for sharing details about the good work you do we are here to talk about our cdbg budget but we are able to talk about so much good work happening in the community um so I can't thank each of you enough to a person um for being ready to use these dollars on transformational work um in whatever corner of um the issues or at whatever corner of the city that you do your work so thank you all so much um up next we have deputy director Hannah Jones from the Department of development who will cover the programs that was what we just went through was our massive list for cdbg and we are now pivoting to a different part of our Hub Partnerships and deputy director Hannah Jones from the Department of development will help us cover these particularly the home investment partnership hapwa and ESG so without further Ado I will let you go through those three things deputy director thank you very much chair Brown for the opportunity to present the department of development's portion of the 2023 action plan affordable housing continues to be a high priority for our department the city of Columbus is dedicated to ensuring that homeowners and tenants are provided with safe and sanitary living conditions throughout our city the goal is to foster a housing market where every household with a full-time wage earner can obtain housing in the private market and to effectively supplement the market where we cannot achieve that goal 2023 home funds are designed to address the affordable housing crisis by preserving and expanding housing options to the public in an effort to increase homeownership opportunities provide affordable rental housing in the city and provide Gap financing to construct new or rehabilitate existing housing stock we are proposing to use our home funds portion of the budget as follows we have 750 000 that is allocated for the choto set-aside choto being community housing development organizations so this is funding specifically designated to our community development Partners it will assist with the ongoing development of at least 15 affordable rental housing units focused on the south side and Linden it will serve households between 50 and 60 percent Ami we are also looking at three homeownership opportunities in Driving Park in Hilltop that will look at 80 percent area median income households we have designated three million 420 for a focus on rental housing projects this will assist with the creation of 300 units affordable at an average rent of 60 percent of the area median income or less and we anticipate that at least 12 of those units will be affordable for 50 and Below Ami 135 000 will go to the American dream down payment initiative this is our down payment assistance program that is offered Citywide and it will provide down payment assistance to approximately 18 first-time home buyers all at or below 80 Ami we have designated 375 000 that will be focused on home ownership projects and that will help fund five homes for households at or below 80 percent 325 000 goes for tenant-based rental assistance which we do in partnership with the community shelter board and we'll assist approximately 55 households who would otherwise be faced with homelessness and then we designate 245 000 for the Community Development collaborative this is for their work with our community development Partners but also provides direct Operational Support to those Partners as well and then there is four hundred thousand that goes for administration and supporting staff costs and I'll pause there to see if you have any questions before going into hopwa okay 2023 marks the first year that the development of department will administer the hopwa program funding from HUD increased significantly in 2022 and we anticipate a similar increase in 2023. so in addition to just ramping up our role in this program the department is currently working to ensure that we are getting these additional resources into the community in a meaningful way funding is proposed to be allocated as follows one million 149 550 560 dollars for tenant-based rental assistance 377 642 that is for the short-term rental mortgage and utility assistance program 471 716 that goes to Supportive Services for affected households to keep them stable in their housing who are being served through the hopwa program 73 948 for the permanent housing placement program which is really focused on providing first month's rent and security deposit to individuals moving into long-term housing 133 883 it's for sub-recipient Grant Administration costs this is cost to the providers that we contract with so that they have Operational Support and then sixty eight thousand two hundred and fifty dollars for internal Staffing support for the grant work and the program manager and then lastly we have the emergency Solutions Grant this is a Federal grant that we provide directly to the community shelter board as our Continuum of Care partner we anticipate receiving approximately six hundred thousand in 2023 this funding goes to support the rapid re-housing and shelter assistance work that csb does and we anticipate that it will serve 2 700 people and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have at this time thank you so much deputy director Jones um and we are now going to move into the public comment portion of am I on track Lucy to do that good I want to make sure there wasn't anything we needed to double back to um we are going to move into the public comment portion of our hearing I know that we have one confirmed virtual um uh resident who will be joining up nope nope no longer there um well do we any other speaker slips okay well I want to remind everyone who is tuned in um that you can still if you miss the opportunity to sign up to speak today you can still submit public comment that public comment period remains open until November 28th and um the plan all of this really good work that has been represented right from the horse's mouth today um can be can be viewed at columbus.gov backslash Finance under the grants management section and then comments can be submitted to Grants MGMT at columbus.gov um so I want to remind people um that they can absolutely Avail themselves of that resource and if any of that is too confusing you can always just reach out to our office we can help point you in the right direction and also take your comment um and my email is ecbrown columbus.gov we hope to continue receiving feedback on how to best utilize these grants we are I am very glad to hear as a member of council as a chair of the finance committee I am really glad to hear this plan today outlined again straight from the organizations and due to the hard work of our finance department very encouraging as we move forward into the next step of our annual action plan thank you again to our community groups and our departments for their presentations this afternoon and um with that we will close our hearing for our annual action plan thank you all so much