The Galveston County Daily News

Editor’s note: The following is a statement by Galveston Open Government Project, a political group formed recently by islanders including David Stanowski. “Word on the Street” will return Thursday.

The decisions that Galveston Housing Authority makes will have a significant impact on our city’s future, yet many Galveston residents know very little about the agency.

A group of concerned citizens, in conjunction with the Galveston Open Government Project, has spent many hours researching the housing authority in an attempt to understand its organizational structure, policies and goals.

The housing authority is a federally directed agency, operating independently of city government, which administers public housing programs.

The housing authority normally receives its funding through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The authority is governed by a five-member board of commissioners, appointed solely by the city’s mayor.

Its executive director serves at the discretion of and answers to the board. The authority does not require city-council approval for its actions, unless requesting city-appropriated funds.

Although HUD requires “community support” for housing-authority decisions, it dictates no specific mechanism to accomplish this.

Before Hurricane Ike, the housing authority operated 990 public-housing units and administered 1,213 private-sector Section 8 units, a total of 2,203 housing units.

Based on the authorit’s initial plan to operate existing and proposed public-housing and Section 8 Units, and on data available to GOGP, we find that 11.14 percent of Galveston’s population would be receiving some form of housing assistance from GHA.

This is 5.12 times the national average, and 6.96 times more than in the city of Houston.

Therefore, if Galveston was in line with national averages, the housing authority would own and operate only 133 public housing units, not 1,039, and administer only 380 Section 8 units, not 1,516.

Turning to the reality of the authority’s policies, HUD requires that all potential occupants of GHA housing be screened for criminal records, in order to provide a safe environment for all tenants.

Any resident involved in criminal behavior, including drug or alcohol abuse, is subject to eviction.

The reality is that the numbers of police “calls for service” for the areas in and around three of the public-housing projects from Sept. 1, 2007, to Sept. 1, 2008, were: Cedar Terrace, 1,425; Magnolia Homes, 1,061; and Oleander Homes, 3,425. Total “calls for service” in one year: 5,911.

Since March, the housing authority has led the people of Galveston to believe it was required to rebuild all of the damaged 569 housing units.

In reality, on Oct. 15, GOGP received written confirmation from HUD that there was no requirement to rebuild the demolished projects.

The housing authority states that one of its goals is to help its residents to become self-sufficient.

In reality, its Family Self-Sufficiency program for Section 8 clients has only 50-60 openings for the 1,213 households th authority serves.

The authority’s executive director, Harish Krishnarao, has said he wants to be more transparent and encourage input from the community.

In reality, it took almost one month for GOGP to receive the requested documents from its first open-records request. The first, and all subsequent ORRs, have been referred to the authority’s outside counsel, costing tax payers $2,286.57, so far.

Last December, the authority also hired a public-relations consultant, costing the taxpayers $6,823.29 to date.

HUD guidelines clearly state that public-housing units should not be rebuilt in a floodplain. In reality, the authority is ignoring the guidelines and pursuing other sources of funding, including the city’s recovery funds, to rebuild in a floodplain at greater risk and higher cost to all involved.

The housing authority has expanded its mission beyond the basics required by HUD, which is “serving the needs of low-income, very-low-income and extremely-low-income families” to now include the “low-to-moderate-income” population which will allow it to increase its range of offerings.

Based upon its own data, the authority intends to increase government-subsidized housing on the island by 1,940 units, or 90 percent.

In July of 2009, the authority applied to HUD and received 303 Section 8 vouchers for victims of hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Houston, a city of approximately 2.2 million people, applied for and received only 500 vouchers. Galveston’s share represents approximately 10 percent of all the vouchers issued for the state of Texas.

The housing authority is planning to apply for a $40 million HOPE VI grant to purchase a large parcel of land for future development.

It has received a special dispensation from HUD allowing it to pay rents 20 percent above market rates to expand and attract more landlords into the Section 8 program.

There is much public apprehension about GHA’s post-Hurricane-Ike plans to rebuild and expand. Only 2,046 people thought it was important to vote in the 2008 local election, but 2,103 citizens signed an online petition expressing their concerns about the authority’s plans. Clearly, this issue is important to the people, so some process must be found to allow broad participation.

Anyone who has questions or who wishes to add any additional research to the GOGP data base can contact the organization at gogp(at)att.net.