McCarthy Park Gets Trees

Things are happening at McCarthy Park, which is known to many as City School Field. A group of neighbors have been working for many years securing funds from the Middlesex County Community Foundation and Community Development Block Grants to improve the quality and accessibility of the park. In a previous round, the handicapped-accessible ramp was rebuilt; and extensive improvements were made to the landscaping and drainage between the two levels of the park. This round has seen the resurfacing of the tennis and basketball courts, and the installation of a swing set. The swings have already attracted young parents and youngsters to the park. Most recently, this past Wednesday, four "London plane" trees (similar to sycamores) were planted along the edge of the park, by Hotchkiss Street. A special thanks to Ken Ahnell of Middlesex Alternatives to Incarceration for providing equipment and volunteers.

Here is a slide show of the planting.



Stay tuned for bike racks, benches, and some nicer fencing along the edges. But no need to wait for these—come on over and bring a ball! Many thanks on all these fronts to Middletown’s Park and Rec Department and to Michiel Wackers of the Planning Department.

[Information and photos for this story provided by John Elmore and Jennifer Saines. Full disclosure: I am Jennifer's spouse.]

Clarification from Wackers on CDBG Grants

From Michiel Wackers, Deputy Director of Planning, Conservation and Development


I thought I would provide some more information to clarify what occurred last night and the difficultly that the Citizens' Advisory Committee faces each year.

St. Vincent DePaul's Amazing Grace food pantry program was left of the recommendation list this year. It was left off largely due to the fact that the City has $61,000 to spend on Public Service types of projects and we received $250,000 in requests from 12 different public service applications. Applicants, rightly, are disappointed each year, but the CAC tries its best over a four month review process.

You mentioned in the article that the Russell Library and the Chamber's Worker Prep Program were left off the list. They were not, as you can see on the list below. Russell Library received the full amount they requested and the Chamber received an amount lower than they requested.

The issue before the council was whether the amount recommended for the Chamber was sufficient for next year's program. The council felt it was not and sent it back to committee to find any solutions along with seeing if St. Vincent's could be funded.

Luckily this year Middletown received $110,000 in CDBG-Stimulus funds. Out of this $16,500 can be used for public service projects. I feel pretty confident that we can get to where the council and applicants want to be for funding with out having to drastic cuts to the current recommendations.

This issue in allocating the $16,500 in stimulus funding is what are the rules attached to it. US Dept of HUD has not release those rules yet. HUD is expected to do so shortly.

Here is the list of recommendations from last night's meeting:

Organization/Program Grant Amount

-- Literacy Volunteers of Central Connecticut/Parent Tutoring $ 1,000 (public service)

-- Russell Library/Job and Career Services $ 15,000 (public service)

-- Middlesex Business and Industry (Chamber) Foundation/Worker Prep Program $ 8,000 (public service)

-- Green Street Arts Center/After School Program $ 15,000 (public service)

-- North End Action Team/Homeownership and Foreclosure Counseling $ 15,000 (public service)

-- Oddfellows Playhouse/At-Risk Youth Troupes $ 5,000 (public service)

-- Shiloh Christian Church/Adventures in Learning $ 2,000

-- Godfrey Library/Handicapped Accessibility $ 35,000

-- Mercy Housing/Shepherd Home Improvements $ 36,515

-- CHC, Friends of McCarthy Park/McCarthy Park Improvements $ 14,485

-- The Connection Inc./Eddy Shelter Security $ 5,000

-- Middletown Police Department/North End Security Cameras $ 30,000

-- City of Middletown/Section 108 Loan Payments $ 45,000

-- City of Middletown/Code Enforcement $100,000

-- City of Middletown/Program Administration $ 80,000

Jennifer Alexander also did some great reporting on the CDBG decision process with the Citizens' Advisory Committee

http://middletowneyenews.blogspot.com/2009/04/cdbg-old-school-stimulus.html

http://middletowneyenews.blogspot.com/2009/04/giving-out-grants-cdbg-part-two.html

Giving out the grants: CDBG Part Two

A few weeks back, I wrote about the local non-profit groups and city departments that submitted applications for Community Development Block Grants. On Wednesday, the Citizen Advisory Committee met at City Hall to discuss how to distribute this federal funding from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which is expected to amount to $407,000 this year.

In addition to their regular allocation, Middletown also has hopes that the Stimulus package will bring an additional $110,000 in CDBG funds, later this Spring. There will be a new, open round of applications for those funds, but they will only be targeting projects which are shovel-ready and can be completed within 120 days. As with all CDBG funds, the grants will be targeted for projects which help low to moderate income people.

At Wednesday's meeting, the CAC created a list of recommendations about which projects should be funded through CDBG. In May, the Common Council will consider that recommendation, but it should be noted that it's not uncommon for the Council to completely revise the distribution of the funds -- the work of the CAC is purely advisory.

Public Service

This year, the CAC attempted a new process for their $61,000 in public service grants. Instead of giving very small grants to the range of applicants, they decided to give larger grants to fewer applicants. They offered $15,000 each in three categories: after-school programs, home ownership and job training. There was an additional $16,000 left undesignated for any other projects the committee wished to support. Apparently, some of the applicants tailored their requests to these grants, but others did not. For example, there were four programs that offer after school/camp activities, but only two specifically requested that grant, so the others were competing for the unrestricted funds.

Creating these focused grants was an effort to be more strategic in their grant-giving, but the new system led to some conflict as the committee members realized that the unrestricted funds would not stretch as far as they would like.

The Public Service grant recommendations were:
•$15,000 after-school grant: Green Street Art Center
•$15,000 home ownership grant: North End Action Team
•$15,000 job training grant: Russell Library

The remaining $16,000 in unrestricted funds were recommended as follows:
•$8,000 to the Chamber of Commerce for their job training activities
•$5,000 to Oddfellows Playhouse for their neighborhood troupes
•$2,000 to Shiloh Christian for their Adventures in Learning after-school program
•$1,000 to Literacy Volunteers for their Macdonough parent tutoring pilot program

As I reported earlier, in this round there were $236,606 in applications for the $61,000 in grants. Green Street, Oddfellows, NEAT and Russell Library received their full request, although in each case the projects are only partially funded by CDBG. Shiloh Christian, Literacy volunteers and the Chamber received significantly less than they asked, but the committee felt that supplying even limited funding was an important step.

The following programs did not receive any funding: CRT's effort to make payments on delinquent mortgages; Amazing Grace's new Saturday hours at their food pantry; Raegan's job training and entrepreneurship program; Shiloh Baptist's Camp Shiloh; HOPE's effort to begin development of four new home-ownership units; the City's plan to offer a compact florescence bulb exchange; and CT Legal Services pilot program to educate social service providers about resources for people in need.

Planning & Other Grants

As expected, the Section 108 loan repayment was set at $45,000 and the $80,000 allotment for planning was recommended for expenses of the city Planning, Conservation and Development office. A new item was added by the Mayor's Office, however, to use $100,000 in CDBG funds to help pay for code enforcement activities by the city -- in other words, to pay for staff time of existing code enforcement officers. These expenses are all allowable by HUD and the CAC did not alter these requests.

Construction

After the other categories were completed, the CAC considered the remaining $121,000 for construction grants, making the following recommendations:

$35,000 to Godfrey Library to make the building accessible to people with disabilities
$36,515 to Shepherd Home to bring their kitchen up to code
$30,000 to the Middletown Police to buy an additional camera for the North End
$5,000 to Eddy Shelter to tile a floor
$14,485 to McCarthy Park to continue improvements at the downtown park

There were $811,476 in requests in this category. The Godfrey Library and Shepherd Home received their entire request, and the Middletown Police received half of their request for two cameras. The Eddy Shelter's request contained some ineligible items, and they were fully funded for the item which qualified. Friends of McCarthy Park received far less than their $71,500 request, but they made it clear that they could implement their work in phases if less funding was granted.

The projects that did not receive any funding were: the Middletown Public Schools proposal to upgrade the administration building at the corner of Hunting Hill and Russell Street; Shiloh Manor's request for various building repairs at the Butternut Street senior housing (affiliated with Shiloh Baptist); the city Redevelopment Agency project to purchase and demolish a house on Bridge Street; Gilead House's request for help with a downpayment on a Liberty Street house that they currently rent and operate; and the relocation of St. Vincent's Soup Kitchen, which is contingent on the move of the Community Health Center.

About the process

After the April 1st hearing, the members of the CAC ranked each application and tried to consider whether partial funding would be useful or whether the project was more of an all-or-nothing venture. In the future, making site visits and having more time with each applicant would be worthwhile goals, and would add to the logic of the recommendations.

The Common Council will review the recommendations and have the final say on how the CDBG funds are allocated. For the construction projects that did not receive funding, the committee was hopeful that some of them might be eligible if the City does receive Stimulus CDBG funds later this Spring.

CDBG: Old-school Stimulus

Before the Recession, before Obama, before the Big Ol' Stimulus Package, there was CDBG.

CDBG stands for Community Development Block Grant -- the yearly inflow of Federal funding that comes from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Like other urban areas across the country, Middletown gets these special funds to help ease the burden of providing services to low-income people in our town. Last year, the city received $409,000. This year, Middletown hopes to get $400,000 to $500,000, which it will in turn distribute to various non-profit groups in town, in addition to funding some of the city's expenses.

The process for distributing the annual CDBG funding goes like this: Each winter, non-profit groups submit applications for their projects. These requests are reviewed by the Citizen Advisory Committee (CAC), which then makes a recommendation to the Common Council for their vote by late Spring. The projects that receive funding can't begin until September 1st. There are fairly stringent regulations to be followed, including the payment of union wages for any construction projects, and documentation that the services benefit low and moderate income people.* The whole process is administered by Michiel Wackers and the city's Department of Planning, Conservation and Development.

Although the process is already underway, Middletown does not yet know how large this year's CDBG allocation from HUD will be. Also, we don't know whether the $110,000 tagged for Middletown for CDBG in the Stimulus Bill will be in addition to our usual amount, or will offset cuts.

This year, the CAC received 26 applications, six of which were from city departments (plus one from a private group to improve a city park). The applications fall into three categories: construction, public service and planning/administration . On March 18th, the CAC met to hear 5-minute presentations and Q&A from each applicant -- a marathon that ran from 5 pm to 9:30 pm. As usual, the dollars requested far outstrip the available funds, but most projects have other sources they can turn to in filling the gap. In fact, the CAC smiles on applications that leverage private donations as part of their project budget.

CONSTRUCTION APPLICATIONS

Under the category of construction, there were 10 requests. Last year, this category awarded $269,000 in funding; this year's applications total $811,476.

The City has three requests in this group:
•from the Police ($60,000), for security cameras to be installed in the North End. CDBG funds were used in the purchase of the first two security cameras in the North End in 2005.
•from the Schools ($127,500), to make improvements to the administration building at the corner of Hunting Hill Ave & Russell St (across from the old Woodrow Wilson), so that people with disabilities could access the building and the Youth Services Bureau could move in. Last year, the CAC allocated CDBG funding for improvements to this building, but the resources were used to upgrade the windows.
•from the Planning Dept ($80,000), to continue the purchase and demolition of houses on Miller & Bridge Streets, a project which has been covered by the Eye ad nauseum here and here.

Other construction requests are from area non-profits:
•Godfrey Library ($35,000) on Newfield Street, pictured, draws people from all over the country to its geneology resources. Researching the family tree tends to appeal to an older crowd, yet the Godfrey is not accessible to their volunteers or visitors with disabilities. The grant request would help the library construct a ramp to their door. If funded, this would be the first time that the Godfrey receives CDBG.
•McCarthy Park ($71,500), a city park in downtown Middletown has seen many improvements in recent years due to fundraising and coordination by neighborhood activists, with assistance from Wesleyan University, the Middlesex County Community Foundation and in-kind assistance with design, landscaping and installation. The request for funds would primarily cover the cost of a walking path around the soccer field, the addition of bike racks and the removal of an old fence along Hotchkiss Street. A portion of the earlier improvements were funded by CDBG in 2006. Here are some before and after photos of the last round of improvements:

•Eddy Shelter ($30,658) on Silver Street, operated by The Connection, is housed in a former CVH building. If funded, they plan to cover a concrete floor with tile and replace mattresses and beds to combat a pest problem. The shelter was funded for various improvements in 2007 and 2008.
•Gilead Community Services ($25,000) hopes to acquire a Liberty Street house where they have been housing 5 low-income residents who receive supportive case management services. The grant would provide a portion of the down payment on the property, which is on the market for $175,000; Gilead would raise and finance the balance.
•Shepherd Home ($36,515) on the corner of Bow Lane and Eastern Drive on the CVH campus provides a transition from homelessness for 70 men and women, operated by Mercy Housing & Shelter. Their grant request would allow them to upgrade their kitchen, which needs a new grease trap and other improvements to stay licensed.

According to city staff, a portion of Shepherd Home's request will be considered under the Public Service category, not in Construction, since it covers equipment and furniture.
•St. Vincent de Paul Place ($242,500) made an application for funding to move their Main Street soup kitchen -- this move would be contingent on the realization of the Community Health Center's plan to construct a new facility on the corner of Grand and Main. In that case, the current Soup Kitchen could become a retail space, and a rear building would be made available for the soup kitchen, providing a single-floor facility for their services, which include outreach services in addition to meals.
•Shiloh Manor ($102,803) is a HUD-funded housing facility for the elderly and disabled on the grounds of the Shiloh Baptist Church on Butternut Street. From the report at the CHC meeting, it seems that the complex is facing significant issues of deferred maintenance and problems with the original construction about 10 years ago. They are requesting funds to address issues such as windows, roofing, carpet and sidewalks, which were identified in the needs assessment that they did last year using CDBG funds.

PUBLIC SERVICE APPLICATIONS

The CAC received 14 applications for public service projects, which are usually requests for operating costs for local non-profits. Last year, this category awarded $60,000 in funding; this year, the applications total $236,606. The programs that applied were primarily related to jobs, kids or homes, with a few exceptions.

•jobs
Creating a resume, practicing your interview, brushing up on computer skills -- these are some of the hallmarks of the jobs programs that applied for CDBG. Russell Library ($15,000) applied for funding for their speaker and workshop series, noting that people are turning to the library for help in this economic crisis. The Chamber ($30,012) pointed to their success in helping new workers adjust to the demands of the workplace. They also focus on finding solutions to the barriers that employees face, such as transportation. Raegans Training/Solid Rock ($15,000) wants to supplement job preparation with lessons in entrepreneurship -- they also have a relationship with a forklift training company.

•kids
There were five applications related to after-school and summer programs for low-income children. Oddfellows Playhouse ($5,000) has a long history of using theater training as a mechanism for helping at-risk youth in their after-school troupes at Maplewood Terrace, Traverse Square and the North End. Green Street Arts Center ($15,000) offers an afterschool program that includes one hour of homework help and one hour of arts training every day, a service which benefits nearly 70 low-income children in the North End. Shiloh Christian Church ($15,000) on Saybrook Road offers a free summer camp and wants to upgrade the computers that the children use in their "Adventures in Learning" programs. Another applicant, the Shiloh Development Corp ($58,000) is affiliated with Shiloh Baptist Church on Butternut Street. They offer a summer camp with a mix of academic and enrichment programs which they target to children in the neighborhood of the church. Literacy Volunteers ($5,000) asked for support for a tutoring program at Macdonough School that would focus on the literacy of parents and their role in their child's learning.

•homes
Community Renewal Team ($15,000) asked for funding to help people at risk for foreclosure by providing direct payment of delinquent mortgages, a service which they already provide, but which needs a more realistic level of funding to be truly helpful. North End Action Team ($15,000) requested funding for education and support on home ownership issues for at-risk households. They cited their strong record of communicating with residents and their current programs offering financial literacy education and the need to expand eviction prevention efforts. An organization called HOPE ($23,094) is a faith-based housing group started by five African-American pastors in town. They are asking for CDBG funds to begin the process of developing 4 new units of low-income home ownership in town in a location yet to be determined, possibly acquiring one of the properties on the city's blight list. The grant would support the architectural and environmental studies, plus demolition if necessary. It is unclear how much of the HOPE request would be eligible under Public Service -- a portion may be eligible under the Planning category.

•other services
There were a few other applications in under the Public Service category, including one from Connecticut Legal Services ($25,000), which is looking to expand into a new area. They are proposing a sort of concierge service to help area social workers and service providers navigate the complex and sometimes contradictory assistance programs that are available to people in need. They see themselves as being uniquely positioned to offer a short-cut for people in the helping professions who need to know what programs are available. Amazing Grace ($7,500) applied for funding to add Saturday hours at the Saybrook Road food pantry, which is currently open just three half-days. Also, the city applied for $8,000 of the Public Service funds to offer compact fluorescent light bulbs to low and moderate income elderly in town.

PLANNING/ADMINISTRATION APPLICATIONS

The only application in this category came from the city itself, for $80,000 for administration of the CDBG program. Coincidentally, this category had $80,000 in funding last year.

An additional request from the city for $45,000 was made to repay Section 108 loans that were made in 2003 to pay for demolition activities in the Miller & Bridge neighborhood -- essentially, the city loaned itself its future CDBG funds. They projected that the repayment of various redevelopment projects in previous years will require about $40,000 in CDBG funds each year until 2012. This author despairs of identifying the category that these funds would be drawn from -- feel free to add your own interpretation in the comments.

And that's the summary of all 26 applications for this year's CDBG funding. The CAC will hold their deliberations at their April 15th meeting.


*Full disclosure: As the administrator for the non-profit Kidcity Children's Museum, I applied for and received CDBG grants in various years from 1995 to 2001, for the purpose of removing blight and restoring the historic Camp-Sterns House/St. Sebastian's Convent as the children's museum.

Redevelopment

The Redevelopment Agency met on Tuesday for an hour or so at City Hall.

Nehemiah's Michael Taylor spoke about the progress of the North End Homeownership project. At this point, Nehemiah and Broad Park are still trying to assemble the funding to build 15 home-ownership units on Ferry, Green & Rapallo (another 2 will be built by Habitat for Humanity). They have pursued a number of funding possibilities, which I have detailed ad nauseum in other EYE posts, here and here, which are contingent on receiving a construction loan from Liberty Bank. In October, Nehemiah notified us that Liberty will not loan the money for the construction unless they believe that there is still a market for these homes, so they are requiring an "after-rehab" appraisal, and a study to estimate how long it will take the homes to sell (we all know how much that ballgame has changed since this project began a few years ago, when real estate was selling like hotcakes.)

Astute readers of the EYE will notice that this is exactly where we stood a few months ago. Unfortunately, the appraisal has not begun because of some sort of internal snafu (it's not entirely clear where) that will require Nehemiah to pony up $4,000 before the appraisal will be done. Hopefully by this writing, Nehemiah has mustered up the funds to take this next step. It is, after all, an expected cost that a developer will face, and one which could be covered by the CDBG* funds that the City has already allocated for this project. But, as I believe is common with CDBG funding, the developer is expected to pay the cost up front and then get reimbursed after the paperwork is all signed, sealed and delivered.

Speaking of cash flow, David Bauer raised the question of how much it is costing Nehemiah for each month that the project delays. Although Michael will bring firmer figures to our next meeting, he estimated that it takes $5,000 to $6,000 monthly to keep this project on hold, including interest payments on the properties they bought, and utilities. He reassured the agency that these costs and his administrative time do not add to the cost of the project -- they are covered through the "Developer's Fee", which is recouped at the end of the project, when the properties are sold and the loan is paid off.

Other Redevelopment Agency members pushed for more of a timeline from Nehemiah. After the appraisal, it looks like the next hurdle is February, by which time they should learn whether they will be moved up from the waitlist for the Federal Home Loan Bank funds or whether they should make a March application for a June award from those same funds. Nehemiah has named next June as a critical juncture -- if funding is not in place by then, they will look at phasing the project, although that would create a large amount of extra paperwork with DECD.

Hopefully, they will receive good news over this winter. Also, Michiel Wackers dangled the hope that this project might be eligible in case the new administration in Washington, DC releases any "New Deal" type grants for local projects. This one is all approved and "shovel-ready" as they say.

But there's no question that the Redevelopment Agency is getting antsy as the months go by.

* CDBG is short for "Community Development Block Grant" funds, which is federal money from HUD (Housing and Urban Development) which goes to cities and towns with "urban" problems. Middletown gets a pot around a half-a-million each year, some of which goes to the operating budget of social service programs in town, and most of which helps with various bricks and mortar projects. Decisions about where to spend CDBG funds are made at the local level by the CAC (Citizen's Advisory Council) and the Common Council. Put that in your alphabet soup!