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By Will Mbah
Candidate for Somerville City Councilor at Large

Every year at the end of summer, the city’s housing and economic development planning staff carries out a performance and financial review of the city’s Community Development Block Grant programs. Even though this involves a relatively modest grant of $2 to $3 million per year, the annual review offers insight into the progress that the city is making to achieve its goals of affordable housing and community development.

The evaluation and reporting process is called “CAPER” – Consolidated Annual Performance Evaluation Report. The federal government requires the city to detail how its grant money last year has been used along with other local and state funding for programs in three categories:

• Affordable Housing, Housing Stabilization and Services for the Homeless;
• Emergency Services for Individuals or Families in Crisis;
• Jobs Creation and Neighborhood Revitalization with Historic Preservation.

The CAPER compiles the financial data and measures program achievements against goals and projections that were previously fixed in a five-year plan. The last plan was 2018-2023, and earlier plans and annual reports date back to 2008. Thus, by providing a standard framework for measurement that is repeated year to year, the CAPER reports track the trends of spending and accomplishment over more than 15 years.

What insights can we get from this year’s CAPER?

This past year (2022-23), the federal government transferred to the city a total of $2.9 million in the main Community Development Block Grant, which is divided into the three program areas – creation of affordable housing units by acquisition and rehabilitation (50%), and local economic development support (10%) and infrastructure, park and green space improvements (30%).

The largest successful project, completed this year has been the first project of the new Community Land Trust. The trust used $1.3 million to buy the house at 7 Summer Street and reconstruct it for three new units of low-income housing. Two families with incomes under 50% of median and one family with income under 80% median are now condo owners at 7 Sullivan Street.

This is a small number of units when added to the 146 new units that the zoning Inclusionary Housing program delivered in FY2023 and to the units under construction by the Somerville Community Corporation. Nevertheless, it shows how the federal grant has added steadily, year by year, an accumulating number of units.

Another source of revenue from the federal government, that is accounted for in the CAPER, are COVID emergency funds that went toward the program of rental assistance for 94 households and emergency shelter for 44 people who became homeless. These activities cost about $240,000 of from the COVID funding, and the city and state added another $407,000 to support the outreach, shelter and emergency services run by the Somerville Homeless Coalition.

Using the CAPER to understand the limitations and obstacles of affordable housing development and housing assistance

What the CAPER illustrates, therefore, is how the city’s financial experts and program managers are able to piece together the monies that come in from various sources – state and federal grants, contributions from developers, other grants, and the appropriations that the Mayor and Council make from the city’s own budget.

The CAPER, of course, identifies areas of activity and spending that are not successful, that fall short of the goals in the Five-Year plans.

For example, according to the 2018-2023 Five Year Plan, the city had expected to carry out in FY2023 the rehabilitation of 20 rental units that are owned or managed for low-income tenants by the Public Housing Authority or the contracted housing NGO’s. For a variety of reasons, including the lingering disruption of COVID and other administrative, design, permitting and construction delays, only one unit was, in fact, completed.

By highlighting this deficiency, the next round of planning will require the city staff to make some adjustments and the money is held in reserve to add to next year’s available funds and to be spent as soon as the eligible projects are ready to go.

Another important insight that tracking the CAPER and the future-oriented HUD Action Plan year to year reveal, are the trends of federal grants as part of the city’s expected revenues and spending potential. In particular, the 2024 plan shows that the COVID-related grant funds will be running out. These grants for housing programs were in the amounts of $400,000 to $600,000 in the last three years, in addition to the $2.9 million in the main block grant. In 2024, the total will revert back to the $3 million level.

Significance for the Council and the public to oversee housing and community development program performance

The CAPER and two related other documents – the “HUD Action Plan Development 2023” and a set of presentation slides on this plan – are now posted on the city’s website under the heading HUD Plans and Reports. Citizens who take a look at them can better understand how the routine activity of city government financial and program performance works. This is what your Council members and other elected and appointed city officers do on a week-by-week basis. They follow the numbers, track the completion of agency programs, and look into delays and problems that come to light. It is not the part of the job that usually generates headlines or controversies, but it is an essential activity of governing.

If you want to learn more or support my campaign, please visit my website at willmbah.com.