The Alternative Press

SUMMIT, NJ—A South Orange organization that has worked with the Summit Housing Authority for a number of years on Tuesday was awarded a contract worth a maximum of $60,000 to manage Phase II of the city’s housing rehabilitation program.

The organization, Housing and Community Development Services, Inc., submitted a base bid of $4,000 per unit to provide services including “reviewing the current rehabilitation policy and procedural manual, assisting in the applicant selection process in its entirety, providing descriptions and cost estimates for rehabilitation work, draft and review necessary paperwork and documents, and handling construction inspection services and all related matters,” according to a memo from Summit Director of Community Service Beth Kinney to Mayor Ellen Dickson and the Common Council.

Money only is expended out of the contract for units that actually undergo rehabilitation, Kinney told the council at its special meeting to award the contract.

Housing and Community Development Services was the sole bidder.

According to the unanimously-adopted council resolution awarding the bid, the contract is for an initial two-year term for an option to renew for an additional two years subject to the consent of both the city and the organization upon written notice at least 60 days before the expiration of the contract.

Kinney told The Alternative Press the rehabilitated units will count toward the city’s quota under the state’s affordable housing program.

She said of the $994,558.58 in the city’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund all money has been fully committed.

The director told the council the bid award had to be made before the end of this month because Summit’s current contract is expiring.

Councilman Thomas Getzendanner added the city is not one of the municipalities in the state “under the gun” by the state’s Council on Affordable Housing to expend all its affordable housing funds or risk having the state take the funds back.

Although homes rehabilitated under the program are not under the normal 30-year deed restriction covering homes purchased under the affordable housing program, Kinney said, there is a lesser deed restriction on rehabilitated homes that is lifted when the homeowners pay back the program, often when they sell their homes.

She added senior citizens most often take advantage of the program.

Although a rehabilitated home is removed from the numbers used to meet the city’s quota when it is sold, the director added, the rotating nature of the program means that the city’s numbers do not suffer when such a home is sold.