Cheshire Selectmen Concerned About Grant Monitoring Letter
CHESHIRE, Mass. — The Board of Selectmen were unhappy to get a monitoring letter from the Department of Housing and Community Development related to the town's housing grant.
The letter outlined several issues, including invoice inconsistency, length of project times and homeowner complaints with the process. The DHCD asks the town, in the letter, to report on current projects and a plan to improve process deficiencies.
"There were quite a few issues that they found in their monitoring and how we're running the program," said Patricia Mullins of the Berkshire Regional Planning Commission told the board on Tuesday. "But DHCD will explain that monitorings are about providing guidance on what they see that needs to be fixed in a program. And so that's how we're looking at this. It seems a bit intense, but it's just saying, 'this is what you have to do to do better.'"
Several board members asked why Mullins did not mention this letter at last week's meeting when she gave an update on the program's status. Chair Michelle Francesconi said these issues could potentially impact Cheshire's ability to receive grants in the future.
"So we're the town of Cheshire, we're the grant recipients. This letter looks really bad for the town of Cheshire," she said. "And we're managing it, we are named in it. We're going to apply for future federal grants, and this makes us look horrible. So why did BRPC, as the management team, not come to the town of Cheshire and say it?"
Mullins said she received the letter on Dropbox shortly before last week's meeting.
She explained that she had not gotten to look through it thoroughly. She said she chose not to discuss it at the time so she could prepare and better understand it during a followup meeting.
"I was in and out for other meetings and appointments and had not had time to really look at it and see, exactly, what our response should be or how to present it or even how accurate everything was," Mullins said. "I just felt like it's not intended to avoid coming in talking about it. It's just I felt like we needed to take care of what we originally planned that meeting for."
Regarding homeowner complaints and the speed of completing projects, Mullins said several factors, including COVID-19, have significantly delayed processes. One example she gave was difficulties finding willing contractors, which she said is a problem throughout Berkshire County.
"As we said last week, we really are not happy with how long it's taken to get through these projects," she said. "And there's a lot of administrative reasons why it takes a long time. And those administrative reasons are why we have so few contractors. And that is the core of the problem, is that we have very few contractors who are willing to bid on these projects."
Mullins said BRPC tries to take on a significant amount of procedural responsibility with grants like this, rather than leaving everything to the town. She explained BRPC has worked to keep the board, the town administrator and the citizen advisory committee as up-to-date as possible.
"We tried to take as much of the burden off of the town as possible," she said. "We try to do as much as possible while keeping you as informed as possible."
Mullins said the town and BRPC have until Dec. 3 to send a counter to the DHCD and talk about issues they have with the monitoring letter.
"So, in other words, we have the opportunity to respond," she said. "We're certainly going to improve any of the systems that they think that we should be doing better on, but we have the opportunity to respond, and if we don't agree with some of the things that are in here, we're given the opportunity to say that."
Also discussed at the meeting, Francesconi discussed the most recent Hoosac Valley Regional School Committee meeting. She said the committee had not yet acknowledged a list of questions the Selectmen had sent to them.
The next Cheshire Board of Selectmen meeting is scheduled for Nov. 16.
Tags: Housing program,
