WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The board of the town's Affordable Housing Trust last month agreed to seek legal guidance on an issue it has been batting around for a couple of years.

 

The question is whether Community Preservation Act money can be used to fund a critical repair program for income-qualified homeowners to help them stay in their residences.

 

The CPA, which identifies "community housing" as one of its three favored categories for funding, largely has been used in town to support home purchases by income-qualified first-home buyers and the creation of income-sensitive housing in town, like the apartments in the former St. Raphael's Church at the corner of Cole Avenue and Church Street or the homes that the Northern Berkshire Habitat for Humanity homes that the trustees have supported.

 

The trust, which has run a successful mortgage assistance program for more than 10 years, also during the COVID-19 pandemic created programs to help assist with mortgage and rental payments in emergencies.

 

But, from time to time, Trustees have discussed finding a way to use some of its funds — which primarily have come from the CPA — to help residents in need make needed repairs to leaky roofs or dilapidated porches in order to stay in their homes.

 

The Trustees have never gotten a definitive answer on whether that's an allowable use of the CPA money, generated locally by a 2 percent surcharge on property taxes (with the first $100,000 of a property's value exempted) and partially supplemented by revenue raised by the commonwealth from fees on transactions at the Registry of Deeds.

 

Guidance on the website of the state's Community Preservation Coalition (a non-profit that supports local Community Preservation Committees) indicates that the repair issue is, to put it mildly, complicated.