About to start CED today...there's important stuff on the agenda including the continuation of the Housing Secure grant funded program run by a consortium of eviction defense orgs, as well as Centro's tenant rep grant for RAP hearings

This grant got significantly delayed several times oer the past year; first, the City failed to agendize the allocation in 24-25, which meant that 1MM dollars budgeted for the program was not disbursed and orgs had to pay the program itself

EBRHA's poorly run and thought out grant to provide assistance for Oakland "small propety owners" that lack legal representation, a group that does not appear to exist in any numbers, is moved to the end of the agenda

Ralph Kanz has been bringing up the issue of house flippers avoiding paying for permits "he says some of these are slum lords, recounts a landlord whose tenant has had to complain, while the landlord lives in Fremont in a 2 MM house, and owns two planes

Kanz says the only person who's responded is Unger.

Council has not yet figured out how to have slideshows go to the zoom if the presenter is zooming in. This keeps happening, not sure why they don't have AV figure it out

Okay, they finally figured it out.

RIght now, the annual RAP report. Worth reading, but I won't transcribe it, you can read the report here https://oakland.legistar.com/gateway.aspx?m=l&id=/matter.aspx?key=36631…

Handy table, 5K eviction notices in FY 24-25, majority from inability to pay rent

Here's the public records request of emails from EBRHA, highlighting the org's failure to collect demographic data for the SPORS program for "small property owner"/landlords served by them in the RAP program, despite it being required in the grant. https://oaklandca.nextrequest.com/requests/25-7406…

EBRHA did not track demographic data for their SPORS program, despite it being a requirement of the grant, and perhaps more critically, after many claims at Council podium that EBRHA represents a largely Black and Brown, Oakland residing landlord base.

They convened into a special meeting, due to presence of CM Jenkins.

RAP pre: 2500 properties registered under RAP have not paid the RAP fee, but RAP pursued and got some...about 96K units are covered by the program, but only 75K pay the RAP fee

The rep said they will have more info on that during the EBHRA/SPORS item.

Now on to Centro's grant for lo-income/mod assistance program in RAP processes.

RAP program manager Victor Ramirez presents. The contract amt is 250K/year, can be renewed up to three years, not to exceed 1 MM

Some of the specs...left, demographic data on those served in the last contract period that ended in September. Scope to right

Jenkins, who is not in the committee, came specifically to interrogate the Centro program for some reason.

Jenkins asks why Centro isn't hitting goals on number cases fully processed "due to some of those cases...complexity of the cases ended up expending more resources than anticipated." he says that Centro Legal had staffing issues; he says RAP is also falling behind due to staffing

Ramirez going through RAP's staffing problems: 32 positions, but only have 21 staff; out of 6 hearing officers, they're down to 3

Jenkins asks why they didn't adjust the metrics given the staffing problems. Ramirez says that the goals are still achievable...they are hiring more staff, Centro Legal is changing model and train paralegals to rep tenants in RAP instead of having attornies in every hearing

Jenkins asks why they've only prevented 4 people from losing housing, he says that Black residents have not been served by the program, listing disparities

HCD deputy dir Ramirez is fielding the questions, he says that the quality of the services, but the outcomes are a "function of due process"; the tenants have defenses they have...it's a matter of having tenants avail themselves of potential services..." not all tenants can win

Jenkins says that Centro isn't serving Black residents, asks if it went through race and equity "why are we rolling this contract over?" Ramirez says that Centro is the only org that responds to the bid, other orgs did not bid

Jenkins, who has a relationship with EBRHA members, and the organization itself, is continuing his interrogation of the program. "we need to go back to RFP" and asks if it went through race and equity

Jenkins: "I urge my colleagues to vote this down". Pretty amazing appearance by Jenkins at a committee he is not a member of

Unger asks if there would be an interruption in services and, Ramirez says they would be. Unger teased out the reality that the system is poor provision of services, or law is gainst tenants . Ramirez: "its absolutely the latter"

Ramirez: "these are quasi judicial, due process...it is the function of the petition, and the ordinances that govern them than it is a reflection of the quality of the services"

It's not news, but the system is stacked against tenants.

Brown: "although I do understand that some of the performances on more complex cases...but I would be curious what does it look like to ensure that even in trying to make sure that the contract doesn't lapse, but ensure that the goals are being met in each year"

Ramirez: "racial equity goals would be achieved by more coordinated outreach, and RAP's capacity also meeting the demand...that's been a constraint for Centro, the City's ability to resolve hearings in a timely matter" due to staffing issues

There's four speakers on the Centro Legal tenant defense at RAP hearings

here's the demo statement again. Centro serves far more Latino clients, but it's not a small number of Black clients either.

David Hall from Centro speaking about the services, "we take everyone who comes in our door, and we take as many cases as we can, every single AA client who comes in, we have represented"

Hall: "no one in a rent board petition loses their housing...that was mistaken...no one is losing if we lose...demographics have been a constant challenge for us...bulk of services are Latino and Black...always looking for better rep..."

Hall: "this isn't a question of not wanting to represent Black clients, we need to get them in our door..."

Hall: "a couple of issues have come up...appeals can take five times as much time...and RAP capacity, we have 16 cases that would have normally been reported during last reporting period that were not because of delays in RAP..."

Hall says that the failure of RAP isn't their fault, "they have half the staff...we have case acceptance guidelines, we can only take so much..."

Fife takes up the issue of staffing, asking about anticipated timeline...Ramirez says that they are down three hearing officers...and two of them are frozen...

Worth noting, Jenkins wrote the Mayor's budget that froze these positions, but did not comment when interrogating Ramirez

Fife: "with positions that can be filled, not frozen...what is the timeline, and how would it impact the services..." Ramirez says that it could take six months to a year, and they would be able to hear more cases

Ramirez says that these are admin hearings, these are petitions for rent increases or decreases, "the stakes are high of course because it speaks to long term sustainability...but the result is not direct housing loss"

Fife says she would want to limit the contract to one year, with only one year administrative extension and work to unfreeze some positions at RAP, and in meantime get numbers up.

The contract item was amended to only one year, with one year extension, with a progress report. Not clear if Jenkins will still vote down the contract at Council.

now on to the eviction prevention services, with Centro and a consortium of other orgs

Hugo Ramirez is giving the presentation; disambiguation, the RAP program manager also named Ramirez, Victor

Going through the metrics, over 179 households served, 90% achieved positive outcome. 41% of the clients served were Black, 31% are Latino.

The last time this contract came through, Ramachandran opposed it as ineffective for the price point.

Now public comment

most of the speakers so far have been supportive of the housing secure grant, most saying that intervention earlier is more effective way of preventing homelessness

Speaker from East Bay Community Law Ctr, one of the consortium in the Housing Secure group of grantees, gives several examples of OHS' successes, which kept vulnerable tenants housed

Hall from Centro gives me more examples, and stats of those served

Another provider says clients are elder grandmas who've lived in Oakland all their lives, working parents and their children whose stability depends on remaining housed.

Emily Wheeler from Oakland Tenants Union says that they send tenants to Oakland Housing Secure from their tenant workshops when they need more help.

A speaker asked why Fife is not listed as introducing the contract

here's more info about Housing Secure

Several speakers have praised Fife's work and support for this and other programs

Ramachandran, who has previously opposed the program on the merits..."members of the public confused"...conflating this with another item. [not in this reporters memory, she claimed she did not want to support because she claimed most of costs were overhead]

Ramachandran says she still has the same issues with overhead, but supports the program

Brown and Ramachandran found themselves on the critical end of commentary. She pulled the item before budget, implying that some or all of the funds from AHTF might be needed to balance the budget

Fife: "what did happen, there was an item that came to CED about allocating money to services that was pulled...I tried to reschedule...the item...you corrected that it was not primarily overhead..."

Fife: unfortunately there are politics that are happening that you all don't see...we should not put staff in predicament on who will and won't support legislation

I guess its worth commenting on, the rumor I've heard is that CAO advised chair to introduce the item, because someone or someones would vote it down if it came out under Fife. I have no evidence for this, again its a rumor, but its to the level where it was actually spoken to

The Housing Secure item was forwarded to Council

Now they are on to the EBRHA RAP rep services

The EBRHA program costs 150K vs 250K for Centro Legal, but they serve considerably fewer people. Seems like the program could be cut easily, given how few benefit and additional money given to one of others discussed today.

A handful of public speakers on this

one of the speakers who spoke as a small property owner just now had a lawsuit with millionaire landlord and prolific evictor John Protopappas that challenged the eviction moratorium https://dockets.justia.com/docket/california/candce/3:2022cv01274/392357…

"Housing Providers of America" is an organization with only one individual, John Protopappas that was terminated in 2024, when it no longer had any use for challenging moratorium

Derek Barnes says these programs are hard to get off the ground, indirectly explaining why it has performed so poorly

Fife has some questions.

Fife: "I have some questions about the demographic data reported by contractor...86% of participants ethnicity is unknown...how is that possible?

Ramirez: "we ask centro and EBRHA to provide demographic data for people they are serving...but we don't restrict that service if people don't want to share the data"

Fife: "Mr. Barnes does it state that 86% of the members served ethnicity was unknown..." Barnes: "In initial contract there was no requirement to do that...through process we created...doesn't require the person to indicate their ethnicity or gender"

Fife: "76%, non-Oakland residents?"

Barnes says that the statistics aren't correct, and that its reversed. [not sure why they wouldn't correct this if that's true, and why Barnes wouldn't have used his speaking time to clarify given how stark it looks"

Fife: "so many times EBRHA comes to this venue and talks about Black landlords being underserved" and notes that there's no data here. She says she wants to limit the term of the contract to one year instead of 3

OCA clarifies that its one year term, with one year option, Fife agrees

item forwarded to Council

To reiterate, this is an exchange directly with the HCD, saying that the contractor "must record and provide stat information for each client, including, but not limited to...presenting gender and ethnicity" and asked if they could go back and get the info. Same info Centro got

Postcript on this because it came up more than once. HCD absolutely kept asking for demographic data. I don't know why everyone is hedging now, unless somehow they discovered they are not allowed to demand it from contractors