Housing Authority reviews operation

FAYETTEVILLE — The Housing Authority Board is looking to get public housing processes up-to-date.

The board received a presentation Thursday from Angela Belford, whom it hired to put together a 45day audit and report. Belford also is chairwoman of the board for the regional Continuum of Care, which is a coalition of service providers for homeless or at-risk residents.

Belford identified a number of ways the authority could become more efficient, upgrade its equipment and make processes easier for staff and residents.

For instance, there are four typewriters sitting in the Housing Authority office, Belford said.

“When I first got there I thought they were dust-catchers,” she said. “I was so wrong.”

Using electronic means, rather than primarily paper, would significantly help maintenance operations, make the application process easier for prospective residents and save staff time, Belford said. The authority’s website also has been updated to include multiple documents and records.

Belford also recommended having regular employee evaluations with a set of metrics, including for the executive director. Creating a deputy director position and reorganizing the organizational chart also would relieve the burden on some positions, including the executive director, she said.

Right now, the Section 8 director, the public housing director and the maintenance director all report directly to the executive director. Belford’s suggested changes would have just the Section 8 director, whose title would change to Housing Choice Vouchers director, and a deputy director report to the executive director.

Giving prospective residents the option to fill out applications online would save time, Belford said. Currently, applicants have to go to the Housing Authority office and fill out three sets of paperwork, she said. Wait time then can be three to 18 months or more, depending on the size and location of the unit requested, said Joy Hunnicutt, public housing director.

The authority should also let residents pay rent and file complaints online. Some residents in the audience Thursday expressed satisfaction with that idea.

Previously, the executive director had been entering bills into the software, Belford said. With an electronic system, that duty could go to the front desk, she said.

Board chairwoman Melissa Terry said she was excited to move processes digitally into current times.

“A way of underscoring poverty is to make things unnecessarily difficult,” she said. “I’m not happy about the findings, but I’m happy about the recommendations to go online as much as possible.”

Ultimately, the board will update its handbook to incorporate the recommendations it chooses to adopt.

The board also interviewed five applicants to serve as interim executive director. Interviews went past 9:30 p.m. It eventually will hire a permanent executive director after a national search.

Belford, along with Billy Rader, George Byers, Mark Starling and Chonda Tapley applied for the interim director position.

Former Executive Director Deniece Smiley was fired after a lengthy board meeting last month. The board then held a series of workshops to come up with a job description for interim executive director, and appointed Laura Higgins, the authority’s Section 8 director, as acting interim director. Higgins is retiring, and has been helping train staff.

Work to replace the water and sewer lines at Hillcrest Towers should begin in summer 2019, according to a preliminary timeline the board reviewed Thursday.

Hillcrest Towers is the 12-story, 120-unit high-rise downtown that provides public housing for the elderly and disabled. The authority applied for a $3 million federal emergency grant in May last year to fix the sewer pipes running through the building. Pipes gave out and flooded the Housing Authority’s office in 2016.

The authority received a notification letter in August, and will have two years to spend the money from the grant, according to Josh Wilbanks with Ledford Engineering.