Ottawa County Housing Commission chides Grand Rapids for expanding into its territory

WEST OLIVE — A month ago, Ottawa Impact founder and county board chair Joe Moss said he wanted to take the county's housing commission "in a different direction" as he suddenly replaced three longstanding members on the panel.

Now, new members are facing their first test, faced with increasingly strained housing inventory and a neighboring community expanding into its territory to help find homes for West Michigan residents.

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At its organizational meeting Monday, April 24, the Ottawa County Housing Commission convened to elect its officers. New county administrator John Gibbs — one of the recently named members — was elected board president; deputy county administrator Patrick Waterman was named vice president.

At issue was the recent announcement by the Grand Rapids Housing Commission that it would expand its service area to include Ottawa County and its communities, citing "a severe rental housing shortage in Greater Grand Rapids," which has created an extremely competitive rental market.

"Over the past year, only about 35 percent of our Housing Choice Voucher program clients have been successful in their search for an affordable unit," the GRHC wrote in its winter newsletter. "Expanding our service area expands the pool of available units."

The GRHC also said the Ottawa County Housing Commission doesn't have funding through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, nor authorization to operate an HCV program, which provides rent subsidies for low-income people.

That could be a problem, as Ottawa County also doesn't have enough affordable units.

Housing Next projected that, between 2020 and 2025, the county’s population will increase by 16,633 (5.6 percent) and the number of households will increase by 6,500 (6.2 percent). The nonprofit works with local governments and developers to create housing at all price points; the figures were from a 2021 housing needs assessment.

The report showed Ottawa needs more units in all categories for rentals and home ownership, including:

• 1,421 units of low-income rental housing (less than $625 per month)

• 1,667 affordable workforce rental housing ($625-$1,249 per month)

• 1,297 market-rate rental housing ($1,250+ per month)

• 1,321 entry-level for-sale homes ($100,000-$149,000)

• 5,117 moderate-income for-sale homes ($150,000-$249,000)

• 4,908 high-income for-sale homes ($250,000+)

A recent study showed Grand Rapids and Kent County need an estimated 34,699 new units to meet projected population growth by 2027.

Ryan Kilpatrick, a lead consultant with Housing Next, told housing commissioners Monday that Ottawa County is "catching up on its rental product after not building it for 20 years," and said he estimated a need for 15,000 additional housing units in the county — 60 percent at market rate and 40 percent with subsidies.

In all, the two counties need a combined 14,618 new rental homes and 7,278 new for-sale homes at all price points by 2025, according to Housing Next.

Gibbs said he liked the idea of promoting home ownership and said the county should be cautious in pursuing subsidies for housing developments, calling it the "poverty investment complex."

"When communities see less subsidies, they tend to embrace these projects better," Gibbs said. "My nightmare is seeing those kinds of things creeping in ... not feeding the monster."

He said the county board of commissioners, now controlled by Moss' far-right political group Ottawa Impact, would agree that fewer subsidies would mean fewer layers of bureaucracy and kickbacks.

"Not knowing where the money goes — people have gone to jail," Gibbs said, referring to cases in recent years where housing authority employees have been convicted of stealing government funds, primarily in Florida.

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The commission then broached the GRHC expansion, and discussed "approving the preparation" of a resolution that outlines their position and to voice their displeasure with the GRHC expanding its voucher program "without consultation with Ottawa County and with negative impact to Ottawa County’s housing situation," according to the commission's pre-prepared agenda.

Lindsey Reames, executive director of the Grand Rapids Housing Authority, attended Monday's meeting and provided some context as to what fueled the GRHC's decision to expand the program into Ottawa.

"We do understand the challenges, but I think it's important to understand the benefits in expanding the jurisdiction," she said.

She said expanding would allow developers to build more project-based units, which will leverage some of their tax-credit funding.

"I think that's a really important component to think about," she said.

"This expansion isn't just about moving Kent County families to Ottawa County. This is about choice — it's called the 'Housing Choice Voucher' — we have multiple families in Kent County who work in Ottawa County and would love (to live) in Ottawa County, as we have families in Ottawa who work in Kent."

Drew Peirce, executive director of Good Samaritan Ministries, spoke to the group's mission of helping secure housing for Ottawa County's homeless population.

He said the Kent County expansion into Ottawa could be problematic.

"We have a real shortage of rental units. On top of that, the market demands a much higher price than what might be considered fair market — especially as designated by (the Michigan State Housing Development Authority) or HUD. So, it's a huge challenge even when names get pulled ... finding units they qualify for and getting them leased up in them. You add into that a whole influx of another group of people competing for those same units that already are incredibly scarce. It will make it really challenging to find units."

Gibbs said Ottawa County's approach has been primarily to focus on the homeless population because it's the most critical need, and said if landlords have the choice between new tenants that were recently homeless over current residents who need rent relief, it would further exacerbate the homelessness issue.

"We think this could create a difficult dynamic for us," he said.

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There were 130 homeless people in Ottawa County in 2020, according to the United Way of Ottawa and Allegan Counties' Point-in-Time Count, the most recent data available on the organization's website.

Reames said there's more to consider than those who are homeless.

"We're not just talking about homeless folks. We're talking about people who are rent-burdened," she said. "Residents in your community and the Kent County community are paying more than 50 percent — in some cases more than 80 percent — of their adjusted gross income towards rent. This is not necessarily about finding them new units, this is about allowing them to lease in place where they already live, but with a rent subsidy that doesn't make them choose between paying their rent or buying their medicine."

Reames said there were practical considerations for the GRHC, primarily developments that straddle the county line and providing state-requested services in Ottawa.

"There's a property in Hudsonville that's in both counties," she explained. "When our residents get vouchers, they can only live on one side of the property, which has now become a fair housing issue."

She said the expansion was necessary to help Ottawa residents — because Ottawa can't.

"You have a group home in Holland, whose owner has decided to opt out of their multi-family insurance program and their subsidy program. And then what happens is HUD asks an agency to please administer the voucher program, so they can stay in place. And because there wasn't a housing commission with voucher funding besides the state agency, HUD asked Grand Rapids to please administer those vouchers," she said. "We didn't have the authority to do that without expanding our jurisdiction."

She stressed the scenario of Kent County residents relocating to Ottawa would be the exception, not the rule. She also extended an apology to the OCHC, saying the GRHC had good intentions, but could have coordinated better.

"I just want to apologize for any oversight — that was not the intent," she said. "Very important lesson learned on our part and we will continue to have open dialogue."

Waterman said he appreciated Reames' comments, but said a conversation needed to be had prior to the GRHC making a decision.

"That would have been a discussion that would have been appreciated before this was announced," Waterman said. "We could have coordinated on the messaging a little bit more. I think you're making decisions for Ottawa County and its housing commission without having any discussion."

New board member Klynt Marcusse, owner of Georgetown Township-based development company Marcusse Construction, asked if it was even necessary for the commission to draft a resolution on the issue.

"Does the time have to be wasted to draft that up? I mean, we're talking to Kent County right now," he said. We have no issue helping out residents of our county, your county ... just, give us a heads up next time? Is that good enough? Or do we have to go through a whole motion and write everything out and waste time doing that?"

Gibbs said the resolution, which was not provided in the pre-prepared packet nor provided to the commissioners at the meeting, "was largely drafted." It was approved by the OCHC (with Marcusse dissenting) and now will move on to the county's planning and policy committee for approval — without the housing commissioners ever seeing what was in it.

It was the first meeting since Moss removed Ottawa County's lone Democratic county commissioner Doug Zylstra from the housing commission — a body he helped revive in 2019 after being dormant since 2011.

Also removed from the board were longtime members Virginia Beard and Thomas Reinsma. Gibbs, Marcusse and area realtor Jared Schuitema were added.

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Moss gave no explanation for the decision at the March 14 meeting, but said on his self-created news website Simply American that Gibbs would help to re-establish a county relationship with federal housing officials, referencing Gibbs' previous employment with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Gibbs worked for HUD for four years, and was briefly the assistant secretary for HUD's Community Planning and Development Department prior to launching an unsuccessful bid for Michigan's third congressional seat in 2022.

Gibbs didn't address if the county plans to pursue its own voucher program through HUD, only saying "conversations were being had."

— Sarah Leach is executive editor of The Holland Sentinel. Contact her at sarah.leach@hollandsentinel.com. Follow her on Twitter @SentinelLeach.

This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Ottawa Housing Commission chides Grand Rapids for expanding into its territory