2004 Group Complaint to H.U.D.

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excerpted & revised from the 2004 letter sent to H.U.D.'s Deke German & to Senator Cornyn (click)

GENERAL and COLLECTIVE GROUP COMPLAINT:

Regarding:

The City of Austin's HUD funded 'Affordable' Housing Programs
Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC) & Austin Neighborhood Housing & Community Development (NHCD)

Specifically, City of Austin (Mis) management of Federally-funded HUD:

Single Family Home Loan Program (SFLP);
Welcome HOME & Dollar HOME
SKIP Programs

COMBINED GROUP COMPLAINT:

To Whom it May Concern:

This letter is an addendum to my previous correspondence, that were typically addressed to H.U.D. San Antonio, as well as to Washinton.

Once again, I am writing in reference to the City of Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC) & its affiliate Austin Neighborhood Housing and Conservation (NHC), which has been renamed Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development (NHCD).

My complaint is in response to a Federally-funded, Municipally-managed H.U.D. housing program (the Single Family Home Loan Program), whereupon I was a client in 1996. Individually, my complaint relates to the overall mismanagement of my project by the City of Austin's AHFC / NHCD, & the City of Austin's failure to maintain its obligatory stance of neutrality as acting manager; suspected Fraud, Waste and Mismanagement, including misuse of Fiduciary Fiscal Reporting duties; & Conflicts of Interest.

However, my greatest concern questions the practices of mamagement from the City of Austin's NHCD in general, and the multiple repercussions thereof.

Furthermore, I would like to emphasize, that while my experience is specific to the program that I participated in, the management tactics and patterns of NHCD in its entirety is the real issue. Because I am addressing a management issue where other H.U.D.- affiliated programs are also managed by the same individuals of The City of Austin Housing Finance Corporation / Neighborhood Housing and Community Development, AHFC's / NHCD's treatment toward me and my project is merely endemic of the department's patterns & practices in general, toward possibly any of its other programs and its clients.

Furthermore, I strongly question whether H.U.D. San Antonio's C.P.D. and O.I.G. Departments will ensure compliance, at the root cause from its participating jurisdictions (pj) which include Austin. The reason being, is that I have attempted numerous times over several years to inform the San Antonio branches of the serious misdoings of Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC) / Neighborhood Housing and Community Development (NHCD); yet I have received little, and oftentimes no response. I have spoken directly with San Antonio HUD investigator Mr. Alex Ramirez; and with H.U.D. San Antonio C.P.D. director, Mr. John Maldonado, whom I do not know if he is of any relation to Mr. George Maldonado of Austin NHCD (Neighborhood Housing and Community Development).

The Curious thing, is that while Mr. Ramirez and Mr. Maldonado of San Antonio H.U.D. rebuffed my complaints, a Fort Worth H.U.D. representative immediately comprehended the seriousness of the types of documentation I presented. While speaking on the phone with her, she immediately said my documentation raised serious questions about Fraud, Waste & Mismanagement. She advised me that it was out of her jurisdiction and to contact San Antonio to request an investigation, based on the concerns of Fraud, waste and mismanagement regarding the City of Austin's practices. Oddly, San Antonio H.U.D. hardly responded and appeared to invest more energy into avoiding/excusing the potential criminal issues that I brought to their attention.

OVERVIEW - Group Complaint to H.U.D.:

There are some common grievances voiced by other program participants regarding their projects and the manner in which they were treated. Their experiences mirror my own and raise questions relating to patterns and practices by City of Austin officials, Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC) and Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development (NHCD); the City of Austin's management toward its H.U.D. funded projects; its treatment toward the clients; and its apparent favoritism toward certain contractors. I will forward the clients' particular stories as soon as they are completed by the individuals.

In light of these patterns, the question is posed whether certain officials (elected or employed) of The City of Austin and its NHCD / AHFC acted with malice and deliberate neglect? Could these particular tactics enacted against participants, who are in vulnerable situations, be contsrued as coercion? Various families, including my own, have been adversely affected by the City of Austin, Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development / Austin Housing Finance Corporation's apparent Abuse of Power.

Some Common Issues & / or Questions Include:

Discrepancies with the Finance Department (i.e. payment authorizations for incomplete work; Fiscal Reporting; Loan Servicing Documents).
City of Austin's Failure to follow through with what Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development / Austin Housing Finance Corporation promised the client it would do;
City of Austin's Failure to address recurring complaints; and to follow through with the prescribed protocols; including complaints related to code-item work and Health and Safety Issues.
Pressure on the client to take actions against his/her best interest and wishes, including Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community development (NHCD) pressuring clients to sign legal documents and payment authorizations prematurely; without merit; or which contradict common contractual procedure.
Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC) &/or Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development's (NHCD) Questionable practices regarding the subject of lead-based paint (click here) & (click here)
Delayed and / or Abandoned Projects;
Poor workmanship, including unchecked code-violations;
Denying the clients the opportunity to fill out the AHFC project / contractor evaluation forms; although this step is defined as part of the concluding process to the project within the Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC) Homebuilder/Contractor Registration Requriements Section 3, part B; & Section 6.

Some of the Practices Raise Questions About:

Preferential treatment toward City of Austin Contractors; &
Misuse of Federal and Municipal tax dollars by the City of Austin, Ausin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development (NHCD), and Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC).

The City of Austin, Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC), Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development (NHCD) continue to use contractors that have a history of poor workmanship; abandoned one or more projects; and/or have failed to complete the work in a timely manner; and/or consistent with the specs. This is in violation of the AHFC Austin Housing Finance Corporation Homebuilder/Contractor Registration Requirements.
Clients complained of being pressured into signing for substandard work against their wishes;
Some Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development (NHCD) projects have persisted for years;
Some clients have been displaced from their homes more than once (and for excessively prolonged periods of time), in order to remedy faulty construction stemming from the City of Austin's initial 'rehabilitation' loan project;
It appears that perhaps some projects with a history of difficulty, may have had more than one rehabilitation loan applied to the same address; and for the same repair spanning over a period of years (Is the City of Austin using Federal Funds more than once for the same project and same repairs, in order to cover-up its deficiencies from the initial project? -- Twice the Federal tax dollars for a fraction of their intended commitment?)

QUESTIONS:

Q: Did City of Austin inspectors pass code-item work that was actually in violation of code?

Q: Why do the City of Austin officials appear to be unconcerned by the apparent misrepresentations of some of its widely used contractors; its representatives of Austin Housing Finance Corporation and Austin Neighborhood Housing and Community Development?

Q: Why do City of Austin Officials appear unconcerned about the potential compromised Health and Safety of 100's of previous housing clients?

Q: Is the City of Austin applying more than one loan; and additional Federal Tax dollars more than once to the same project, in order to cover-up the City of Austin's deficiencies from the intitial project? In other words, is one federally-funded loan program (LeadSmart) covering up the lack of oversight from another City of Austin federally funded loan program (Single Family Loan Program) -- Twice the Federal tax dollars going half the distance of what the Public commited them for?.

Q: Duplication & Waste: Are the costs of these 'Repeat' jobs being passed on to the HomeOwners, the taxpayers, other nonprofits and more than once to the Federal Government?

Q: Has the City of Austin mis-reported the status of failed & abandoned projects to the HUD and the Federal Government? Has the City of Austin reported any incompleted projects as 'completed successes'?

Q: Have the contracts accociated with failed projects typically been dissolved; rather than reported?

If so, does a dissolved contract nullify a participating jurisdiction's requirement to report the status of the project?
Does this practice artificially inflate the City of Austin and its contractors' performance profile scores, and thereby produce a false progress/accomplishment report?

Furthermore, project clients (HomeOwners and HomeBuyers of the City of Austin Housing Programs) have still been held liable to their loan terms regardless of if any money was ever disbursed from the AHFC escrow accounts to their home; and regardless of whether or not the clients' homes were indeed rehabilitated or built to code per the contract.

Q: How do these apparent bait-and-switch tactics by our Public Officials apply to Consumer Protection laws and the Home Lemon Law (click) -- (click) HB3182 proposed by Representative Senfronia Thompson? Are Consumers being victimized by the misuse of our own tax dollars via questionably-managed HUD housing programs?