HAP Falsified $3.7 Million Multnomah Co. Contribution In Federal Grant Application 10/23/02

On Attachment 28 page 65 of the HOPE VI grant submitted to HUD by the Housing Authority of Portland is a listed financial commitment by Multnomah County of $3,758,500 for a branch library to be sited on HAP's Columbia Villa property. However, today the office of Multnomah County Executive Diane Linn confirmed that Multnomah County has made NO such commitment.

HAP was clearly inspired to imagine an official commitment from a letter authored by Multnomah County Commissioner Serena Cruz, Attachment 19 page 59.42. At first Commissioner Cruz says, "we are still in the middle of our siting process." But later she confuses the issue by saying, "We would be pleased to be able to contribute to the revitalization of Columbia Villa with the new branch library."

The site of a new library in North Portland is highly controversial. The citizens committee which has been working on this issue for years has determined that the library should be located on Lombard street. Years ago, before serious funding shortages, a branch library was located on Lombard street. It was accessible to a community of several neighborhoods.

Looking for leverage in the HUD grant submitted June 22, 2001, HAP choose to deliberately misinterpret a letter of support from a single Multnomah County Commissioner into a line item commitment of $3.7 million dollars from the government of Multnomah County apparently hoping that HUD officials wouldn't notice.

The Housing Authority of Portland MUST immediately notify the federal office of Housing and Urban Development, the city of Portland, Oregon's congressional delegation and other interested parties of this deception. This misrepresentation to HUD begs the question: How many other so-called commitments of contributions listed in the HOPE VI grant application are without merit?

HAP's behavior is disturbing because it brings a County Commissioner, Serena Cruz, and the Housing Authority of Portland into an unholy alliance in an apparent attempt to deceive the Federal Government and the people of North Portland who want a say in the placement of a new library.

In a candidate's debate Tuesday Oct. 22nd, Serena Cruz proudly announced the inclusion of a Library as part of her contribution to the $200 million Columbia Villa remodel project. This is obviously NOT true since there is NO commitment by Multnomah County to site a Library at Columbia Villa. In spite of the fact that candidate Cruz spoke for almost an hour on the importance of neighborhoods when it came time to address the only real neighborhood issue of the evening Ms. Cruz ignored the neighborhood impact and avoided the public policy issue.

In spite of the seriousness of HAP's deception it should not divert attention from the central argument surrounding the $200 million Villa remodel project. The vital public policy question still remains for every government and institution with a real financial commitment: Do we want to support a public policy which says, "Low income clients are best served by gathering as many of them as possible into a single compound of government owned buildings. This policy supports the herding of an overwhelming number of low-income people into the single neighborhood which already has the highest number of HAP low-income clients in the city of Portland, Multnomah county and the state of Oregon. It acknowledges that neighborhood stability and community balance are irrelevant to its purposes."

Until August 26, 2002 none of the contributors to the $200 million Columbia Villa remodel project knew how many Housing Authority of Portland clients were in each neighborhood throughout Multnomah County, HAP's area of responsibility. On August 26 an email, Let The Debates Begin, was sent to a very large constituency of interested parties listing the number of HAP clients by neighborhood in Multnomah County. In addition, a web site was established which published this information, a map and other background information, http://www.goodgrowthnw.org . It is now necessary for every participant to reevaluate their contribution in light of the newly revealed public policy implications