A D.C. agency that was recently accused of mismanaging millions in funding for a housing project will be placed under the microscope again on Monday at a scheduled oversight hearing before a council committee.
The hearing before the council Committee on Housing and Workforce Development could shed more light on why the city’s Department of Housing and Community Development gave millions to a nonprofit that had no experience in development.
At-large Councilman Michael Brown, who chairs the committee, said he intended to ask about the department’s vetting practices.
“Some of this is not just the past administration but goes on before that,” he told The Washington Examiner.
Critics say the department has a history of awarding grants to nonprofits that might not be qualified for the work tied to the grant.
Sandra Seegars, a Ward 8 Advisory Neighborhood Commission member who has raised questions for the past two years about a failed housing project in her neighborhood, said last week she wanted more answers from the agency on how it selects its grantees.
“My question would be how to stop them from giving money to inexperienced people,” said Seegars, who is also running for city council. “Before you give money, talk to the ANC commissioners in the area.”
The failed housing project at 1300 Congress St. SE and others are now the subject of a D.C. attorney general investigation. The probe came after Brown and Ward 1 Councilman Jim Graham announced they had found that DHCD awarded the anti-gang violence group Peaceoholics $4.6 million to acquire and rehabilitate those properties even though it did not have development experience.
Graham and Brown said their investigation found Peaceoholics contracted friends or associates to do the development work but not a single unit was delivered during the two years the nonprofit was managing it.
In 2010, DHCD quietly handed over management of the development to another organization. Seegars said part of the property is still boarded up. The building was supposed to be renovated to house low-income families.
Brown said, however, that he did not expect the oversight hearing to bring any closure on the issue.
“I expect we’ll get a lot of ‘can’t answers’ because of the pending [attorney general] investigation,” he said.
