The Marshall County Commissioners opened a public hearing Monday morning concerning the upcoming owner-occupied housing rehabilitation project.
As explained by Priority Project Resources Grant Writer Shannon McLeod, with the county’s Regional Stellar Communities designation, $500,000 is earmarked for work to be done on homes owned by residents in the county who may not be able to otherwise fund repairs of a critical nature.
McLeod said several interested residents signed up for the program and applied based on their income level status.
“We had a total of 62 applicants that did apply for the program,” stated McLeod. “All of those applications were then scored. It is largely based upon financial need so documented income levels and the ability that you could not find funding elsewhere to do these needed improvements to the home.”
Additionally, the applications were scored on the applicant’s age, disability, veteran status, a female head of the household and other demographics. When the application scoring was complete, the Marshall County Crossroads Regional Stellar Initiative Housing Committee members landed on 15 applicants who qualify with five on the waiting list. Residents who were not chosen for the program were sent letters with information on other programs that may assist them to get the help they need.
As part of the process, McLeod told the commissioners that she toured the homes with inspectors and construction representatives to determine a project plan.
“We’ve toured the 15 homes and actually took pictures and measurements and tried to come up with a scope of work. No homeowner will receive more than $25,000 per home. That is the maximum cut-off. Some of those homes are probably going to need the $25,000 others may not. That’s where I’ll hopefully have some room in the budget to fund a few more as we go down.”
Out of the $500,000 grant funds for the project, about $75,000 was set aside for costs such as administration fees, home inspector fees, construction management fees, and miscellaneous costs for environmental studies and publication.
There is no local match required.
No public comments were given during the hearing.
McLeod noted that she will now send in the formal application to the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority by mid-May and rehabilitation on the homes could start this fall and be complete by the end of the year.
