Blistering report takes city, CDC's to task

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Headline in today's newspaper.  The thing that is interesting about this headline, and what I have been saying for years, is that the city is partners with the CDC's.  In fact not only partners, but the buck actually stops with the city (the PJ - Presiding Jurisdiction), not the CDC's.   Let me explain.

Mr McGhourthy after requiring three years of documentation.  Wait a second, three years of documentation??!!

• Does this mean money was given to them without any documentation?
• How can this all be Jackie Vachon Jackson's fault when she was not there three years ago?

Evidently money was given out without documentation and now we are asking for three years of receipts and financial audits.   Jahn, imagine running a business like this??  We will give you whatever money you request for three years and then we will ask for the reports later.

Then he goes on to say "If we are unable to justify certain costs disallowed by HUD, the impacted sub-recipient will be required to pay the disallowed cost."   Although these sub-recipients may show net asset value, they typically do not have much CASH, especially when their Executive Directors receive compensation in the mid-$100,000s.  If the sub-recipient does not have the cash, who pays HUD back?

• In the words of Bruce Almighty , if you said the PJ, the presiding jurisdiction, or the City of Worcester
• BINGO Yahtzee .   You are right!!!

There is a great chart in the newspaper showing the average cost per unit of 6 different projects averaging about 350,000 per unit and that is all Jackie Vachon Jackson's fault too?  Hey, why not blame George Bush while we are it.  Don't get me wrong she was involved with some questionable dealings, of which we are sure to hear more, but she surely is not responsible for this scathing audit.

I could go on and on about this, but it is a beautiful Sunday morning and the Pats first home game today. At  the same time you got to love the quote from Mullen Sawyer "The city does not build affordable housing, we build affordable housing".  That's great then you do not need the City of Worcester giving you any more money then?     

Lets hope this audit sheds some light on the systemic problem that has existed in the City of Worcester for at least the past ten years.

1. An over reliance on CDC's as the developer of choice in the City of Worcester.
2. We need to evaluate, if we really need more low income housing when we are well above the target set by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. 

Lets hope also that the new RKG Housing Report, that will be coming out soon, will be listened to this time unlike it was ten years ago.