The City of Hialeah should get out of the business of managing affordable housing, said Mayor Esteban Bovo Jr. at a meeting on April 23.
And now Hialeah will be outsourcing the administration, management and maintenance of Hialeah’s 14 affordable housing properties to Hialeah Housing Authority (HHA), a public housing agency that operates 1,117 public housing units and manages 5,128 Section 8 vouchers, according to HUD.
Now, under the new administration, the city’s 625 affordable housing units will see gradual rent increases.
On Jan. 9, when the mayor’s office presented the proposal to have HHA take over to city council members, Bovo emphasized three times, “we will not raise rents on the city’s housing.” However, during the April 23 session, Ruth Rubi, the Finance Management Director, reported that there will indeed be an increase in the rental rates for vacant units.
“The legacy tenant will remain the same…The increase comes in the form of a voucher, Section 8, on basically empty units,” said Rubi.
Currently 40 of the city’s 625 units have been vacant for months due to ongoing repairs, according to Rubi. The vacant units will now be leased for $1,239 with Section 8 vouchers or other rental subsidies. This will be the first time Hialeah’s affordable housing takes Section 8 vouchers, said HHA Director Julio Ponce. HHA will also make the units available to renters who don’t need vouchers or additional subsidies. “If someone on another waiting list or not on any list comes looking to rent a unit in these city properties, we will rent it to them for $1,239,” said Ponce.
The mayor’s chief of staff, Ismare Monreal, told el Nuevo Herald that Hialeah will receive more money through federal funds, so tenants will pay less out of pocket.
The agreement between the city and HHA for the management of these properties would be a minimum of five years, with potential renewal, through a 6 percent fee.
Although the increase in rents is now official, the city has been raising rents on these properties when they become vacant for some time. According to public documents provided to el Nuevo Herald, all properties have a range of rental prices, varying from $300 to $1,070. In many cases, a building can have up to four different rates. The city has not provided detailed information on the reasons.
Jesus Tundidor, council president, told el Nuevo Herald that in the city’s largest property, Daisy & Rosa, “rent has been honored until the end, but when someone dies and the unit becomes available, rent is charged at market price.”
Councilman Bryan Calvo, the mayor’s main opponent, considers it beneficial for residents that HHA manages the properties because there have been maintenance issues for a long time.
“No one wants to raise rent, but the most important thing is that no apartment remains vacant,” said Calvo. “The most concerning issue is that there are 40 vacant units. It’s disheartening when there’s so much need.”
The revelation of 40 vacant units in Hialeah’s affordable housing comes after thousands of people lined up at the John F. Kennedy Library to register for the Section 8 voucher lottery for 1,000 slots just opened by HHA.
Financial challenges of Hialeah’s affordable housing
According to a letter sent by the finance director, Rubi, to council members, the affordable housing program faces financial challenges because the city has been subsidizing part of the property expenses, mainly because the rental income does not cover annual maintenance costs.
Rubi projected an affordable housing shortfall of $1.061 million to be subsidized by the city’s general fund for 2024.
El Nuevo Herald requested the budget for these affordable housing units, and the city sent documents from the past five years showing revenues, excluding the expenses incurred by the properties.
The records only indicate that each year the city reports on the transfer of general budget funds to cover the deficit of the affordable housing fund covering staff, but they do not detail the expenses incurred by each property.
Each year, there was an increase in general fund transfers, from $353,000 in 2020 to $907,000 in 2024, adding up a deficit of about $2,874,473 over those five years, according to Hialeah reports.
This subsidy has led to a “significant financial burden that the city must address.”
The chief of staff estimates that with this new agreement with HHA, by 2027 Hialeah will be up to date.
Four decades of Affordable Housing in Hialeah
In 1984, during Raúl Martínez’s tenure, the city of Hialeah initiated its affordable housing program.
At that time, Martínez sought permission from HUD to use $1.4 million in federal funds to build a 32-unit apartment complex for low-income families.
The first affordable property was Villa Esperanza, located at 1470 and 1480 West 38th Place.
Martínez, who left politics two decades ago, believes that “Bovo is dismantling the affordable housing program,” although he notes that “this started with Carlos Hernández when he sold all the construction equipment, carpentry, electricity, and plumbing that the city had.”
“If there is deterioration and lack of maintenance in these buildings, it is the fault of the administrators,” Martínez asserts.
According to the former mayor, Bovo’s comment that Hialeah is withdrawing from the housing business is nonsensical.
“The city has never been in the housing business but in providing services to meet a need,” Martínez said. “The city is here to offer services, apart from water, firefighters, police, and waste.”
“I feel extremely frustrated and angry seeing how they continue to destroy something that took so much to build,” laments Martínez, who estimates that since he left the mayor’s office in 2005, the need for housing in Hialeah has only increased.
READ MORE: Struggling to stay in Hialeah: Evictions surge in new luxury enclaves
HUD and local code violations
Much of Hialeah’s affordable housing is currently funded through the HOME Investment Partnerships federal program , which is the largest federal grant to state and local governments designed exclusively to create affordable housing for low-income households. According to HUD housing standards, properties must be decent, safe, sanitary, and in good repair.
However, public records provided by Hialeah reveal that at least 7 of the 14 affordable properties have incurred city code and HUD violations, presenting conditions that pose risks to the safety of residents. These violations include:
▪ Fire exit signage damaged
▪ Expired elevator inspections
▪ Expired elevator inspection certificate
▪ Shopping cart obstructions in hallways, leading to multiple incidents
▪ Shopping cart obstructions in stairwells
▪ Illegal dumping
In one building, Villa Esperanza, which is part of HOME program, tenants reported to city inspectors that a person was living in the laundry room.
These violations are part of the reason Mayor Bovo’s administration wants to transfer control of the city’s properties to HHA.
“With HHA, a robust service that the city cannot provide through subsidies will come; we will have a much more robust city administration,” explained Rubi before the council.
READ MORE: Hialeah turns to developers, attorneys to help tackle its affordable housing crisis
