photo by: City of Lawrence screenshot

Members of the Affordable Housing Advisory Board discuss a potential study examining the effects of COVID-19 on the City of Lawrence's housing market at their meeting on Monday, April 8, 2024.

A 30-day public comment period is now open for a proposed reallocation of $100,000 in pandemic relief funds toward a housing study examining the effects of COVID-19 on the City of Lawrence’s housing market.

At Monday’s Affordable Housing Advisory Board meeting, the group heard more about a proposed amendment to the city’s 2019 Community Development Block Grant/HOME Annual Action Plan from Brad Karr, a community development analyst with the city’s Planning & Development Services office. The proposal is related to the $446,184 in Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act funds the city was awarded in 2020, which were then added to the local CDBG/HOME plan for spending. The funds were distributed via the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

All of those funds were originally allocated to the Lawrence Community Shelter to build operating systems as an ongoing response to the pandemic. But Karr told the board that project remains in the planning stages nearly four years later, due in part to supply chain and labor issues.

That project’s scope of work has also shifted over time, Karr added, which has led to the shelter identifying needs that wouldn’t be eligible for the funding. Karr explained that the regulations regarding the funding mandate that all expenditures must be used to prevent, prepare for and respond to COVID-19. In the meantime, Karr said city staff is working to find other funding sources for the shelter.

Who will conduct the study still isn’t clear. Karr told board members that the city would put out a nationwide request for proposals if the amendment is approved.

A public comment period for the proposed amendment will remain open through May 9. Comments can be mailed to the city’s Housing Initiatives Division at P.O. Box 7087, Lawrence, KS 66044; emailed to housinginitiatives@lawrenceks.org; or submitted in person at the department’s offices at 1 Riverfront Plaza, Suite 320.

It will then fall to the Lawrence City Commission to decide whether to approve the amendment after the public comment period, Karr said. From there, the amendment will be submitted to HUD if it’s approved.

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While the group didn’t take any action on Monday, board members did have plenty of questions about the proposed study. Board member Brenda Wahl asked about how long it’s been since the last time Lawrence conducted a housing study, which Karr said was in 2018.

“… We’re going on six years now, and obviously there’s been some changes — COVID-related and otherwise — in our community on housing,” Karr said.

Karr said in recent years, one of those changes has been a shift toward a need for more temporary housing and permanent supportive housing — the latter of which was the subject of an assessment of its own that in 2022 estimated a need for nearly 400 more units. The 2018 study didn’t put as much emphasis on those categories, Karr said, but rather on the need for affordable rental and homeownership units.

One board member, Mark Buhler, was skeptical about the need for a new study.

“What are we likely to learn for $100,000 that we don’t already know?” Buhler asked. “I know things have changed. (The) pandemic, I guess, has passed. It just kind of feels like it’s going to tell us it’s as bad or worse, and our goals are still the same. Whoever’s $100,000 it is has now gone to a very capable consultant to tell us what we think we already know.”

However, Affordable Housing Administrator Lea Roselyn told board members that it’s usually recommended that communities conduct housing studies more frequently, on an annual basis. Roselyn said she’s heard people express the same notion Buhler did, and said the reality is that the 2018 study has been an “asset and a benefit” to numerous community partners in understanding housing needs in Lawrence.

But what that study didn’t anticipate was a global pandemic, Roselyn added, and it was instead intended to provide a broader, more general view of the community’s housing needs. There’s now a need to find much more specific and current data, she said.

“We all understand that the pandemic substantially impacted the housing market, (and) not only what happened in the market but it has impacted population growth, it has impacted income, it’s impacted availability, it’s impacted need, but we don’t quite know how,” Roselyn said.