 Our friends from the media being here and everyone else here as well I want to thank our city manager and our county manager for being here with us and other staff from the city and county also You all can see that I'm here today Surrounded by my colleagues Standing together in support of our neighborhoods at McDougal Terrace and letting them know that they have the support of our entire community School board members county commissioners and city council members We are all united in support of our friends and neighbors in McDougal Terrace and we recognize the importance of standing together to do that There are four people who will be speaking today, and then we're happy to take questions from the media I'll start off then County Commission chair Wendy Jacobs will be speaking then Ashley Kennedy on behalf of the McDougal Terrace residents and then we'll ask Jim groves our emergency management director to say a few words also About some of the work that they're doing Our hearts go out to the residents who have been relocated from McDougal Terrace being in a hotel away from home Not knowing when you can return is terrible, and I think we all all of us ignore that and acknowledge it and have Been acknowledging it and understand the depth of the difficulty that people are facing On Saturday and at the meeting at Burton school and at other times I've had the opportunity to talk to a lot of residents one-on-one About the burdens that they are facing and I will tell you that one of the things I have been struck by is the way in which they have weathered this emergency with unity as McDougal Terrace neighbors and with great dignity and patience and I have been amazed and admiring of the residents of McDougal Terrace who have been able to do this very difficult thing together and Have really hung in there under extremely difficult circumstances For 40 years our community has failed these people and the people that lived in these This housing community and others before them and we are here now to tell them that they are not alone That would we do everything in our collective power to make this right? for the last 10 days or so with The Durham Housing Authority with the support of our local governments has been working closely with HUD Greensboro office and our state and national partners to try to bring resources to bear to improve the situation as quickly as we can Yesterday afternoon, thanks to the convening assistance of Congressman David Price's office I let a conference call of many of these partners These included director Anthony Scott of the Housing Authority Commissioner Wendy Jacobs city manager Bonfield county manager Davis members his staff Emergency management director Jim Groves representatives of congressman Price and Butterfield as well as senator Burr We also had on the call for Representatives from the governor's office as well as Mark Benton the assistant secretary of health and human services for North Carolina Who presides over the division of public health? all of those representatives From the national government and the state government as well renewed their offers of assistance to the residents of mcdougal terrace and to the housing authority I and director Scott have been in constant contact with our congressional representatives of these last days particular with congressman Price's office Because congressman Price chairs the house committee that oversees funding for housing the apartment of housing and urban development in Washington Congressman Price's staff is working actively with HUD so that Durham Housing Authority can receive both technical assistance and most important emergency capital funding going forward as Well as what are known as tenant protection vouchers all of those pledges of support by current prices office Were renewed yesterday on the phone call the congressman's office and all of our representatives in washington Will be as well as the governor's office will be working to procure the emergency support that we need from The department of housing and urban development We also discussed on the call yesterday again the assistance that our state public health officials are offering to help dha Educate its residents and the public about carbon monoxide and other potential safety issues Our community is treating lists like the full fledged emergency that it is for 270 displaced families We have fully engaged our emergency management capabilities There are daily calls with Anthony Scott our Durham Housing Authority director with Jim groves Our emergency management director our city and county managers and other agencies as necessary on that call Which could include social services alliance behavioral health and our other organizations There's a communication system with mcdougal terrace residents now and i'm i'm sure that jim grows when he speaks will want to make comments about that That system as well I want you all to know i want everyone to know in this community that Director anthony scott has my full support and i believe the support of this assembled leadership Mr. Scott had led has led this incredibly difficult process With poise with wisdom with humility and with transparency He made a very courageous and difficult decision to relocate those residents that were recently relocated knowing the difficulties that would ensue knowing how difficult it would be And yet he and his staff have worked 24 seven to make this relocation as painless as it can be No one knew that there were high CO readings at mcdougal terrace until they were recently discovered When they were discovered mr. Scott made the decision to relocate because the safety of its residents is his highest priority I fully endorse that and I fully endorse this difficult decision As I said earlier, this is a problem that is 40 years in the making Everyone in Durham who is paying attention has known that mcdougal terrace and other housing authority communities Have been deteriorating for decades and been patched together Mr. Scott is the leader who is doing something about that In the past two years with the support of roughly 15 million dollars in city funding Mr. Scott has led dha's renovation of damar court of marine road of larrell oaks community Hundreds of units and will be renovating jj henderson as well next year With the first significant new housing that the Durham housing authority has built in many years To be built at next to jj henderson as well All of this is Durham housing authority work led by mr. Scott in order to create new housing and to fix up Old housing for our Durham housing authority residents He has made a plan to redevelop the Durham housing authority communities at oldham towers at liberty street And at forest hills heights so that the people there can live in excellent housing in mixed income communities That will end the isolated poverty Which we see afflicting these residents of mcdougal terrace And the residents of these other communities as well And this plan is funded by 60 million dollars of the 95 million dollar affordable housing bond That was just passed by Durham voters 60 million dollars of the bond is allocated to the Durham housing authority to change the lives of its residents I'm proud that our city government and our voters have chosen to support the residents of Durham housing authority in this way The bond money is not money that can be quickly deployed bonds have to be issued and so forth But we know that there money is going to be needed and there are other sources of money that we can deploy The housing bond has had another important effect on Durham housing authority With the passage of the bond mr. Scott has been able to program Durham housing authority scares capital improvement funds For keeping mcdougal and cornwall mcdougal terrace and cornwallis especially in deshitch shape pending full redevelopment That was the plan for this year Now of course these funds are being diminished by the expense of the mcdougal relocations And we will have to support the Durham housing authority and replenishing these funds Our first priority is to get support From the federal government through their emergency expenditures And we also know that there will need to be A considerable local resources devoted to this as well and we need to be ready to do that We also need to be clear at this time that we did not have a full accounting of the repairs Needed in the apartments at mcdougal terrace to make sure they are safe sanitary and decent living conditions We support mr. Scott's assertion that no one will be moving back in until dha can guarantee the safety of their apartment Mr. Scott and his staff are assessing the situation and we will be there to support them In that as well Amidst the terrible difficulties that our residents are facing There are many people who deserve our thanks and praise And I want to just say that one of our speakers in a moment Is one of those people and that is ashley canady ashley is foremost among these these the people who deserve our thanks and praise She has been leading and holding her community together not only through this emergency But she has also been doing so for many years as the president of the residence council And all of us have dealt with her in that context and have seen the extraordinary leadership That she has been able to offer so ashley. Thank you for your incredible And if you've been there on saturday and you saw I said something similar about ashley on saturday The the mcdougal terrace residents pretty much tore the roof off the building when I did so We thank the volunteers who have poured out to help people like nana asante smith Who has helped lead the organizing of volunteers and supplies People like leonardo williams whose restaurants dwellies has become headquarters for donations And has provided so many meals People like businessman wanzara zua who set up his grill at mcdougal terrace last sunday To feed the people there and show the unity of our communities People who have set up go fund me pages to support our residents are friends at the united way who have given each resident A $250 cash card out of their durham one fund and are preparing to do much more We have had in recent days realtor step forward to speak to the housing authority to talk about wanting to help the residents be housed I cannot name nearly everyone who has helped in this effort because there are just too many to name The number of volunteers and donors Is hundreds maybe thousands of people in durham and I want to thank our community for this incredible outpouring But we also know that this voluntary effort is volunteer effort while important can't do nearly the whole job We need government to step up We need our private business partners to step up And we need to make sure that this is a long term effort because this is this problem is not going to be solved this week I want to thank our city departments fire The city county inspections the police department Neighborhood improvement services and others transportation and others who have helped so much I want to particularly uh single out durham public schools for their amazingly quick response on transportation I was just so gratified the way in which our public school system sprung into action to get these kids Transported now from 12 different hotels to their schools. It hasn't been perfect There have been some difficulties, but of course that was going to be the case But our schools have done a wonderful job in transporting these kids And in this case, we know that there's schools when when when when when children are moved to different homes In different these hotels now the schools are providing critically important stability And i'm just very grateful that our public schools have been able to do that So I want to repeat The most important thing is this that our hearts are with the residents of mcdougal terrace the hearts of this whole community We know that over many years that we have not done what we have needed to do as a community to make these communities Make these housing authority communities what they need to be We have now got a plan to do it Through the housing bond and through the through the plan that that mr. Mr. Scott has started But it's going to take a while to do that and now we're in an emergency situation That we have to deal with as an emergency situation and we will do that We will do that. We are looking forward to helping in any way that we can So now i'm going to uh turn the microphone over uh first to commissioner jacob's then to Ashley canady and finally to jim groves and then we'll take questions. So commissioner jacob's Thank you, uh, mr. Mayor My purpose here today is to really stand in solidarity Uh to represent durham county government my fellow commissioners our staff our county manager to say that we stand in solidarity here Also with durham public schools With everyone in our community to say that we support The residents of mcdougal terrace We will do whatever we can to Make the situation right I want to first acknowledge that this is a terrible crisis In our community and there are many many reasons that we have come to this moment And it involves decisions that were made locally at the state level the federal level. It is a very complex situation But this is a defining moment For us as a community And that we all standing together Bringing together the collective resources that we have We are going to do what needs to be done as a community And like all disasters we saw it happen last year with the gas explosion downtown When we have disasters You know, it's a terrible thing and But we also I feel like need to also look at some of the positives of this situation that I have just been amazed at I will say that Every single person I talk to this is what everybody is talking about Everybody in our community cares About what is happening at mcdougal terrace and I want the people Of mcdougal terrace to know that This is what everyone in our community is talking about. What can they do to help? And so I think that is really important People say we're going to do it like Durham do it like Durham and we're going to do it like Durham That's what we're going to do Because we've seen it happening the outpouring as the mayor spoke about people wanting to help And in many different ways and we'll need to sustain that For a very long time and on every different level I also want to just say that This crisis also for me Really is a shining example of what is the strength of our community And again, it is the people of our community and the people of mcdougal terrace I have been blown away By the people of mcdougal terrace And it has really shown me and I think it's shown the whole community What a strong community with dougal terrace is among an important community And the strength and the leadership and the resilience of not just ashley canady, but there are a lot of incredible people In that community that have just Risen up and taken control and so Again, this is to me is the silver lining of this crisis And it brings me back to what The mission of Durham county government is we have a great quote on the outside of our health and human services building by phil freelon Which talks about how The success of Durham county government and our community will be based on Our capacity to enhance the well-being of every person in our community So this is what this is about. It's about the people in our community Investing in the people of our community Our greatest resource And I lastly want to say that the county has been a partner doing what we can on our end the first day When anthony scott started the evacuations that friday We had 20 social workers volunteer For about eight hours. I don't know until late that night. Just ad hoc Going around and trying to go door to door and help With the process We've had a lot of our gss staff helping public health emergency management um and Now alliance health is coming in with support And there are plans for our library Mobile unit to go around and I know jim groves is going to come up and talk More about it. Um some of the more details about what the county has been doing But we will we are prepared to do whatever we can With our resources our human resources To help support the community during This very difficult time But not just now but ongoing We have to make sure that people in our community are connected to the vast Resources that we have so I look forward to new connections and new strengths And a new direction That will come out of this experience and I'm hopeful for the future. Thank you and I'm proud To introduce our hero. I'm one of many heroes, but our hero Ashley kennedy. Thank you. Ashley Good morning everybody. Um before I start. I want to thank my team. I have an excellent team that's sitting over in the corner I want you guys to give my team a hand. They've been really excellent with Helping in this process Um, as you all know, mac doogle is going through a serious crisis right now It's it's very disheartening and it's very sad But we have become a community that stands together And to continue to help us stand together. We need to cut down on a lot of confusion That is going on Um, we have different go fund means we have different different stuff that's going on Everybody wants to help but we in order to make it run smoother. We need everybody to get on one accord Because um, we have a lot of families that are being forgotten about because people want to go to certain hotels There's 12 hotels We are still operating out of 51 b as you see we got our 51 b strong shirts on We're mac the mac united now Um, we're still accepting donations. Um, we're at capacity with clothes So if you guys can please um spread the word that we can't take any more clothes right now We don't have any space for it. Um, and we just appreciate you guys. Um Not just through this crisis. I want you guys to remember us after this after this happens Come back to our community once the cameras are gone Stand with our community because our community we will come home And when they come home A lot of people are being judged. I want anybody to be judged anymore I just want them to be welcome back to the community with open arms And they're going to need a lot of resources because you don't realize the kids have been crammed in hotel rooms for going on 10 days now And it's starting to take us toll on the children The hotels aren't you know, we know there's a business, but they can't really Have the kids running around the hotels and stuff like that. So we need that type of support um For our children and just like I said just continue to stand with us. We're going to get through this Um, just reach out to us, you know, sometimes my day can't get hectic But I have a strong team and we're just going to make sure we continue to move forward And just continue to you know, just hold us in your prayers Come out say hello Don't be afraid of us come to the mac and like I said Everybody's in mac-dougal now. I want to see everybody in mac-dougal when the community comes back And just some people just may need a hug give them a hug play with their kids If they come at you with aggression, don't take it personal Just realize they've been stuck in a hotel for 10 days and it's a lot So once again, I want to thank everybody. Um, you see we 51 be strong. We're the mac united. That's our new thing in mac-dougal I just thank you guys all for your support and I thank my team as well Thank you Thank you so much. Ashley. Um, you can see what an amazing leader that she is She always puts it all in perspective for us I'm going to ask now. Mr. Jim groves our emergency management services director Please come up and and talk to us a little bit as well about some of the things that they're doing Good morning. Jim groves, uh, city county emergency management director Um, I want to recognize Ashley and just the great work you've done. It's uh, it's really wonderful to see Um, how our volunteers can kind of band together and people just kind of take the initiative to volunteer and kind of Lead amazing efforts like this. So thank you for everything that you've done Um, just a quick share of information about what we've been doing for emergency management Um, trying to help coordinate, uh, the mac-dougal effort With everything that's been going on Our job with emergency management is really to Uh, coordinate resources and get them to where the need is So a lot of what we're doing is working with our volunteer organizations Salvation army united way alliance mental health care and making sure that We've got this kind of one united front on how we're going to get the uh, the resources to the people in the hotels And and how we're going to make sure that We don't have any Holes or where we don't have any gaps We need to make sure that we're feeling those so the right resource gets to the right people that have been displaced or Um, I've been relocated from mac-dougal terrace. So we're really really really trying to Work to get the necessary food supplies Um medications diapers wipes And formula anything like that. We want to make sure it's getting from where it's being stored at To the hotels and assist as much as we can in that effort We have developed an incident action plan from Probably the second day that we heard about this and really that helps guide us on roles and responsibilities Of any type of support mechanism that we can offer Our incident action plan includes like the wellness checks Social services folks have been going out and looking at the vulnerable population that have had been relocated We're looking for infants, you know, two years and young to make sure That we've got our public health folks being able to look at them we're also looking at Our community paramedics going out there and looking for people that they used to be working with So we're trying to connect again the resources to the need We've been coordinated conference calls Several times during the day, but A five o'clock meeting is a standing meeting that we've got to make sure that we're sharing information And understanding the need and making sure that we can reallocate resources to the needs. So every day at Five o'clock, we're getting together with the city county management Anthony scott at dha Our public health folks our social services folks just to make sure we're communicating and sharing information as best that we can Lastly at the end of every day, we were putting together a situation report And that kind of breaks down everything that's going on from inspections at dha to the transportation needs to Excuse me for that The transportation piece of it The inspections piece of it And everything that's kind of going on with what's going on the volunteer effort We're going where things are going you heard actually talk about 51 b And and as she runs out of space, we're trying to support it and find other locations for them to be able to Store these supplies and get them to the right direction Lastly is we've already pulled the state in Kind of in support of what may or she was talking about Last Tuesday, we brought in the state recovery folks That the north can on office of recovery and resiliency The HUD folks legal and we started looking at recovery options How can we help the people that have been relocated? How can we help dha and how can we help? City and county government should they need to do Any type of other support so we're looking at Way way way in advance like years down the road on what we might need to do for recovery I think that's Sure and thank you for wanting to be we ask everyone in medougal terrace to sign up for our alert Durham notification system and We're not giving kind of the the the opt-in information publicly But we gave it just to the medougal folks so nightly as we're requested We are pushing out updates to the medougal folks On progress of what's happening that day Meetings that might be scheduled the next day if there's special transportation that's going on so The the Durham housing authority through emergency management would be constantly pushing out this messaging to the folks to keep him Prized of the status of this relocation effort. Thank you very much All right. Thank you I appreciate it all of the folks who have spoken and now I'm going to ask our members of the media if you all have any questions I believe that Tony is going to bring you all a microphone. We're live streaming and so you want to make sure that you're able to be heard Thank you. Good morning. Mayor Sloan Heffernan from WRL news. Thanks for having us WRL's investigation that aired yesterday showed dangerously high levels of carbon monoxide in several units at the Hoover road Housing complex what answers do you have for the people there? What is your reaction to this possible expansion of this problem? Yeah, well, so Thank you for that That's really a question that The housing authority is best posed to the housing authority because they're the people on the ground dealing with it But of course if there's any danger to people At Hoover road or elsewhere That they will have to be relocated to safety I'm sure that that is going to be the first priority of director Scott so That's critically important. No one can be living in unsafe conditions no matter where they live and That's That's an absolute But in terms of the actual situation on the ground at Hoover road in terms of You know individual units and so forth I know that's work that the housing authority is is doing and I think you should When you get I know that director Scott's having daily briefings And you'll be able to ask him that question to get some specifics in light of that report Have you had any conversations about evacuations at that unit and also further? Investigations of other housing complexes. I'm I have not had any discussion about that with Mr. Scott But I'm sure that he and I will talk today. I once that The housing authority is able to make an assessment of the situation and so Any of our older housing authority communities Clearly we need to make sure that in all of them everybody is safe And if that means additional inspections, which I'm sure that it will entail then those need to happen How are you prepared for a possible crisis across Durham with carbon monoxide leaking from appliances at multiple housing complexes? Yeah, well, you can see right now that the situation that just the situation at mcdougal terrace has Certainly stressed our resources and so a lot of Thought and work will have to be given to that So should such a situation arise. I don't anticipate that but it is certainly a possibility and I know that our housing authority folks our emergency emergency management folks Will be thinking and figuring out should that occur But I we don't know enough yet to to know about that. Thank you I'm here, but I agree. That's a super important question I just have a few quick questions. Could you run through real quick how you guys will use that 65 million dollars to help mcdougal terrace and the Other tenants living in affordable housing from the affordable housing bond chris The affordable housing bond is a 95 million dollar affordable housing bond that the voters passed in november so a couple months ago And that includes roughly 60 million dollars for the Durham housing authority to Redevelop some of its housing communities The communities that have been targeted for that for the first phase of that are Liberty and oldham downtown, which are also very old housing communities far as hills heights as well and mcdougal terrace is not in that first group of communities to be renovated through the bond For several reasons one of which is you have to be able to have private capital as part of what? Private capital have to come in bank loans and so forth and The housing authority and its consultants and I agree with them made the Made the assessment that the places that that that capital was most easily Attracted would be downtown to begin with and plus mcdougal is very large and Would take a lot of money to redevelop So mcdougal is not first on that list But what the housing bond has done for mcdougal is and this was mr. Scott's plan for this year as I mentioned earlier Is it freed up capital funds within mcdougal's within the housing authority budget? The housing authority receives very limited capital funds from the federal government As as you know the the housing authority is a creature of the federal government and has been grossly underfunded for ever for decades Set steadily squeezing down the amount of money to maintain and renovate even do basic maintenance on our Durham housing authority communities and so Because of that we as a locality have had to step up because the federal government's not doing its job We supported the Durham housing authority and renovating at damar court marion road now jj henderson and we will be doing Consider continuing to do that But one of the things that the bond has done is it's allowed the housing authority to plan to use its capital funds which are limited for the renovation and this year to keep jj to keep mcdougal terrace and Cornwallis especially in decent shape until they can be fully redeveloped which is going to take some time Now of course that capital money is being Severely called upon to Just house folks in these hotels and so that money is going to have to be replenished To be able to do the job that we need to do so the indirect effect of the bond on mcdougal terrace is freeing up this capital money for Future renovations in the short term and do you know how much of those capital funds will go to mcdougal terrace specifically? I don't I know that The entire capital fund of the housing authority Available was is approximately seven million dollars, but that's being spent down at a Very rapid rate right now and how much are you asking for the federal government's being burst? We don't have an amount yet I mean, I think one of the things we don't know and this speaks to the question of the first reporter also We don't know the the entirety of the need But we also know that the federal government's emergency you know HUD is You know Terribly underfunded by the congress and so even their emergency funds at the federal level are limited But i'm sure we will we'll ask for everything we need We don't know what that needs going to be yet. It'll be in the millions of dollars But exactly what the exact ask will be and whether or not we're going to be able to receive those funds Is something we still don't know yet in my last question I know the city has stated that they don't oversee dha technically that is under the u.s. Government But do you feel like the city has dropped the ball in anywhere? Maybe in terms of naming the uh board members or Ordinances and well, I'll just speak to that in two ways one is In terms of the board members. I think we have a great board I really do and they are the ones that hired director scott. I think they've done a great job of that I'm very You know, I think our board has done a really good job In terms of dropping the ball. Yeah, I think that you know that I would put it as I did earlier in a much uh A much more profound light than that because you know dropping the ball implies, you know, that's sort of a That's not the kind of metaphor I want to use for it What I would say is that we as a community Have failed this community Of mcdougal terrace for 40 years um We have not done what we have needed to do to Have and not just mcdougal terrace, you know are all of our housing authority communities In the last couple of years we've started to change that we've renovated a bunch of our housing authority communities We've passed the bond to be able to fund the redevelopment of more of our housing authority communities But historically have we all dropped the ball? Yes, we have and I think we all have to acknowledge that We have to apologize to our communities Uh for this failure that we as a as a city and as a community have have Been part of for for decades no question And can you tell us how soon those renovations will happen? crystal no because We don't know the situation yet as you know still lots of work being done in order to assess the the level of The need what are the repairs that are needed? Can all the apartments be repaired and if not what should happen, you know There are lots of variables and so we all wish this was going to be known today or All right, you know soon, but i'm afraid it's going to take longer than that to be able to figure this out So we don't know exactly what renovations we're talking about no I mean you you've heard the reports from mr. Scott where he's he's talked about the number of um Of of of stoves the number of uh heaters you've been i've seen you at his press conferences at water heaters and so forth So you know that they're doing their best to assess the need But there also is are also mold issues and so forth They're working very hard to assess that need but It's going to be a while before that's complete Are there any other options that you're considering maybe moving residents to another facility? I mean, what are the other options other than hotels? Yeah So um, you heard ashley say uh, we're going to go back home and I have Everybody is going to be doing everything they can to Get the mcdougal terrace residents who want to go back home back home Um, I think that will there's going to have to be an assessment of are all those units still usable And there there are other options which include vouchers for people As we know it's hard to place vouchers in Durham now But we we've had pretty good success Lately through some of the work that we in the city have funded in helping people place their vouchers. So, um We'll have to see what all the alternatives are We've we've heard from members of our real estate community who have also offered to step up in terms of the vouchers and so We don't know exactly what's going to happen But we know that a lot of people want to move back into mcdougal terrace. We want to make that possible for them But we have to assess I say we the housing authority has to assess Those units with the professional people that they have who are working for them in a perfect world What is the overall vision if everything were to go the way that you would want them to go What do you foresee? Within the next I would say year for mcdougal. Yeah, I would say that that uh That every that the uh, that's a great question if I think actually Kennedy might be better to answer that than me and so I'm gonna see if she wants to do you want to answer that Actually in a perfect world, but what happened for mcdougal over the next year in the perfect world? Go for it There's no such thing as a perfect world But if we had a perfect world For mcdougal terrace, it would be that everybody's living in safe and healthy and Better conditions than what we're living now. No carbon monoxide. No sewage No gun violence just a perfect community, but we ain't perfect, but we're gonna try to get us there Awesome answer That was a lot better answer than I could have given to me Hi mayor, um Virginia You mentioned that you know for 40 years the community has let down the residents of mcdougal terrace But obviously you didn't know and many of the community didn't know about the inspection reports in 2018 and 2019 Which mentioned miss misaligned chimney and ventilation systems with aging gas appliances Shouldn't there be some accountability of individuals who saw those reports and did not ensure that those issues were addressed? Accountability is absolutely important and as uh as we move through this, I'm sure there will be accountability We're right now in the situation where our concern is how do you get mcdougal terraces? How do you move towards The creation of this perfect world that ashley described and that's what we're all working on now We're all looking forward Towards how do you how do we deal with this emergency situation? How do we do deal with the long term not just at mcdougal, but the other derma housing authority communities? Through the work that the housing bond will provide and so forth But of course Accountability is important and I'm sure that You know, there'll be time for that And my next question is for jillian johnson As a member of the housing authority board Did y'all discuss these reports at derma housing authority board meetings and what action did you think was being taken? Sure, so we discussed the reports in the context of the overall score the public housing Assessment system score that the housing authority gets each year My understanding is that any Like-threatening situations are required by HUD to be remedied immediately and then other deficiencies to be addressed over time We were informed that you know all the deficiencies and all the public housing communities were Programmed to be addressed over time, but of course the issue the it consistently comes back to the issue of funding The public housing authority every year gets less and less funding Even less than what HUD says they need to address these conditions And so any um any problem that wasn't immediately life threatening to residents that's uncovered in those inspections Gets placed into a plan to be to be resolved In addition to the long-term plans to redevelop all of the public housing authority properties in Durham Those maintenance requests, um, you know that come out of those inspections Are our program with that funding so I you know my my understanding is that the housing authority Does the most urgent repairs? First and as quickly as possible and then other things, you know for a long time have not been able to be addressed Simply due to lack of capacity And do you think that that that system has been working and it's effective? No, I don't I mean honestly, I think very little about public housing in this country is working or is effective You know, we've we've underfunded public housing for as long as I've been alive, you know more than 40 years and there there's just no There is not a good system. There's not a good Way for any public housing authority in this country the Durham public Durham housing authority included To do the kind of work, um that is needed to maintain Aging properties and that's the reason that our housing authority under the leadership of mr. Scott and many others around the country Are moving to rad are moving to bring in private capital in order to Redevelop these properties because the federal government simply refuses to invest the funding that is that would be necessary For us to maintain public housing to a reasonable standard And it seems like the housing authority has successfully reached out to the city and asked for help with Development projects and development planning. How come this y'all didn't consider reaching out to address these issues that affect people directly Um, well, I would say the redevelopment does in fact affect people directly There are hundreds of families who are going to be living in redeveloped units And their lives will be improved by that in terms of the maintenance issues at other properties The housing authority director has had conversations with me and the mayor regarding city support prior to this incident Regarding city support for repairs in Specifically the three biggest oldest public housing communities in Durham Hoover Road Cornwallis and McDougal Terrace In addition to the seven million dollars that they were hoping to spend this year for those improvements from their capital fund We had had a brief conversation about potential requests from this for the city to supplement that funding So we have had that conversation This crisis I think has delayed That long the long term thinking about how we would do those repairs because a lot of that funding Will be spent right now on remedying this crisis But moving forward the city is very is is prepared to help with funding from whatever sources we have available For repairs to those three housing communities and any housing communities that the housing authority Wants us to support and I will repeat again The city has never in the years that I've been on council The city has never turned down a request from the housing authority for funding We are very committed to supporting the housing authority and its residents and are are putting up An extraordinary amount of funding From local sources to supplement their needs that the federal government has failed to meet Thank you. Thank you Thank you, jillian. Thank you, virginia other questions any other questions from members of the press All right. Thank you all so much for being here. We appreciate it. I want to thank especially all my colleagues on the school board On the county commission and on the Durham city council for being here and I want to say to chair micah lee. Thank you all For the school board folks being here as well and especially to ashley. Thank you again, ashley He's called upon so often to speak on behalf of her community and to mr. Jim groves. Thank you so much jim for being here Thank you everybody