In March, Utah received nearly $20 million in federal dollars to shore up communities riddled with foreclosed and abandoned homes.
So far, the money sits idle, generating growing concern among Utah's affordable housing advocates, who fear the state will miss out on the next round of neighborhood stabilization plan (NSP) funding.
"Utah hasn't distributed any of the initial $19.6 million, which puts us at risk to receive any NSP-2 funds," said Steve Graham, president of the Utah Community Reinvestment Corporation, a not-for-profit consortium of banks that helps finance multi-family rental units across the state.
"We're supposed to be applying for those [phase 2] funds right now," he said.
Graham and others believe Utah's process for using the money has bogged down and become secretive. Members of the Utah Housing Coalition met Wednesday for an NSP update, and instead, found they'd been left out of a state Request For Proposals process that closed in mid-May.
"We thought we'd get a road map today -- how to access the money and what to do with it," said Tara Rollins, Coalition executive director. "The RFP shocked everyone. No one knew about it."
The state simply aims to maximize those dollars, said Gordon Walker, director of the Division of Housing and Community Development.
Walker had hoped to form a nonprofit to oversee the 18-month program, using members of the Olene Walker Housing board for both purposes. However, his boss required that task to be bid out by the state's purchasing division instead.
"If I hadn't had to do the RFP, we would have been housing families by now," Walker told The Salt Lake Tribune Wednesday.
Walker also voiced frustration over the complex web of federal rules that govern the money -- which he says were set forth by Congress in fall 2008 and have been in a constant state of flux ever since.
"This is not an easy program to implement," Walker said. "There are a lot of strings attached. It truly has been a maze we've had to work through."
The RFP closed May 14, with just two bids received by the state: one from the newly formed Utah Center for Affordable Housing, directed by Zions Bank executives Dan Peterson and Mike Plaizier, the other from the St. George-based Three Point Enterprises, LLC.
The bid has not yet been awarded.
Darin Brush, chief executive for the Community Development Corporation, objected to an apparent lack of transparency regarding the RFP, since none of the participating stakeholders were given any heads-up about it.
"To find that an RFP had been issued and closed, it's tragic."
His organization, with its statewide footprint, could have competed for the bid had he known about it, Brush added.
Walker expressed surprise the advocates were unaware of the RFP.
"They're well-connected and have a real back-channel communications network," Walker said.
The state's Purchasing Division posted the RFP online, but no invitations or alerts were sent to stakeholders, Walker said.
Walker's boss, Palmer DePaulis, said he pushed for the RFP because such a process is in the public domain, fully transparent to interested parties.
"That would concern me if none of those stakeholders were notified," DePaulis, executive director of Utah's Department of Community & Culture, said Wednesday when informed of advocates' concerns.
"I will have to review it," DePaulis said. "I know we're in a time crunch ... but we want to do things right."
More than two months after the state received federal money to help provide affordable housing to communities hard-hit by the recession, the first dime of the nearly $20 million has yet to be spent.
Housing advocates feel like they've been cut out of the loop in a secretive and slow-moving process.
They also fear the state may miss out on phase 2 of neighborhood stabilization plan funding -- $2 billion nationwide -- with a July 17 application deadline.
