V2N16: BCHA: Self-Licking Ice Cream Cone

Instead of filling community need, THEY CREATE THEIR OWN DEMAND

As far as I can tell, I am the only member of the public who attended the Blaine County Housing Authority (BCHA) annual meeting on February 26th. As is typical, attending the meeting (online) took some work. The meeting was noticed on the City of Ketchum website, but there was no information or link. On the BCHA website, public meetings are buried in the menu options. In my observation, making public meetings challenging to attend is par for the course for the current BCHA. But I finally found it and zoomed in.

The Chair called for comments from the public, but that was farcical given no public members were there, and public comment was not permitted on the agenda. Under BCHA rules, you can’t do it in the meeting if it's not on the agenda. I know this because the Executive Director made the Chair stop talking about how things were going at the Silver Creek facility—-it wasn’t on the agenda.

In this meeting, they re-elected Keith Perry as Chair. That was after he said he doesn’t live in Blaine County for four months of the year. But no one else volunteered for the role; he was unanimously approved, and they changed their rules to permit officer attendance by Zoom.

In her updates, BCHA Executive Director Carissa Connelly noted that BCHA has hired a full-time Program Manager for the Silver Creek transitional housing program. This struck me as odd because she said there is insufficient demand for Silver Creek’s 32 units.

She requested approval to lease these motel rooms to Blaine County employers on six-month leases. She said BCHA would prioritize essential workers, but if there was no demand from them, she would offer them to anyone. If she successfully offloads the excess inventory on six-month leases, will it require a full-time person to manage it?

This is what I mean about the self-licking ice cream cone. There doesn’t seem to be demand for all of BCHA's housing, so they hire people, like the Silver Creek program manager, to create their demand. My favorite quote from the meeting: “The goal is to improve our numbers.” Is that how public housing is supposed to work?

This isn’t the only excess inventory. BCHA also has a unit for purchase and two units for lease. How is that consistent with a housing crisis and hundreds of people on their waitlist?

Creating Dependency on Federal Funding

Then there was a zinger. BCHA wants to reduce rents below a federal threshold so that tenants qualify for federal HUD money. As Ms. Connelly noted, government funding streams are more reliable for BCHA than money from the tenant’s employment. Ms. Connelly is good at working the system. She got HUD money for Ketchum’s next Bluebird project (most likely on the Lift Tower Lodge site per the Council's stated preferences) before the Council approved any specific project.

The problem with HUD money is that it has only two requirements and won’t let you impose any others: US citizenship and poverty. The income cap is often below what a full-time job pays around here. This discourages people from working full-time lest they lose their housing benefits. HUD money doesn’t require work at all. And if you take HUD money, you cannot reserve your units for essential or local workers.

This approach does not solve Ketchum’s workforce housing problems, yet Ketchum taxpayers pay for 100% of BCHA’s staff costs.

What Housing Do We Need?

According to the Mayor’s IME editorial from February 3, 2021, we need housing for the “lifeblood” of Ketchum’s community: teachers, first responders, and healthcare workers. I agree. I would add that we also need housing for people with families to ensure a future for our town.

Isn’t it strange that, given his stated goal is housing for essential workers in Ketchum, he is building housing for everyone BUT them? In his 10+ years in public life, he has championed using taxpayer funds to build subsidized housing that benefits corporate employers throughout the WRV. Why is that?

Ketchum has limited money, land, and community character. The City Council is wasting our resources on a program to build hundreds of units on very valuable land in hideous, massive boxes at very high prices to house people who are not only not essential workers but also usually do not have families and often do not work in Ketchum.

It’s Worse Than That: The Big Lie

In December, we got a Christmas surprise from City Hall: a future land use map (“FLUM”) that calls for massive upzoning near River Run and Warm Springs bases and that turns many single-family residences into “non-conforming uses.” The FLUM flummoxes me. The stated rationale by Ketchum’s Housing Director (and repeated by the Mayor) is that if we build more condos (conveniently located near the ski lifts), housing will be more affordable for working people in Ketchum.

This is horse patootie. They both know what the City Planner and everyone involved in real estate development in the WRV know: We can’t regulate short-term rentals, and if you build a condo, it will be either a second home or an Airbnb (or both). Both of those uses price out a working person in the tourism industry in Ketchum.

They know they lie to us when they say that upzoning will reduce home prices. Yet they persist in saying it. They even say things like:

• “Take a breath; it will take years to be developed.” Spencer Cordovano

• “Ketchum’s population growth is only 52 people per year.” Neil Bradshaw

• “We will only do this if it helps working people.” Amanda Breen.

If all that is true, we don’t need this FLUM, yet they will force it down our throats.

Whose interests are they promoting?

Welcome to “Asschum”

They have gone rogue with their Apenization program for Ketchum. Their actions will replace low-revenue locals with high-revenue tourists and second home owners, who they will tax every way from Sunday to generate revenue to build dorms for chronically underpaid transient tourism industry workers.

That is not a community called “Ketchum.” That is a resort destination devoid of local character. I call it “Asschum.”