A planned $60,000 cut in the village subsidy to the Oak Park Regional Housing Center is not going to happen, this year at least.
The village is planning on restoring the $60,000 that it was looking to cut from the agency’s subsidy in the annual village budget, which is scheduled to be approved on Dec. 7. In the meantime the village and the Housing Center will look at ways to reduce the subsidy in the future.
The Housing Center will receive $425,000 this year from the village’s General Fund. Originally the village planned to cut the subsidy to $365,000, hoping to encourage the Housing Center to share offices with Visit Oak Park. But that was not feasible this year.
“That’s $60,000; that’s a lot of rent. But I think everybody’s committed to them, so it will be in there, but we’ll keep working with them and see what we can do,” said Village Manager Cara Pavlicek.
Last year the Housing Center received $471,000 from the village but $50,000 was a one-time increase to hire a fundraiser. In 2015 the center also received $180,000 in federal Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), which are allocated by the village. In 2016 the center should receive $151,000 in CDBG funding, Pavlicek said.
Housing Center Executive Director Rob Breymaier told the village board last month that the Visit Oak Park offices are just too small to house both entities.
“Their office is about a third the size of our office and their storefront really has no space in it for us to have any direct services provided within it,” Breymaier said. “We are open to them moving their administrative offices into our building and we have had some discussions about that and they seem open to it as well.
“But I don’t think it will save the same amount of money as we would have saved going the other way, because we have larger offices and, therefore, the larger rent and utility bill.”
In response to questioning from trustees, Breymaier said the Housing Center would consider moving from its offices on South Boulevard, where it has been since the 1970s, if it could find a better location.
“We aren’t necessarily wedded to that space,” Breymaier said. “What we are wedded to is a space that makes sense for the service we provide, which means it has to available to folks on transit and it has to be visible within the community so people can see it and find it. It needs to be an attractive place.”
But Breymaier said it is hard to find a visible space close to the el for the rent it currently pays.
“Where we currently are we get a steal for rent,” Breymaier said, “because of the condition of the building, but it is a really great location that we pay very low square footage for.”
Breymaier said there might be space for Visit Oak Park administrative staff to move into the current Housing Center offices, especially if they share an office manager and perhaps other back office staff.
The village has been looking to reduce the amount of money it gives to so-called partner agencies such as the Housing Center and Visit Oak Park. Breymaier said he understands that and is always looking to save money.
But Mayor Anan Abu-Taleb seemed skeptical of Breymaier’s professed willingness to be more self-sufficient. Aub-Taleb said he felt the Housing Center had a “sense of entitlement” to the funds the village provides annually to subsidize the agency.
“Whether it’s CDBG money or local taxpayers’ money, that’s what you’re getting and that’s what you’ve been getting for a long time,” Abu-Taleb told Breymaier at the Nov. 16 village board meeting. “I just get this sense that we should close our eyes and sign off and not question anything and I have an issue with that.”
Trustee Glen Brewer rushed to defend the Housing Center after Abu-Taleb’s comment, saying that the Housing Center helps preserve Oak Park’s diversity and is as important to the village as the Oak Park Economic Development Corporation (OPEDC).
“I don’t think there is a sense of entitlement; I think there’s is a sense of investment,” Brewer said. “I think we invest in the Housing Center for the same reason we invest in OPEDC, and we increased the investment in OPEDC because we believe in what EDC is doing.
“All I think some of us on the board have said is we should not decrease our investment in the Housing Center. What they do is important to maintaining the diversity of this village, which impacts the business environment of this village.”