Councilwoman Marie Carrubba, D-Ward 4 and Housing Committee chairwoman, speaks during Monday’s City Council work session. P-J photo by John Whittaker

What does the City Council’s Housing Committee have on its agenda for the coming weeks, months or even years?

That was the question Lisa Schmidtfrerick-Miller of the Chautauqua County Health and Human Services Department asked committee members earlier this week. And while Schmidtfrerick-Miller had the alleviation of lead-based paint in city houses on her mind, the question goes beyond lead paint.

“That’s why we worked hard to get resources to people to help people with getting the lead taken care of,” Schmidtfrerick-Miller said. “I guess we all know there is a problem. Is there something we can do? We’re trying to bring carrots and sticks. We’re trying to bring carrots into this process with HUD funds and radon funds and whatever we can get our hands on. This has to be a piece of a bigger strategy. I’m offering, can I help in some way? Is there something we can bring to the table, proposals that we can bring, things that have been effective in other communities in addressing some of these other issues?”

Marie Carrubba, D-Ward 4 and Housing Committee chairwoman, didn’t have immediate answers to Schmidtfrerick-Miller’s question, but did offer to have the county official back for a longer discussion. Schmidtfrerick-Miller noted issues in which landlords couldn’t participate in some of the county’s lead paint remediation programs because they hadn’t paid their taxes as well as other housing issues that have cropped up during the county’s lead paint work.

“It sounds like we need to be looking at changing some of the code enforcement in terms of what we can do,” Carrubba said before referencing a housing code case that ended up costing the city tens of thousands of dollars through a court settlement. “Unless it’s in our code we can’t really just randomly decide are we going to penalize someone. We have had that happen.”

HOUSING COMMITTEE’S ORIGINS

The council’s Housing Committee has been in existence since January 2004, shortly after Republicans recaptured a majority of the City Council in the November 2003 election. Originally called for by former mayor and 2003 mayoral candidate Richard Kimball, the committee was envisioned as a way to discuss solutions to city housing issues that had become an issue in the 2003 campaign season. Enforcement of city codes, renovation and use of existing buildings were all items on the task list when the committee was created.

“In my own mind, I envision it to be, rather than looking at little things, looking at bigger issues,” said Tony Dolce, R-Ward 2, in 2004 when the Housing Committee was created. “Maybe this committee can look not only at upkeep and maintenance, but really look into what other places are doing to solve the problem. We know what the problem is. The process works, but it’s slow. Why is it slow? Is there something we can do to speed it up?”

Former councilwoman Carolyn Bloomquist represented the city’s First Ward and was the Housing Committee’s first chairwoman. She was realistic, saying at the committee’s first meeting in April 2004 that the committee likely had years of work ahead of it. Initial steps focused on higher permit fees, adding an additional housing inspector to focus solely on housing inspections and a home ownership fair to increase the percentage of owner-occupied homes in the city.

“We want to see what we can do to help remedy the situation, find out where the brick walls are for inspectors when they go out, work at revising the code if necessary,” Bloomquist said. “That’s going to be a substantial job in and of itself. We can’t expect to have it done in a week or a day or a year. These changes have happened over 30 years. But I think with the people in the room we should make some headway.”

Dealing with abandoned and unlicensed cars and and the repair of vehicles in residential areas were among the first things the committee tackled, but a spate of drug arrests and a shooting next door to an after-school activities site prompted Bloomquist to call a special meeting to discuss solutions. She discussed a lockdown law that had been passed recently in Binghamton that prohibited people from living in a house if a certain number of illegal activities took place in it. John Calamunci, who formerly represented Ward 4 residents, proposed a systematic demolition list to tear down vacant buildings and direlict houses.

The ensuing few years saw the Housing Committee remain active, including the push for landlord licensing legislation and a focus on neighborhood issues as they would come up through the city Development Department. The committee also helped push the creation of a neighborhood plan through consultant Charles Buki. That plan resulted in a series of action steps implemented as a collaboration between the Jamestown Renaissance Corporation, the city and nonprofit funders — with some of those programs such as the Neighborhood Block Challenge continuing today.

Over the years, however, the committee itself has taken on less importance. Some months had seen the committee cancel meetings due to a lack of agenda items. The committee has hosted area organizations that work on housing issues in recent months, with Carrubba bringing her experience through the Southwestern Independent Living Center to speak about housing issues with low-income or handicapped individuals. The committee has also been a place to hear about issues created by the closure of the city’s Housing Court during the COVID-19 pandemic, a decision that brought to a halt enforcement of housing code violations for more than a year.

‘ISSUES THAT ARE AFFECTING SO MANY’

Carrubba didn’t have a lengthy response to Schmidtfrerick-Miller’s offer of help or request for the Housing Committee’s agenda.

“I think we’re all aware of the housing stock in the city is some of the oldest in the state and we’re up against an issue where affordable, accessible and up-to-code housing is very difficult for the low-income population to have,” Carrubba said during Monday’s meeting. “Housing rental costs in this area are very, very high and, as I’m sure you are well aware, we have some landlords that aren’t always responsive to requests to keep their properties up to code. There’s probably not a person on the council who doesn’t see that we need to do more to try to get funds to these individuals.”

Twice on Monday, Carrubba noted the difficulty tackling the housing issues Jamestown faces during the committee’s short meetings, which typically last between 15 and 30 minutes before the council’s work sessions.

“She’s also willing and we have discussed having her come back for a more in-depth discussion of what can be done, how we can work together to try to reprogram housing in the city of Jamestown,” Carrubba said. “We look forward to that. It’s a necessary discussion — it’s just very difficult to do within the confines of our very brief Housing Committee meetings. During a half hour there were many questions that were being asked and I think it’s something where we really haven’t directed our focus. We’ve had many issues with code enforcement and how do we address these issues that are affecting so many.”