Board agrees to surrender property

The Tucumcari Housing Authority board agreed to surrender its property and management responsibilities to the Eastern Regional Housing Authority of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, based in Roswell.

The housing authority board’s vote at a special meeting March 19 ended an effort to keep THA independent that began in August when state-level officials of the federal housing authority informed the THA board of their intention to bring THA under regional control.

The March 19 decision came on a 4-1 vote of the THA board. Three city commissioners and Tim Durkin, who represents public housing residents on the board, voted in favor of the move. District 1 Commissioner Ralph Moya voted against it. District 2 Commissioner Paul Villanueva did not attend the meeting.

Moya said he was voting no because he was advocating for residents who live in public housing areas within his district.

“These are poor people who live in my district, and I will not vote in any way for this transfer,” Moya said.

Moya said his experience in dealing with the regional housing authority in business dealings had been unsatisfactory.

The board, which consists of all five city commissioners and Durkin, had delayed a vote on the transfer of responsibility at its February meeting and asked Randy Knudson, the city’s attorney, for an opinion on the regional housing authority’s order that the city surrender its management and property responsibilities.

Knudson’s opinion, discussed at the March 19 meeting, stated the regional housing agency was acting within terms of contracts between the city and the regional authority. According to the contract terms, he said, the regional authority can assume property and management authority if the city fails to meet HUD standards in HUD’s judgment.

Based mostly on a standard of 98% occupancy rates, which the Tucumcari authority apparently had failed to maintain, the regional HUD authority had given the Tucumcari authority unacceptably low scores in its performance ratings despite high scores in other areas.

City manager Britt Lusk had observed in earlier meetings the standard would not be met if as few as two of THA’s 90 units were unoccupied at any given time.

After the March 19 vote, District 4 Commissioner Christopher Arias said while the city did not meet HUD’s standard, “the standard was rigged.”

The decision to transfer management and ownership, he said, “was not made lightly.”

The THA board had voted in December to remain independent despite the regional authority’s resistance, but the regional authority repeated its claim on THA management and property based on terms of the contract.

THA Director Viki Riddle took the March 19 decision in stride, telling the THA board “I will not let the transfer keep me from doing the best possible job I can” in managing THA.