By Donald Wittkowski
The financially struggling Ocean City Housing Authority is running at a $100,000 loss as it awaits a crucial payment from Washington, D.C., that has been held up by delays in getting the federal budget approved.
Jacqueline Jones, the housing authority’s executive director, said the agency will be “very, very low on cash” through Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal year.
“That’s a great concern, obviously,” Jones told the authority’s commissioners while giving a financial report during their monthly board meeting Tuesday.
The authority’s finances have been strained by a late $117,000 payment from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Normally, the money would have arrived from HUD months ago, but has been held up by delays with the federal budget’s approval in Washington, Jones explained.
“So, we’re going to be watching our pennies, literally, through the next month or so,” she said.
The HUD funding can be used for both the housing authority’s capital and operating expenses. The money is not expected to come to the authority until the start of the new fiscal year on Oct. 1.
Until then, the authority will tighten its belt and hold off on any extra capital projects, although it will keep up with basic maintenance repairs, according to Jones.
Looking to cut costs, the authority will eliminate one job beginning Oct. 1, but other positions will remain untouched, said Bob Barr, a city councilman who serves as board chairman. The job being cut is occupancy clerk.
The housing authority continues to implement a series of management and financial reforms following the removal of former Executive Director Alesia Watson, who was fired on May 16, a week after pleading guilty to an embezzlement scheme.
Watson, 54, of Galloway Township, faces a maximum sentence of one year in prison and a $100,000 fine for embezzling federal housing funds to pay off credit card bills for her personal expenses. She was originally scheduled to be sentenced on Tuesday, but the date has been postponed until Sept. 7 for undisclosed reasons.
During her guilty plea on May 8, Watson admitted misusing two housing authority credit cards to buy 69 MasterCard gift cards between December 2013 and March 2015. The gift cards were used for personal expenses and were also shared by Watson with friends and family members, authorities said.
Watson then used HUD funds administered by the authority to pay off the credit card bills associated with her purchase of the gift cards, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Authorities said between $6,500 and $15,000 was lost in the embezzlement scheme.
After Watson was removed, the board brought on Jones, a veteran housing executive, to help rebuild the troubled agency. Jones also serves as executive director of the Vineland Housing Authority. Jones has taken on the same duties at the Ocean City Housing Authority under a shared services agreement with the Vineland Housing Authority.
The Ocean City Housing Authority uses federal funds to provide affordable housing for low-income senior citizens, families and the disabled at its Pecks Beach Village and Bay View Manor facilities.
In other business at Tuesday’s board meeting, the authority announced that tenants at the Bay View Manor senior citizens complex would no longer be allowed to rent out their parking spaces during the Ocean City Block Party festivities in May and October.
The block party is a hugely popular tourist attraction in the spring and fall, drawing tens of thousands of visitors to Ocean City’s downtown area for a weekend of shopping, dining and sightseeing. Parking is usually at a premium with so many visitors in town.
Barr and Jones said some tenants at Bay View Manor would capitalize on the block party by renting out their parking spaces to visitors. In some cases, they “force” other Bay View Manor tenants to move their cars, too, to create even more parking spaces that are rented out, Barr said.
“It’s not fair to ask a housing authority tenant to move from the parking spot,” he said.
Both Barr and Jones noted that the tenants have been renting out the parking spaces without the approval of the housing authority. The authority has not been able to find out where the money goes, they added.
A parking operation is not allowed on the housing authority’s public property if the money does not go back to the agency, Jones said.
A major concern is that the authority could be exposed to liability lawsuits if someone suffered an injury on the Bay View Manor property while they were directing cars in the parking lot.
“It’s a very sticky situation,” Barr said. “I think the practice should end.”
