JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The News4Jax I-TEAM has now learned that the Jacksonville Housing and Community Development Commission has decided to hold back on funding for a local non-profit housing rehabilitation organization.
The decision comes just days after the I-TEAM reported on a state investigation into the non-profit, Wealth Watchers, as well as on a city investigation into a former manager of the city’s Division of Housing & Community Development.
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As the I-TEAM reported, an audit of the housing division released last year looked at how the division distributes funding for affordable housing programs.
The audit revealed what was described as an "apparent conflict of interest" centered on Wealth Watchers. That involved the non-profit's vice president, who is also the president of a construction company, which submitted bids and received grant money for projects the non-profit was doing.
After the audit, Darrell Griffin, a former manager in the city's housing division, was demoted. He is now suing in federal court.
The state investigation into Wealth Watchers is being conducted by the Florida Housing Finance Corporation, an agency which oversees grant money for affordable housing programs. Wealth Watchers advertises its partnership with Florida Housing online, but a spokesperson for Florida Housing told the I-TEAM it has canceled that contract.
Friday morning, the housing commission's chair said that due to the state investigation into Wealth Watchers, and what they have learned about the nonprofit through media reports, they decided to hold back approximately $85,000 in funding, for the time being.
“As soon as this investigation is resolved, the City Council can recommend moving that money above the line and allocate the money,” said commission chair Philip Mobley. “But for 2016-2017, they did not receive any funding, and what can happen, is once that process is resolved, there is an opportunity for them to come back and get program funding to be able to satisfy their request, but that needs to be resolved first.”
The president and CEO of Wealth Watchers, Carrie Davis, was also at Friday’s commission meeting.
She reiterated a stance which she has held since the audit was released last fall -- that the non-profit was operating under city guidelines, in the way the bid was awarded.
She feels the commission's decision was unfair.
“To come back to an organization such as Wealth Watchers, who's brought millions of dollars into this community to support home ownership and to prevent foreclosure, to say that you were gonna use you guys as the scapegoat, and we're not going to fund you although you scored significantly high, you scored high enough to receive funding, and according to the OGC, there's nothing in place to prevent Wealth Watchers from being funded, but to say ‘well, because of something we heard that we have not been able to validate,’ then it has to call into question, is there equal treatment, is there fairness,” Davis said.
The commission is scheduled to meet again on June 22, and the commission chair says that if the investigations are resolved by then, their funding can be restored.