While the program has been detailed in some city memos and conversations with council members, Mendelsohn took issue with the fact that the program wasn’t briefed in a committee and that it doesn’t look like master lease programs in other cities.
In other master lease programs, a city or some other entity will act as a landlord, leasing a property and then subleasing to individuals. With the city or entity on the hook for the lease, this can make it easier to house people with poor credit or rental histories and to control rents. Dallas’ master lease program, which was approved by the City Council this week, is a bit different.
This master lease program allocates $3 million to Housing Forward, the lead organization for Dallas and Collin counties' homeless response system. The funds will go toward paying for items like security deposits and application fees that could otherwise keep people out of housing. The money will also go toward incentivizing landlords to take in voucher holders or people with bad rental or credit history, leasing to them individually. Doing it this way could allow individuals to build credit, Christine Crossley, director of Dallas’ Office of Homeless Solutions, told City Council. She also said that the program could open up another 360 units for the homeless every year.
That all sounded good, but it didn’t sound like a master lease program to Mendelsohn. She wanted to hold off on approving the program for another five weeks to give her and others more time to hash out the details. The rest of the council disagreed, with some council members pointing out the urgency of Dallas’ homelessness problems and the need for such a program now.“It can't be a master lease program when there is no master lease holder." – Cara Mendelsohn, Dallas City Council
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While they considered the topic of urgency, Mendelsohn brought up several properties purchased by the city in recent years meant to help house the homeless.
In December 2020, the city approved the $3.5 million purchase of Hotel Miramar off Fort Worth Avenue. Dallas also bought an old hospital off South Hampton Road for $6.5 million in January 2022 and another hotel building off Independence Drive for $5 million in February 2022. None of these properties are housing anyone right now.
To make a point about Dallas’ urgency to house the homeless, Mendelsohn wanted updates on all of the projects. She got a partial answer before City Council member Chad West called a point of order over her questions. He said he was upset about the timeline on these projects, too, but that it wasn’t relevant to their discussion about the master lease program.
“Hundreds of people could/should be housed in those three properties,” Mendelsohn told the Observer by text Thursday.
The three projects are still in the works, Page Jones, a spokesperson for the city told the Observer. “Through multiple programs and properties like these, the Office of Homeless Solutions (OHS) is dedicated to providing supportive housing and services for the formally homeless,” Jones said. She said that the property on Fort Worth Avenue will soon have 40-45 units and that “construction is expected to commence imminently.”
The South Hampton Road property could have 100 units with supportive services but the project is awaiting more community input, which should start coming in July. Another 132 units should be made available at the Independence Drive property. Renovations of the resident services building on the property were completed earlier this month.
Mendelsohn’s move to delay the master lease program vote another five weeks was ultimately defeated. Even though she voted to approve the program, she still takes issue with it.
“It can't be a master lease program when there is no master leaseholder,” Mendelsohn said. “As I said in the meeting, if OHS needs money for something else, I'm likely to support it, but what we passed is not what we allocated money for, and the need for a master lease program remains, in my opinion."
