Berkeley’s new approach to homeless services: the proposed Housing Crisis Resolution Center. Image: City of Berkeley
The city of Berkeley says it will change its commission recommendation process after a community agency brought allegations of serious conflicts of interest during a recent bid for municipal funding.
Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency (BOSS) raised these concerns in an April 16 letter to city officials after bidding to run a new one-stop homelessness services center for which the city plans to issue a contract next month.
Read more about homelessness in Berkeley.
BOSS and one other agency, the Berkeley Food and Housing Project (BFHP), put in bids in December to run the new center. Both service organizations are based in Berkeley, and have worked in the city since the early 1970s. BOSS requested $450,145 to run the center, and the BFHP requested $996,899 for the job. The city’s Homelessness Commission and city manager have recommended that the contract go to the BFHP, and council is slated to make its decision next month.
The commission report said only that the BOSS application did “not contain all of the necessary functions” required by the city in its request for proposals.
BOSS challenged the commission recommendation in April, saying two Homeless Commission members affiliated with the BFHP and another group, YEAH, should not have taken part in the discussions. BOSS wrote that their “organizations will gain financial resources as a result of their participation in the funding discussions and eventual funding recommendations” made by the commission and the city.(...)
Read the rest of Nonprofit accuses city of Berkeley of ‘unethical contracting practices’ for new homeless center (1,357 words)
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Post tags: Berkeley city budget, Berkeley City Council, Berkeley Food and Housing Project, Berkeley homelessness, BOSS, Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency, Christine Daniel, Donald Frazier, Elisa Della-Piana, Government accountability, Government transparency, Homeless Commission, Housing Crisis Resolution Center, Jesse Arreguin, Linda Maio, Marianna Sempari, YEAH!, Zach Cowan