Slow survey responses hurt city grant application, Housing Office says

Neighborhood residents encouraged to turn in surveys delivered to them

By Kate Hayden | khayden@charlescitypress.com

Survey responses are well under what the Charles City Housing Office needs before the city can apply for a residence rehabilitation grant, the office said Tuesday.

Households between the areas of North Grand and E Street/4th Avenue and 9th Avenue are asked to turn in their residency surveys by Friday, July 22, Director Heidi Nielsen of the Housing Office said. The surveys were mailed out to affected households on July 11.

“We sent the survey out to 252 households,” Nielsen said, including a handful of vacant properties that were identified and cut from the list.

When city employees visited the neighborhood door-to-door last week, only 15 complete surveys were picked up. The city needs an 80 percent response rate from the economic residency survey.

Including a few surveys that were dropped off at City Hall by Tuesday, Nielsen estimates about 20 percent of the neighborhood has responded.

“I’m not sure if we’re even going to apply (for the grant) unless we can get a higher response rate,” Nielsen said.

The survey is a necessary step for the city’s Community Development Block Grant application, a state grant that would hopefully replace funding lost from a 2012 grant that closes this year, Nielsen said.

As part of the application, the city chooses a target neighborhood where grant support would fund housing rehabilitation projects. The Housing Office’s confidential survey will be used to calculate neighborhood statics as part of the application, Nielsen said. No personal information will be included.

“The survey is so simple, it’s only five questions. It only takes less than a minute,” she added.

Charles City partners with the North Iowa Area Council of Governments (NIACOG) for the grant, which is awarded by the Iowa Economic Development Authority. If the application is accepted, this will be the city’s fifth grant award, Nielsen said.

If the office doesn’t receive enough responses, Nielsen will likely go before the Charles City Council to decide the office’s next steps.

All neighborhood residents are encouraged to submit their surveys even if they believe they are over income limits or are renting, Nielsen said.

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