Houston plans door-to-door income survey to qualify for Fire Station 93 grant

City staff in Houston plan to go door to door asking residents about household income so the city can apply for an $850,000 Community Development Block Grant for Fire Station 93, Deputy Clerk Charlie Shupe told the City Council at a special meeting Monday.

The council voted Oct. 8 to seek the grant as the match for the city's USDA Community Facilities project, a joint Public Works and Fire Station 93 facility.

The survey is meant to show whether the project meets the grant's requirement, described by the state Division of Community and Regional Affairs, that at least 51 percent of beneficiaries be low or moderate income. Shupe said the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's published figure for Houston is 49.6 percent, just under that threshold.

The application is due Dec. 4. The $850,000 is the most one community can receive and would cover only the fire protection share of design and construction costs. It would add to $1.95 million listed for the project in a Senate Appropriations Committee document, a committee list rather than an enacted appropriation, that names the City of Houston as recipient and Sen. Lisa Murkowski as the requesting senator.

Shupe said staff are looking at areas around Crater Lake and Cheri Lake Drive with a short, simple questionnaire and may expand the survey to most of the city. Two staff members will likely canvass, possibly with fire department personnel, and Shupe agreed that canvassers should stay neutral rather than give residents a sales pitch. Shupe, who lives in the area the station would serve, said the project would lower insurance costs and shorten response times.

Deputy Mayor Jeff Brasel read a statement from Mayor Carter Cole, who attended remotely. It said feasibility work for Station 93 was completed Oct. 4 and that staff are still completing grant requirements. "The next administration will need to finish this effort," it said.

The council then reelected Cole mayor, 6-1, and Brasel deputy mayor unanimously. The council chooses both from its members for one-year terms.

Brasel thanked Shupe for the block grant work: "I don't envy you in door knocking around here, so have fun with that."