10. October 2020 minutes
New Hanover County-City of Wilmington Workforce Housing Advisory Committee
October 7, 2020 Regular Meeting
Committee Members Present: Shamonique Brantley, Evelyn Bryant, Tom Gale, Don Harris Katrina
Knight, Katrina Redmon, Frank Smith, Steve Spain, David Spetrino, Paul Stavovy, Glenda Tate
Staff Present: Tufanna Bradley (NHC), Glenn Harbeck (CoW), Rachel LaCoe (NHC), Suzanne Rogers
(CoW), Rebekah Roth (NHC)
Call to Order
The meeting was called to order and a quorum was established through roll call at 3:01 pm by Chairperson
Evelyn Bryant.
Approve Agenda
Mr. David Spetrino made a motion to approve the agenda, which was seconded by Ms. Glenda Tate and
adopted unanimously.
Approve Minutes
Mr. David Spetrino made a motion to approve the draft minutes from the September 2, 2020 meeting.
The motion was seconded by Mr. Don Harris and adopted unanimously.
Public Comments
No members of the public requested to provide public comment.
New Business
Update on Housing Study and Survey
Chairperson Bryant recognized Workforce Housing Planner Rachel LaCoe.
Ms. LaCoe presented a committee logo created by New Hanover County’s Communication department.
She provided an update on the two components of the project.
Bowen National Research portion of the study:
• Wrapping up research, incorporating a regional component to show the impacts of Brunswick
and Pender County
• Still on track to deliver draft by October/November, will need two weeks to incorporate UNCG
findings into their study
• Expecting a presentation in early 2021
UNCG portion of the study:
• 1,130 responses (goal of 1,813) but currently have over 95% confidence level
• Wrapping up survey in Mid-November
Targeted Outreach Efforts
• Compared to the overall demographics of New Hanover County, responses are slightly under the
overall percentages for Black/African American and Hispanic populations
• Location based demographics, particularly downtown, need more attention
• Committee members committed to distributing paper copies of the surveys to their networks to
assist with the outreach
• Suggestions also included having a computer available at the downtown library and including a
postage paid returned with envelopes for the paper copies
Update on City of Wilmington CDBG-CV
City of Wilmington Community Development and Housing Planner Suzanne Rogers and Ms. Katrina
Knight gave an update on the City of Wilmington’s Eviction Prevention program.
• Eviction Prevention Project funded with CARES Act money
• Overview of applications and challenges of the program, including that the money cannot be
uses on subsidized units and landlords are not willing to participate
Announcements
Ms. Rogers announced a Fair Housing training on Thursday, October 22 with North Carolina Legal Aid.
Mr. Steve Spain requested an agenda item be added to the November meeting. He requested that staff
make a presentation on the difference of straight rezoning vs condition and how the Committee can bring
Workforce and Affordable Housing into the conversation when County and City staff review these cases.
He would also like to discuss the role of the committee in advocacy in the future.
Mr. Spetrino added that it would be helpful if the City and County were able to give tools to make it easier
for developers to add workforce housing.
City of Wilmington Planning Director Glenn Harbeck announced that there will be a Workforce Housing
related ordinance amendment proposal released later this week that would allow unlimited density if 10%
of a project’s units were dedicated for workforce housing.
Adjournment
With no further questions or comments, a quorum was established through roll call. Chairperson Bryant
adjourned the meeting at 4:04 PM.