City Manager Cites Need for Controls on Housing Agency

Problems like those that have plagued the city’s housing commission since 1984 might be avoided if the commission, its budget and its controversial director, Ben Montijo, were more closely watched by the City Council, City Manager Sylvester Murray said in a report released Tuesday.

The report suggests that the council set specific performance goals for Montijo and give itself the authority to fire him if those goals are not met.

But Murray’s report falls short of recommending--as the commission’s critics have suggested--that the agency be made a city department and put under the supervision of the city manager.

“Most of the current problems of the commission stem from administrative actions of the executive director and the lack of controls and approvals of his actions,” Murray wrote in a summary of his report.

The solution, Murray said, is to leave the commission’s independent status intact but place tighter reins on Montijo, his travel, contracts and use of consultants. The commission is a seven-member board appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the City Council. The commission is funded through federal grants and local monies, with council approval.

Montijo declined comment on the report, but in a statement released by his spokesman he said he felt “comfortable” with Murray’s recommendations.

Ken Guyer, a spokesman for the commission, said he did not believe the city manager’s conclusions reflected poorly on Montijo.

“I don’t think he (Murray) is saying Ben Montijo has done anything wrong,” Guyer said. “Maybe he has been human and made a few mistakes. I don’t think the city manager’s report lays any blame for anything.”

Murray was on vacation Tuesday and could not be reached for comment. Attorney Paul Robinson, the housing commission’s chairman, also could not reached for comment.

Murray’s report comes after a steady stream of criticism of the housing commission, most of it from activists Mel Shapiro and Hans Jovishoff. The pair, members of the San Diego Housing Coalition, a nonprofit watchdog group, have been pressing for reforms in the commission since the agency engineered a deal to provide it with new office space in the fall of 1984.

That transaction, which will enable a private businessman to make a $1-million profit while saving the commission as much as $2 million over the next 10 years, was later ruled proper by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. General Accounting Office.

But Shapiro and Jovishoff persisted, arguing that the commission spent too much money to remodel its new quarters and provide perks for Montijo and his top staff, that several of the commission’s transactions were never approved by the City Council, and that Montijo abused his travel budget and a special fund over which he had sole control.

In essence, the pair have argued that the commission has misspent funds that could have been used to provide housing for poor people--the purpose for which the commission was created in 1978.

In July, the City Council, acting in its role as the Housing Authority, asked Murray to assess the housing commission’s proposed budget for the 1986-1987 fiscal year and examine its policies and procedures. Murray was also asked to recommend whether the commission should become a city department or remain an independent agency.

Among Murray’s recommendations were the following:

- Require that no surplus or discretionary funds be spent by the commission’s staff without the explicit approval of the commission and the Housing Authority.

- Require the housing commission to approve in public sessions all purchases and contracts exceeding $10,000.

- Eliminate the use of credit cards, as was done at City Hall earlier this year.

- Require that Montijo’s travel be approved by the chairman of the housing commission.

- Establish a professional advisory review committee to review real estate deals. The county housing commission uses a similar advisory board.

- Create a task force of members of the City Council and the housing commission to review and establish goals for the mix of housing to be produced each year.

Murray recommended against returning the commission to its former status as a city department because, he said in the report, the conditions that prompted the city to make the commission independent still exist today. He said the commission needs the independence and flexibility it has in order to more easily contract with private firms to construct housing for the poor.

Shapiro, one of the activists whose criticism prompted Murray’s review, said he was disappointed that Murray did not recommend that the commission become a regular city department.

“I certainly don’t agree that the commission should stay the way it is,” Shapiro said. “There isn’t going to be any more accountability.”