Finance Committee - 1/17/2018 Page 3
Mayor Donchess
Very good. She is very good at her job and knows this federal stuff, the urban programs, the lead grant, the
community development block grant, all of those subjects extremely thoroughly. Because people don’t’ have
background on this, why don’t you explain what the lead grant is and how this will be part of that program?
Ms. Schena
The lead paint program is a competitive grant funded by the US Department of Housing & Urban Development,
HUD for short. When it is awarded, it is a three-year program. This is our fourth grant. | believe we’re up to
$11.8 million for a total amount that the city has received since 2007. The grant is geared towards assisting
units that are occupied by low-income households. It can either be an owner-occupied property or a rental
property but whoever lives there must be those income guidelines. This contract is we sub the work out to a
licensed risk assessor and lead paint inspector who goes into these units after we qualified them and does a
comprehensive examination of all the painted surfaces to test where the lead hazards are and then writes the
report and hands it over to our department. From there we develop a scope of work and work with the property
owners. We bid the project out and award it to a lead paint contractor to go in and do that mediation. The
program also includes a small pot of money for healthy housing remediation. We also do an assessment. Our
staff does that. That might be looking for air quality issues, mold issues, ventilation, trips and falls, pest
infestation. It really runs the gambit depending on the property. We have a small amount of grant money that
we can put towards correcting those issues as well. After the work is done, this contract covers the inspector
to go back in, clear the unit. They actually have to take dust wipe samples and send it to a lab to make sure it
is safe for the family to return. We have to do approximately 150 units under this grant. Since we’ve started
we’ve done just over 500, not including what we will do under this upcoming grant. We have a lot of work to do
in Nashua even though we’ve done that many units. There are 1000s more. We continually exceeded our
goals, and we hope to continue to do that and keep getting that money.
Alderman O’Brien
Do you also look at the water?
Ms. Schena
Under this grant it is lead paint that we are testing. That is what we are authorized to remediate. Typically, the
risk assessor is not looking at water unless there is a specific reason why. If there was a lead poisoned child
and there was no indication that it could be the housing, they may look further and test the water to see if that
is a potential source. There is quite a questionnaire that they go through with the family to try to figure out
where the contamination could be coming from. Some people have candies that are imported from overseas
or pottery. There’s a few different places where children can be exposed by lead but typically paint is the
biggest problem. We don’t automatically test for the water, and part of that is we don’t have the funds to
correct it if we find that problem but also it is typically not the source of the issue.
Alderman O’Brien
| am very excited to see that you applied for and have done so many homes. Knowing Nashua, we have quite
an older community that lead paint was used quite extensively at one time before the hazards were even know.
Anything to do to protect the children, particularly, they may inadvertently gnaw on the windowsill. This is
something that is good, and | thank you. Keep going.
Mayor Donchess
This is a competitive grant so the performance on prior grants is a big factor on whether we get the money,
which we successfully were awarded several months ago.
