Conti says he left to help agency

January 31, 2006

PAT LITOWITZ
plitowitz@ncnewsonline.com

A nonprofit agency learned it couldn't collect federally subsidized rent checks with Donald "Ducky" Conti on its board.

Rather than prevent Affordable Housing of Lawrence County from accepting tenants using Section 8 vouchers, Conti resigned from the board and his role as secretary last week.

"I'm not going to stand in the way of Affordable Housing," said Conti, who also serves on the board of the Lawrence County Housing Authority.

Through its funding provided by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the housing authority gives qualified, low-income residents vouchers for housing.

"I had a conversation with our Section 8 director," housing authority executive director Robert Evanick said of Eugene DiGennaro. "Since Ducky was on our board, for us to sign a Section 8 voucher would be a conflict of interest.

"I didn't tell him to leave the board of Affordable Housing. That was his decision."

Affordable Housing was created by the housing authority in 2003. Its original mission was to build homes for senior citizens and handicapped individuals. The group's focus changed to rehabilitating homes last year with purchase of eight properties, seven of which have apartment units. The eighth property is being leased.

To date, none of the apartment units has a Section 8 tenant. For Affordable Housing's properties to qualify under the HUD program, a tenant with a Section 8 voucher must request that the housing authority inspect and approve the property in which he or she wishes to live.

Affordable Housing's construction consultant Robert Ratkovich said no such requests have been made.

"I didn't realize this was a big thing," Conti said. "All of the sudden, it was a conflict of interest."

Evanick said the housing authority sought to be pro-active in the conflict-of-interest issue. The question the housing authority forwarded to HUD was: Can a housing authority board member sit on another board that receives authority funding?

The potential for conflict comes into question because the housing authority board oversees the agency's finances. Although the authority waits for HUD's decision, Evanick said he moved to prevent a problem before it took place.

Conti said he didn't accept Evanick's reasoning.

"I called up HUD," he said. "They did not give me a decent answer. They said technically it could be a conflict."

Ratkovich said the conflict of interest issue wasn't brought up until Evanick's resignation as Affordable Housing chairman in early December. Ratkovich, who also is New Castle City Council president, said the conflict question should have been raised in 2003, when the new agency was formed.

"When it was created, they should have known," Ratkovich said of the original board. "Why weren't these questions raised then instead of now?"

Conti represents the fifth board member to leave Affordable Housing in two months. The remaining members are chairman
Bill Bonner and Deno DeLorenzo.

Conti said Affordable Housing will survive despite the bad publicity surrounding the agency. However, he claims unfavorable coverage cost Affordable Housing more than $200,000 in state funding.

After pleading guilty to a misdemeanor violation of the state's gambling device law, Conti finds himself fighting to keep his seat on the housing authority.

"The (county) commissioners want to put me through the ringer," he said. "I'm still going forward with the housing authority."

Copyright (c) 2006, New Castle News