Agenda - Council - 02/24/2015 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Accent Homes, Inc. has been chosen as the build partner for a new home to be built in the City of Ramsey for a severely injured veteran, Army SPC Marco Solt. Marco lost both legs from an enemy improvised explosive device (IED) blast. This home will be provided to the Solt family at no cost through donations of labor and materials and volunteers, as well as funding through the HFOT organization. Accent Homes will donate all contractor fees and supervision costs as well. Our last project of this type was a home we built for the DARE Program in Brooklyn Park that resulted in a donation of $50,000 to DARE. Brooklyn Park recognized the importance of this program and donated the building permit. Accent homes has requested that the City of Ramsey donate the building permit for this project. Staff did research the organization for any potential issues, and did not seem to find anything suspicious about the Homes for Our Troops (HFOT) organization, or the two charity rating organizations that gave HFOT a top rated review. CharityWatch, Charity Navigator, and the BBB Wise Giving Alliance seem to be the three most commonly referenced charity -rating services. HFOT looks to have received positive reviews across all of these rating organizations below. A summary of the reviews are below: Charity Navigator looks mainly at financial performance metrics and accountability & transparency performance metrics and gave HFOT a 100% rating on Transparency & Accountability and a 96.68% financial rating. CharityWatch is also known as the American Institute of Philanthropy and gave HFOT an 'A' rating (on a scale of F to A+) which is considered a top -rating. Groups included on the Top -Rated list generally spend 75% or more of their budgets on programs, spend $25 or less to raise $100 in public support, do not hold excessive assets in reserve, and receive "open -book" status for disclosure of basic financial information and documents to CharityWatch. The BBB's Wise Giving Aliance also passed HFOT in all 20 of its standards for charity accountability. GuideStar gave HFOT an average rating of 5 out of 5 stars. Funding Source: Fund Balance remaining from the City's Housing and Redevelopment Authority (HRA) Fund Recommendation: Staff recommends that a not to exceed $4,000 from the HRA Fund be transferred to the General Fund -Building Permits line item for a request to donate the costs of a Building Permit for Homes for Our Troops. The request was also reviewed by the Economic Development Authority, which recommended the utilization of the HRA Fund Balance for this request, and also directed Staff to work with the Anoka County Veterans Services Department. Staff continues to communicate with said department, but does not have a commitment at this time. Action: Motion to approve a not to exceed $4,000 from the HRA Fund be transferred to the General Fund -Building Permits for a request to donate the costs of a Building Permit for Homes for Our Troops. No file(s) attached. Attachments Form Review Inbox Reviewed By Date Tim Gladhill (Originator) Tim Gladhill 12/08/2014 08:48 AM Patrick Brama Tim Gladhill 12/29/2014 11:07 AM Tim Gladhill (Originator) Tim Gladhill 02/18/2015 04:07 PM Diana Lund Diana Lund 02/19/2015 07:20 AM