St. Petersburg Housing Authority receives $842K HUD grant
By Breanne Williams
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: May 14, 2024

The St. Petersburg Housing Authority has received an $842,360 grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for public housing upgrades.

On May 6, HUD allocated $3.17 billion in Public Housing Repair funding to 2,756 public housing authorities. The funds went to PHAs in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. According to the St. Petersburg Housing Authority, the grants are intended to help the PHAs make “capital investments in their public housing stock.”

“This grant is a testament to the ongoing commitment of our organization to enhancing the quality of life for our residents and investing in the future of our community,” SPHA President Michael Lundy said in a statement.

SPHA is the leading affordable housing provider in St. Pete. The organization serves more than 4,000 low-income households and has a total of 134 public housing units in six properties: Clearview Park Apartments, Disston Place Apartments, Gateway Place Apartments, Romayne Apartments, Sunset Oaks Apartments and a single-family home.

The funds can be utilized in various ways, including supporting “development, financing, modernization and management improvements of public housing developments,” according to a release. The money can go toward large-scale improvements like replacing roofs on existing structures or can be used for systemic upgrades like installing water conservation measures or making existing properties more energy efficient.

A spokesman for SPHA said the organization will use the funds to bring their housing properties up to the new National Standards for the Physical Inspection of Real Estate standards, or HUD NSPIRE, which were finalized last year.

The grants were provided through HUD’s Capital Fund Program, which annually supports all PHAs in creating or renovating public housing in their respective communities. HUD Acting Secretary Adrianne Todman said the grand funding was necessary to ensure the public housing supply meets residents’ needs.

“At HUD, our mission is to create strong, sustainable, inclusive communities and quality homes for all,” Todman said in a release.