The Housing Authority of Fulton County has a new board.
Or nearly half of one: four new members on the nine-seat body, just enough for a quorum that can conduct business, according to County Commission Chair Robb Pitts.
Commissioners met Monday to appoint a new housing board — and to remove Antavius Weems and Lamar White, the only members of the previous board who refused to resign. After four hours of wrangling, commissioners voted 5-2 to remove Weems and White, then quickly approved four new members:
- Stephen Davis, senior director of government affairs for the Atlanta Apartment Association/Georgia Apartment Association
- Felicia Moore, former Atlanta City Council president and mayoral candidate who lost to Andre Dickens
- Lauren Waits, Democratic policy consultant and community activist
- Holly York, vice president of development for MUST Ministries
Commissioners sought to appoint five new members, but Commissioner Khadijah Abdur-Rahman tried to reinstate her previous appointee: Earnestine Pittman, former mayor of East Point. Pittman was blocked from attending several housing board meetings during her brief tenure, and she alerted commissioners to many of the agency’s problems, Abdur-Rahman said.
“You do not make the whistleblower suffer for the actions of others,” she said.
Other commissioners, although saying they had nothing against Pittman, said reappointing her would not serve the goal of “reconstituting” the board. Her nomination failed.
Pitts said afterward that Abdur-Rahman may present a new nominee at the commission’s Aug. 7 meeting. The new housing board is expected to meet at 3 p.m. Wednesday, to meet a HUD deadline for hiring an outside consultant to run Section 8 operations, Pitts said.
The housing authority, which in both June and July was weeks late in delivering Section 8 rent voucher payments to dozens of landlords, is threatened by the U.S. Department of Housing & Urban Development with the loss of federal funding. HUD cited multiple failures by the authority, including a lack of qualified staff, and set a July 31 deadline to receive extensive documentation that the authority had failed to provide since late June.
At the start of Monday’s meeting Pitts said state law lets commissioners remove the housing board for “inefficiency or neglect of duty or misconduct in office.” Notice of the hearing was sent to Weems and White on July 17, he said.
Appointing or removing board members is the county’s only role in housing authority operations, Pitts said. But members of the public, including housing authority staff and former board members, spoke up about the agency’s dysfunction at previous commission meetings. Now HUD is eyeing the situation closely, he said.
“One of HUD’s recommendations has been to reconstitute the housing authority board,” Pitts said. The county asked all board members to resign, and all did except for Weems, the chair; and White, the vice-chair, he said.
On Sunday night, Weems sent out a statement denouncing Pitts and blaming the agency’s failures on its staff. He said the authority has contracted with Alpharetta management firm CVR Associates to manage the Section 8 voucher program. That is one of three consultants HUD recommended in a July 10 letter to take over voucher management.
During a public comment period, more than a dozen people lined up to speak in support of Weems. Some were apparently under the impression commissioners were about to abolish housing assistance.
Weems and White also apparently hired three individuals as consultants who are now described as the housing authority’s interim executive director and deputy directors: Roslyn Harper, Charcella Green and Devetrion Caldwell. All three spoke during the public comment period, blaming former housing authority staff for the problems.
Harper said Section 8 rent payments for August will be on time. People from other area housing authorities had been brought in to “show us how to do it,” she said.
Pamela Roshell, county chief operating officer, said she has not seen the contracts for the consultants and can’t confirm whether they were hired in compliance with HUD rules.
Weems, on the board since 2018 and its chair since 2020, said he was lied to by housing authority staff about the agency’s condition. He blamed them for the authority’s problems.
Weems said his term as board chair ends Sept. 30. He asked to remain on the board until then.
Ultimately commissioners voted 5-2 to remove Weems and White, with only Arrington and Hall opposed to the change.
About the Author
