A group of Mapleton residents will keep their affordable apartments thanks to the Presque Isle Housing Authority and a Brunswick loan fund.
The housing authority now owns the 12-unit Living Easy Apartments complex on Pulcifur Road in Mapleton, which will retain federal rent assistance for its tenants.
The apartments were built as part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Rental Housing Program, which offers subsidies to tenants. But owners Lester and Debbie Hersey wanted to sell, and a new buyer might have exited the federal plan. Without that boost, 12 families could have had to pay higher rent or move, Presque Isle Housing Authority Executive Director Jennifer Sweetser said.
“We are thankful that the Herseys were willing to leave the Rural Development program in this way, because they didn’t have to do this,” Sweetser said. “It’s a good thing for the community that they were willing to preserve the subsidy for the people that live there.”
The Brunswick-based Genesis Community Loan Fund, which works to create and preserve affordable housing, started things rolling in 2018, Sweetser said.
The USDA contacted Genesis to notify them the property’s mortgage was coming due, so the property was at potential risk of losing subsidies. Genesis reached out to Presque Isle Housing and they worked together, Sweetser said.
With a Community Development Block Grant, administered by Genesis, the authority bought the building for $240,000, she said. The arrangement continues the mortgage — and the USDA subsidies — for another 30 years.
Under the federal rental assistance program, tenants pay 30 percent of their income on rent and utilities, which helps keep housing affordable. If the Herseys had sold to a private buyer and the building was removed from USDA Rural Development, it likely would have resulted in the tenants having to move, Sweetser said.
“We’ve had the building since the 1970s and we were ready to sell,” Debbie Hersey said Tuesday. “Now is our time to retire.”
The apartment complex was built under Rural Development Section 515, which offered loans to build housing in rural areas for very low- to moderate-income households, older people and people with disabilities, according to the USDA.
Maine has 7,700 apartments under that program, according to the Genesis Fund. As property owners grow older, many want out of the apartment businesses.
The Genesis Fund is a certified nonprofit community development financial institution that provides project guidance and financing to develop new affordable housing and preserve existing housing, Communications Director Elyse Tipton said.
The fund started in 1992 as a group of midcoast Mainers that united to help a family that was unhoused, she said. They launched a loan fund that helped build more than a dozen affordable homes.
The fund also administers grants and helps develop other community resources, such as health care facilities and food pantries, Executive Director Liza Fleming-Ives said.
The fund has overseen the purchase of five other Maine properties with a combined 142 units in the past five years. The Housing Authority of the city of Old Town acquired Main View Apartments in Orono in a deal similar to that in Mapleton.
“What’s at stake is if this property had paid off the USDA mortgage and not transferred, the rental assistance would have been lost,” Fleming-Ives said. “Mapleton would have no longer had 12 apartments that were assisted by that support from the USDA.”
Genesis administered USDA grant funds so the Presque Isle Housing Authority could buy the complex, Fleming-Ives said. Genesis will also loan the authority money from the Maine Affordable Housing Tax Credit Program to complete renovations, she said.
The move caught the attention of Maine Gov. Janet Mills.
“This partnership will help a dozen Aroostook County families stay in their homes safely and affordably, in the place they have set down roots and lived with dignity and comfort,” Mills said in a press statement.
The Presque Isle Housing Authority manages 185 public housing apartments and 179 section 8 vouchers, Sweetser said. The authority has formed an LLC to manage the Mapleton property, and will spend about $200,000 on upgrades to take the building through the next 30 years.
Staff have already met with tenants of Living Easy Apartments.
“It should be fairly seamless,” she said. “They’ve known for a couple of years [that] the Herseys were looking to sell. For most of them, I think they’re glad that they don’t have to move anywhere.”
