Asset Management

TAG Associates has been in the forefront of developing asset and site-based management procedures at large public housing authorities (PHAs). TAG's principal helped focus contemporary thinking in the field of asset management during the early 1990s by writing a definitive report recognized by the National Commission on Severely Distressed Public Housing (NCSDPH). TAG's approach to asset and site-based management has helped define the components of asset management of large public and subsidize housing portfolios.

A significant part of the asset management protocol is the use of a formal site visit procedure that supplies a framework for the asset manager to review activities at the site during a monthly formal meeting. A greatly expanded version provides for an annual management audit. The annual audit is anticipated to take a day or longer and contains a series of action steps, file reviews, and data analysis. The intent is that the audit be performed prior to any annual contract negotiations for privately managed sites. In addition, there are supporting protocols describing what asset managers should be evaluating and looking at, as well as revised job descriptions for asset managers which relate directly to performance measures, established at the beginning of the year. Asset management protocols have been implemented by TAG in Kansas City, Detroit, Philadelphia, New Haven and the District of Columbia.

In the development of its recommended performance measures, TAG has reviewed and assessed a variety of public housing and private housing management indicators and performance measures, and has incorporated both into its asset management plans.

Implementation of asset management invariably involves training authority staff. The TAG Associates team can demonstrate extensive expertise in training, particularly training that illuminates asset management to housing authority staff. The principal of TAG developed and implemented a highly successful activity-based training for financial management of Resident Management Corporations. This "learning-by-doing" approach to training is a highly transferable approach to address a PHA's needs. TAG's training experience also includes work at the Housing Authorities of Kansas City, Indianapolis, District of Columbia, Philadelphia, New Haven and Detroit. At these authorities, TAG has performed training in PHAS management options and project based budgeting. TAG has also performed training in some of these areas at San Francisco and Dade County (FL), as well as PHAS training at numerous authorities, including Puerto Rico, the District of Columbia and Detroit. TAG Associates has also provided direct technical assistance to the San Francisco Housing Authority in a variety of key management areas, including an extensive training program for middle and upper-level management.

TAG has been a leader in development of management procedures for PHAs overseeing private property management firms. Drawing on our many years of experience with private management of public housing and formative role in bringing mixed financing to public housing, TAG has worked with a number of major Housing Authorities to effect a transition from the traditional public housing management model to the advanced asset management models used in the management of private market properties. TAG has developed and implemented RFPs for alternative management entities and developed formal procedures for overseeing the private management of PHA developments.

Success of the Consultant in
Administering Asset Management
TAG has been highly successful in administering asset management programs throughout the country. By applying our expertise in site based and asset management, we have developed a 100 percent success rate of assisting PHAs in their removal from the HUD Troubled list. The PHAs that TAG assisted in this manner include Kansas City, Detroit, District of Columbia, Indianapolis, and San Francisco. TAG continues to provide on-going asset management assistance in Kansas City and the District of Columbia and is actively involved in implementing and refining the asset management capacity of these large PHAs. TAG has developed and implemented RFPs for alternative management and developed formal procedures for overseeing private management of PHA developments.

In addition to the preceding PHAs, TAG has investigated issues related to the privatization of housing at many PHAs. As mentioned above, we have worked in this area in Dade County, the State of New York, the Philadelphia Office of Community Development, and for the National Commission on Severely Distressed Public Housing. Many of our other privatization evaluations were performed for HOPE VI and other mixed-income projects. TAG also has developed an asset management methodology to assist with PHA portfolio management and the prioritization of capital improvements.

Property Management
Associates of TAG have more than twenty five (25) years of direct operations experience gained through working at senior management levels at the Cambridge, Boston and San Francisco Housing Authorities, through managing private real estate, and through working with a large number of clients providing strategic technical assistance. Management activities have included management of conventional state-aided family housing developments, preparation of operating budgets, preparation of management improvement and intervention plans, and supervisory responsibility for a very large PHA's fiscal affairs department. Individual staff profiles include selected details of related PHA management experience, as well as private management experience.

TAG Associates is a leader in the development of plans and strategies for initiating site based management and PHA asset management strategies. TAG has completed or is completing work on these projects in Detroit, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, and Kansas City, MO. As part of mixed income and HOPE VI development projects, TAG has also assisted PHAs implement the utilization of private and alternative management entities.

Physical Facilities Planning and Management
TAG Associates has provided a variety of services related to the maintenance, management, and modernization of physical facilities. Large scale assessments have been performed for the Capital Fund Program (and predecessor programs) for large PHAs. Other services have included inspections of housing units and developments, evaluation of maintenance work order systems and maintenance operations, development of cost estimates for modernization of developments, and design of preventive maintenance programs. Housing viability studies and distressed housing rehabilitation planning are other examples of TAG's work on capital improvement plans. Through TAG, capital assessments have been performed in recent years for Kansas City, Chicago, Philadelphia and Rockford (IL).