A couple of years ago, an incident developed in Red Bank when an owner-occupied home was condemned after a bondsman, looking for a fugitive, forcibly entered the wrong house. The occupants were at church, and they came home to find their home condemned by Red Bank. The Red Bank police had been on the scene with the bondsman, and upon entering the house, the police felt like the house should be condemned as unsuitable for habitation. The family was forced to vacate, and it took months to find sources of funding for repairs for the very low income homeowners.
At the same time, Monty Millard ascended to mayor, and several of us decided to locate sources of funding for repairs of owner occupied homes in Red Bank. Red Bank did not have anyone on staff to assemble and administer a program for renovations in Red Bank. And, Mayor Millard let us go to work on the project.
We identified a number of agencies: Widows' Harvest (which is a wonderful program), Habitat for Humanity, South East Tennessee Development District, Home Builders Association (which was very generous), and a number of local churches (Red Bank Cumberland Presbyterian, North Shore Fellowship, and Red Bank Methodist). We also included the Weatherization Program from CNE.
The weatherization program offered funding of up to $6,000 for weatherization work in residential units (homes and apartments). The CNE program was a complete bust. As far as I know, none of our referrals received any services from CNE. I understand that much of the money was never used, and that there have been several directors of this program. The new one always blames the previous one for the failure of the program. If CNE operates any of its other programs like the weatherization program, CNE needs a new board and new staff.
Steve Daugherty Sr.