In a wide-ranging interview, Syracuse Housing Authority Executive Director Bill Simmons shot back at city officials’ scrutiny of the redevelopment of public housing, said a new phase of the project should close soon and minimized a closed-door meeting of SHA’s Board of Commissioners. 

The housing authority recently made a surprise move by committing to taking on property management responsibilities once public housing in the South Side is redeveloped. Originally, the Missouri-based private developer McCormack Baron Salazar, known for several neighborhood redevelopment projects across the nation, was set to manage the property. 

SHA’s increasing responsibility in the project comes as faith in the agency and Simmons has publicly wavered. 

“SHA always anticipated taking over management,” said SHA Deputy Executive Director Jalyn Clifford. “It’s just sooner than originally anticipated. So it’s really nothing new.” 

A volley of blame and finger pointing has roiled the project. Simmons, city officials and other stakeholders involved in the massive $1 billion redevelopment project have been brought under the microscope over the pause of the Children’s Rising Center. 

Simmons has faced the brunt of criticism for transparency and capacity issues from both the city and leaders from the non-profit organizations tasked with bringing the redevelopment project to fruition.

“We just keep doing what we do. I mean, it’s our land. These are our residents. This is our housing project. We have a plan for them. We just keep moving forward,” Simmons told Central Current. 

Mayor Ben Walsh, who said that status quo would only hinder the progress of the project, has expressed concern about Simmons’ leadership, stopping short of calling for his removal. Allyn Family Foundation Executive Director Meg O’Connell and Deputy Mayor Sharon Owens have publicly called for Simmons to be ousted. Owens, the board president at Blueprint 15, stated during Central Current’s Democratic mayoral forum, that she should have fought harder to bring about leadership changes at the housing authority. 

“I should have screamed louder, jumped higher and pound my fist to make the changes happening now more urgent two years ago,” Owens said. 

Simmons stayed out of a closed-door meeting last Thursday where the SHA board of commissioners convened — with legal counsel — to discuss what the board has termed “personnel matters.” Following the meeting, Board President Calvin Corriders Sr. declined to elaborate on what prompted the previously unscheduled meeting. 

“So your question would assume that he was the conversation discussion. That may or may not have been the case,” Corriders said, when a Central Current reporter questioned if Simmons would be briefed on what was discussed in his absence.

Simmons told Central Current on Monday that he has faced such evaluations every year during his tenure and is unbothered by the calls for his resignation. 

“Nobody can make sense of why Bill Simmons needs to be fired,” Simmons said. “I ignore it,” he said. 

Central Current: Last week at the Executive Session, everybody refused to speak with us, but you were out of the meeting for a while. What was that about?

Simmons: Well, I get evaluations by the board every year for the past 20 years. That’s all. That was just another evaluation. But today it’s front page news, but I’ve been doing this process for 20 years.

Note: Central Current later followed up about the tenor of the review from the board. SHA has not yet replied to the question. 

CC: The city has had a lot to say about your leadership, including Deputy Mayor Sharon Owens. If she does become the mayor, do you fear it may affect your leadership at SHA?

Simmons: No, I’ve been here almost 20 years at the Housing Authority. I’m losing money by being here working on this project. There’s no threat to me. 

You know, even the board, … even they know when they come over here, they put their hand on the Bible and say they’re going to do what’s in the best interest of the authority, not listening to the mayor. So when the mayor says, ‘fire Bill Simmons’, and they went and told them, ‘No, we’re not firing Bill Simmons,’ because they know what the work here is and what’s involved in this process. And me leaving, you know, will set this project back at least a year. So, yeah, you know, it just didn’t make any sense.

Editor’s note: City officials said Tuesday in a statement that “concerns regarding the performance of the executive director and his staff have been well documented by the city and other project partners and have been conveyed directly to the SHA board for review. In the meantime, the City remains fully committed to working closely with Syracuse Housing Authority, its developer and our federal and state partners to move the project … forward for the benefit of residents and our community.”

CC: What kind of problems has the SHA faced because of the ongoing turmoil with the city?

Simmons: Well, it creates problems for the project, from the standpoint that when you’re doing tax credit properties, it requires us to go out and get investors to buy those tax credits with the Housing Authority being involved. You know, I have a lot of involvement and knowledge with the tax credit program. Because we built, managed Freedom Commons. We built and managed homes in Syracuse. And so that experience is important to investors. If the investors think there’s going to be all this upheaval and Bill [Simmons] may be gone, they might not want to invest in the project. So that’s the sensitivity that the city needs to be aware of, in terms of saying Bill [Simmons] is incompetent, and he needs to go. They’re just impacting financially investors investing in a project, but also scaring the residents. We’re having residents move, and people say, ‘Why am I moving if this is not going to happen?’ So that’s where their negativity impacts the program. It doesn’t impact me. 

CC: What are some challenges that have not been addressed by the SHA?

Simmons: I think everything’s being addressed. The noise doesn’t come from the Syracuse Housing Authority, you know? It comes from the city, comes from Blueprint 15, and I can’t control people running for office and want to make a political issue out of this thing. My board has talked to the mayor and told them, ‘Look, you’re not hurting Bill Simmons, you’re hurting the project.’ Because when you make all this noise and create all this uncertainty, investors don’t want to invest. Residents decide maybe I don’t want to move. That’s the only thing that’s hurting the project. But I can’t tell the mayor or deputy mayor to stop saying what they’re saying.

CC: What’s next for the second phase of the East Adams redevelopment project?

Simmons: We have a closing scheduled [on the second phase], probably at the end of this month, or early September. Once the project [is] closed, and it’s like 18 months out before the project is complete. Department Housing and Urban Development requires that when they do their tax credit programs. So, you know, we’ll be building phase one, closing on phase two, build that out, and then we’ll get over to Pioneer Homes.

Editor’s note: The second phase will entail building a new building on a vacant lot at the intersection of Oakwood Avenue and Burt Street. Clifford explained that closing on the project will allow Syracuse Housing Authority to begin building. HUD awarded a $50 million Choice Neighborhoods Implementation Grant to the housing authority last year, the first CNI grant in the state, to help with the project.

Read more of Central Current’s coverage

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Debadrita Sur is a multimedia journalist and Report for America corps member who reports on the I-81 project and public housing for Central Current. In 2023, Sur graduated with a master’s degree in journalism...