Harrietstown Housing Authority Executive Director Sarah Clarkin, left, is retiring after 12 years on the job next month. Patrick Murphy, right is set to take up the role. Here, they stand in front of one of the two apartment complexes the HHA operates -- the 78-unit Lake Flower Apartments. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

SARANAC LAKE — Sarah Clarkin, who has been the executive director for the Harrietstown Housing Authority for the past 12 years, is retiring next month.

After more than a decade of helping provide housing for Saranac Lake’s working class, elderly population and young families, she said she’s going to miss and remember the people the most — the people and their pets.

With her office in the Lake Flower Apartments, she said she knows everyone living in the high-rise building. She’s become part of their lives, and they’ve become part of hers.

Now she is handing the reigns over to Patrick Murphy, who was unanimously selected to be her successor by the HHA board search committee after a national search that brought in almost 30 applicants from several states and one other country.

Murphy said he took the job because he believes housing is important to the village.

“In this time where housing is so critically sparse in availability, we do provide a tremendous role in housing the people who work here,” Clarkin said of HHA and its sister organization, the nonprofit Adirondack Housing Development Corporation, where Murphy will also become the CEO.

The two organizations support around 260 households, according to Clarkin. Assuming an average of two people per home, that’s around 10% of the town’s population, she said.

Murphy is “well-known and well-respected” in the area, according to Clarkin, and she is confident handing the operation off to him.

“Leaving a job after 12 years is a big step. … I can’t imagine being more comfortable leaving this position and having Patrick come in,” she said.

Murphy said he’s got “big shoes” to fill.

They’ll overlap for four weeks through September, then Clarkin will leave on Sept. 27.

Clarkin has a lot of knowledge to pass on, but she said Murphy is starting with more knowledge than she did 12 years ago.

Murphy said his job will be to continue to improve the living conditions for the organization’s current residents and then create new housing for new people.

Clarkin felt now is a good time to retire. The HHA is in between projects, and she didn’t want to leave mid-way through the upcoming major renovation to the Lake Flower Apartments. She wants time to enjoy the Adirondacks and feels she has not been able to do that yet.

The HHA recently completed assessments on both of its apartment buildings. Now that they know what needs upgrading, they just have to find funding.

The biggest thing found was that the plumbing in the high rise — built in 1960s with many pipes original to the building — is in need of replacement. While the walls are opened for this work, they’ll also upgrade the ventilation and renovate the kitchens and bathrooms. This will be a big project, which will require blocks of tenants to move out temporarily while work is being done. A plan for this construction is currently being devised.

Murphy and Clarkin said the town of Harrietstown has been a generous supporter of the HHA — obtaining grants on behalf of the organization and putting in its own funding. When the Lake Flower Apartments needed a new building facade to keep its bricks from falling, the town chipped in $100,000.

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Housing help

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HHA is overseen by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. It operates two main programs: public housing at the Lake Flower Apartments and Algonquin Apartments, as well as vouchers for Section Eight private housing.

There are 78 units in the high rise — mostly one-person studio apartments, with some one-bedroom units.

There are 35 units at Algonquin Apartments — more two- and four-bedrooms for families.

These 113 units are rented to people earning at or below 80% of the area median income.

Clarkin said Franklin County’s AMI is $77,800, so 80% AMI in Franklin County equates to an annual income of $46,800 for a one-person household, $53,450 for two people, $60,150 for three people, $66,800 for four people.

When she told this to the Harrietstown Town Board last week, town Supervisor Jordanna Mallach pointed out it is “really easy to be under that” number.

The Section Eight vouchers are for people at or below 50% AMI. Someone with one of these vouchers pays 30% of their income toward their monthly rent, and HHA covers the rest.

Clarkin said HHA has 135 vouchers, but the hard part is finding an apartment to match a voucher with.

“They get a voucher, and then they need to try and find an apartment,” she said. “It’s very difficult.”

The vouchers last for 60 days, but “we’re always granting extensions,” Clarkin said. Often, there are eight to 15 people who have vouchers but are looking for a place to apply them.

Clarkin said she hears of stories of landlords not accepting vouchers — which is illegal — but often, she said landlords opt to accept other applicants who don’t have if there are multiple people vying for an apartment.

She doesn’t know why.

“Vouchers can be great, because the landlord is at least guaranteed that portion of the rent that the housing authority is paying,” Clarkin said.

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AHDC

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The Adirondack Housing Development Corporation, which was created through the HHA, is a “small but growing” sister organization, Clarkin said. It is currently focused on Saranac Lake, which she felt has been “left out of the mix” with housing development.

This organization oversees the public housing at the Helen Hill Apartments and is overseen by the state. These 12 subsidized units are rented to people earning at or below 60% AMI.

Clarkin said AHDC is “on the brink” of offering more housing. An area nonprofit is dissolving, and the AHDC will absorb its properties and cash. Clarkin said she wasn’t ready to reveal what nonprofit is dissolving yet.

Clarkin said she is seeing “tremendous demand” for housing in the 80% to 130% AMI — people with good salaries who still can’t find a place they can afford. While HHA housing programs are for people in the lowest income tier, the AHDC focuses more that middle-income tier, which Murphy said developers sometimes overlook.

He said there’s a need for a variety of housing for a range of “overlooked” income levels in the region.

There are limited existing or potential options for housing in the Adirondacks, so they have to strike when they can.

Clarkin said what sets HHA and AHDC apart is that they are public entities and have contracts with HUD or the state which guarantee revenue to run these housing complexes.

These public contracts come with a lot of regulations governing how things are run — annual building inspections, background checks on every tenant every year, a lot of paperwork — which take time, but they’re important.

“There’s a reason why they’re there,” Murphy said.

This results in a lot of paperwork for the staff, and Clarkin praised their staff. The HHA’s six-and-a-half employees do a lot more than provide people housing, she said. They arrange rides for residents, make doctor appointments and help elders balance their checkbooks.

Clarkin said she’s proud of how her team got through the chaotic coronavirus pandemic — a pandemic she initially thought would last “a few weeks” and then lasted three years.

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Murphy starts up

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Murphy is leaving his job as treasurer for the village of Saranac Lake. He owns the small business and nonprofit consulting firm Murphy Minded. He’s also the treasurer for Play ADK.

In the past, he’s been the deputy village clerk-treasure, Saranac Lake Area Chamber of Commerce executive director, a village trustee, a Wild Center employee, a member of the Saranac Lake Local Development Corporation and a member of the Saranac Lake Housing Work Group.

Murphy said he’ll now work with the village from the outside-in and knows the staff there well.

Murphy said he hopes to work with developers and the village to ensure new developments or rehabs are not just built, but that they are affordable. He said there needs to be a commitment to affordability.

Part of his first acts on the job, he said, are to meet with the residents and learn how to continue providing housing for the people who work here and make Saranac Lake what it is.