Special town meeting backs effort to get housing project up and running.

PROVINCETOWN — With police station articles rendered moot by last week’s election results, most of Monday’s 45-minute special town meeting was focused on injecting more money into the Harbor Hill housing project.

Voters passed Article 1, transferring $492,000 from the town’s free cash to the Year Round Market Rate Rental Housing Trust to ensure that Harbor Hill, a 28-unit housing complex in town, can get more units renovated and filled.

The money will allow the trust to have enough cash on hand to sign contracts to operate and renovate the former timeshare property while still being able to continue to pay the debt service on the town’s $10.7 million purchase of the property last summer.

“Everyone knows there is a housing problem in Provincetown,” said Kevin Mooney, chairman of the trust’s board. “With this, we create opportunities for people to stay or return to Provincetown.”

Currently only two units are filled, and 22 units need significant renovations so they can be legally occupied, according to town officials.

The subsidy will carry the trust through June 2020 and the money will be held in the town’s general fund and distributed to the trust only if needed to prevent a deficit before the end of the fiscal year.

State procurement laws require organizations to have the full amount of the contract costs upfront, and the request of town meeting was determined by the construction contract and a 5% contingency.

Harbor Hill is a market-rate community housing project, the first of its kind in the state. It seeks to fill the gap for people who do not qualify for affordable housing but still cannot afford to live in Provincetown.

The project has been plagued by delays, cutting off the chance for the trust to bring in rental income to pay off its initial investment.

The town had to sort through 1,300 deeds of timeshare holders and go through Land Court and Bankruptcy Court. It then had trouble finding someone to renovate and operate the complex, going out to bid twice looking for contractors and managers.

Before town meeting, town officials and members of the trust’s board said they might have to sell off some units to keep the project afloat if the article did not pass, and several voters said they wanted to stand by it.

“Now is not the time to cut bait,” state Rep. Sarah Peake, D-Provincetown, said.

The transfer was recommended to voters by the Select Board and the Finance Committee. Mark Hatch, chairman of the Finance Committee, said Monday’s vote would give the project a chance to succeed and it would be a disservice to stop the project before it can fully bloom.

Because Harbor Hill is not up and running, the waters remain murky on how it will do financially, Hatch said.

“It’s going to be a couple of year before we really understand what’s happening here,” he said.

The town is trying to increase the trust’s transparency, and there are plans to videotape its meetings and have quarterly reports to the Select Board, said Acting Town Manager David Gardner.

Two articles concerning a new police station were indefinitely postponed because voters rejected a debt exclusion question at the annual town election last week.

— Follow Ethaqn Genter on Twitter: @EthanGenterCCT.