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City Slowing Plan for Covenant House Development Amid Probe, Report Says

By Maya Rajamani | May 20, 2016 5:46pm | Updated on May 23, 2016 8:50am
 The city is delaying its search for a developer to build a new Covenant House facility on the West Side amid investigations into the agency's practices, a report said.
The city is delaying its search for a developer to build a new Covenant House facility on the West Side amid investigations into the agency's practices, a report said.
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DNAinfo/Rosa Goldensohn

HELL’S KITCHEN — The city is delaying its search for a developer to build a new facility for the Covenant House amid investigations into the agency’s practices, a report said.

The city’s Department of Youth and Community Development began investigating an anonymous complaint that claimed the agency — which provides housing and other services to homeless youth — ”wilfully and intentionally” inflated data about the number of people it provides services, the New York Times reported.

Covenant House, which currently has a facility at 460 W. 41st St., says it serves nearly 4,000 homeless youths each year, but the complaint said the agency counted some of the people it served more than once to get a deal with the city’s Economic Development Corporation.

The complaint also stated that Covenant House’s executive director overstated the number of people on its waiting lists, the Times reported.

The director, Creighton Drury, “stepped down… on Monday to focus on the development project,” the Times added.

In January, the EDC and Covenant House issued a Request for Proposals (RFP) looking for a developer to build its new headquarters, as well as a 700-unit housing development with affordable apartments.

EDC has slowed the RFP process down since the allegations arose, the report said.

A spokeswoman for Covenant House told the Times the agency has hired a law firm to investigate the claims, and that no evidence had been found so far to point toward non-compliance by the agency.