Brinshore Development’s relationship with the Chicago Housing Authority was on rocky ground before the developer listed the bulk of its CHA-affiliated properties for sale last month, public records show.The Chicago-based national affordable housing provider is selling 20 properties across the city , or 2,435 units that include 695 units subsidized by the CHA, according to listing details.The properties are under “severe stress” due to defaults as a result of the CHA missing payments to Brinshore and deferred maintenance, Brinshore cofounder Richard Sciortino wrote in an August email to then-Chicago Housing Authority interim CEO Angela Hurlock.Brinshore is one of Chicago’s top affordable housing developers and is known for being a significant partner of the CHA. The developer has been instrumental in the housing authority’s Plan for Transformation, a 2000 pledge to tear down and rebuild tens of thousands of CHA-subsidized units at developments with affordable and market rate apartments.Sciortino and Brinshore cofounder David Brint didn’t respond to requests for comment.A Brinshore spokesperson said in an emailed statement that the firm has had a “fruitful and enduring” relationship with the CHA, and its decision to market a portion of the CHA portfolio is “due to a number of factors, none of which have to do with our dissatisfaction with the CHA or the City of Chicago.”“There have been times, however, when our financial and property management needs have not been fully addressed by CHA, which has made our job of providing safe, sound, and affordable apartments for our residents challenging,” the statement said.Brinshore said these issues stem from a “complicated regulatory structure, … a lack of resources, and occasionally because of the general nature of bureaucracy.” Related Brinshore Development puts 20 Chicago properties up for sale, including CHA units Prior to marketing the buildings for sale, records show Brinshore warned the CHA that its properties were struggling due to difficulty working with the agency.The developer had been trying to refinance its properties but couldn’t work out the deals with housing authority staff. Properties that receive certain federal subsidies to build and include affordable units often need additional government resources to help finance renovations or improvements.“Some of these [properties] are losing money and the others are merely scraping by,” Sciortino said in the email to Hurlock. “All of them have significant deferred maintenance that need to be addressed since we have exhausted our replacement reserves and must resort to using operating revenues to make minimal repairs as required.”For over three years, Brinshore has been attempting to work with the CHA to refinance one property “without success,” Sciortino wrote. Brinshore cofounder Richard Sciortino speaks at a November ribbon cutting for the new Westhaven Park Station apartment building near the United Center.Arthur Maiorella/For the Sun-Times CHA spokesperson Matthew Aguilar said in a statement to the Sun-Times that about a third of the units at each Brinshore property are subsidized by the agency.“Property owners are responsible for building maintenance and are not solely reliant upon CHA resources for this purpose,” Aguilar said. The maintenance issues were made worse because the CHA hadn’t made “true-up payments,” or payments to correct the agency’s subsidy balances, on some Brinshore properties for over 12 months, records show. Sciortino said these payments are the primary source of revenue for most of its CHA properties.The firm’s regulatory agreements with the housing authority dictate that true-up payments must be paid on time, Sciortino wrote to Hurlock.“Unfortunately, true-up payments are never made on time,” he said, adding the late payments put the CHA in a “constant state of default.”The CHA has been “completely up to date on all required payments” since August 2025, the agency said in its statement. This came after a 12-month period of “significant structural improvements within our agency, including reorganizing our Property and Asset Management Department,” Aguilar said. The housing authority also reviewed its process around making true-up payments.Brinshore and the CHA’s tumultuous relationship marks another pain point in what has been a messy year for the housing authority. The CHA, which has a budget of over $1 billion, has gone more than a year without a permanent CEO. Mayor Brandon Johnson and the embattled agency have found themselves in a clash with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development over the appointment of the mayor’s candidate of choice, retired Ald. Walter Burnett, who is unlikely to land the job.The CHA had another relationship with a real estate partner go awry in September 2024 when The Habitat Co. ended its property management agreements with the CHA after nearly 40 years, the Chicago Tribune reported. Habitat had overseen 3,400 units of public housing for the CHA.On top of the financial challenges, Brinshore and its development partner, The Michaels Organization, said maintenance crews were repeatedly threatened with violence while working at Westhaven Park on the Near West Side, records show. That property is listed for sale.A Michaels employee said maintenance staff on the 2200 block of West Maypole Avenue were threatened by a group of young men, who said they wouldn’t allow the employees to work and that they wanted jobs at the property. Michaels lost workers as a result of the incidents, the employee wrote in a July email. Apartment buildings along the 2200 block of West Maypole Avenue.Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times The incidents prompted late-summer meetings between the developers, the CHA, the 12th Police District, Chicago Department of Housing Commissioner Lissette Castañeda and Deputy Mayor of Community Safety Garien Gatewood’s staff, records show.Sciortino followed up in an email with the CHA’s chief of staff and its interim chief operating officer and Castañeda with a plan for addressing the “serious gang problem": additional security and job training and placement.It’s unclear what the plan for increased security was as Sciortino wrote that its current security company had given notice to terminate its contract “over the difficulty of working at this site,” records show. Sciortino said the developers had “cycled through nearly every security firm in the City and all of them have notified us that they do not want to work at Westhaven for similar reasons.”The firm has “been told that much of the gang intimidation stems from their desire for jobs,” Sciortino said, but many of them aren’t eligible for work due to “prior convictions” or “lack of skills.”Lance Williams, professor of urban community studies at Northeastern Illinois University, said it’s unlikely that the alleged incidents of gang violence actually involved gang members. Gang members are not organized in such a way where they are tapped into development issues, he said.The neighborhood around Westhaven Park has experienced significant gentrification, pushing generational community members out of the area — and some of those residents have become activists joining groups such as Black Men United to advocate for job opportunities, Williams said. But he said the few people who are left in the neighborhood are not able to benefit from working at the new developments.“That is immoral and unethical,” Williams said. “That is the conflict you hear going on.”Mayor Brandon Johnson’s press secretary Cassio Mendoza said in a statement that the mayor’s team and the 12th Police District met with Brinshore, Michaels and the CHA “to devise an alternate safety plan for the Westhaven property, which included directing [local community violence intervention organizations] to the building and its surrounding area.”The efforts, Mendoza said, have led to “a significant decrease in instances of violence within and near the property.”The mayor’s office challenged Sciortino’s assessment of why the most recent security firm’s contract ended, saying the firm terminated its agreement with Brinshore after the developer cut the firm’s contracted hours. Brinshore didn’t respond to a request for comment regarding the cut hours.The mayor’s office didn’t comment on the CHA’s default status and Brinshore’s maintenance troubles.The CHA said in a statement that it “will continue to collaborate with all of our partners in the city to address safety concerns from our residents and business partners with urgency.”Brinshore and Michaels recently finished the final phase of a 30-year development project at the CHA’s Henry Horner Homes redevelopment site. Westhaven Park Station is included in Brinshore’s property sale.Brinshore has invested $4.8 billion in communities nationwide, with around 12,000 units spread across 16 states, according to its website. The firm has 66 properties in Illinois. It’s the 16th-largest affordable housing developer in the country, according to trade publication Affordable Housing Finance. Related CHA, developers mark end of Henry Horner Homes redevelopment on Near West Side CHA residents grow frustrated as agency marks one year without permanent CEO ...read more read less