PITTSFIELD — Tenants said they had an understanding with the board that oversees the Pittsfield Housing Authority — no PHA staff members were welcome at the board's meeting on Friday.

It was an agreement that was supposed to ensure tenants felt free to speak candidly about their concerns with the PHA, which is an independent agency that oversees 10 public housing developments in the city that together have more than 700 units.

The meeting was public, just like a gathering of the City Council or School Committee would be.

Yet tenants said it was still a disappointment when, close to an hour into the meeting in the community room at Dower Square, they noticed the assistant to the Pittsfield Housing Authority's executive director sitting in the back.

Michael McCarthy, the chair, and Justine Dodds took notes as tenants voiced concerns about the housing authority. Although no changes were committed to at the meeting, the board was receptive to issues tenants brought up, chiefly coming together on reversing the ban on grills.

"I'm not surprised," Aja Young, a PHA tenant organizer, said when asked about that turn of events after the meeting. "[PHA is] showing that there's no trust or respect on their side when it comes to us."

The meeting was called to address concerns about general issues with the staff, concerns about transparency and the dilapidated state of the agency's properties. Much of the discussion also centered on a controversial policy the agency proposed that would ban grills, wildlife feeding, sprinklers, children's pools and crack down on items like chairs that are left out in common spaces.

Board members, most of whom are appointed by the mayor and are tasked with overseeing PHA policy, listened to tenants and took notes during much of the meeting.

But tensions rose when tenants started noticing Madonna Meagher, assistant to the executive director of PHA and grant writer, sitting in the back of the audience.

Meagher, of Great Barrington, told The Eagle after the meeting she had attended as a private citizen, free to join in on a public meeting, and noted that she hadn't been asked by the chair to identify herself publicly.

"Any citizen can attend an open meeting," Meagher said. "I am a citizen. I informed the chair ahead of time that I would be at the meeting."

Kathy Moody, city councilor for Pittsfield's Ward 7, attended the meeting to listen to the problems her constituents were voicing.

During the meeting, Michael McCarthy, chair of the Board of Commissioners, acknowledged there were trade-offs to having PHA staff present at the meetings. One pro, he said, is that PHA staff are able to hear directly from tenants about the problems plaguing public housing properties.

The cons, he said, are that tenants may not feel they can speak candidly about their problems, due to a perception that doing so might jeopardize their housing security.

"I think what a lot of people are feeling is that it wasn't really transparent," said Kayla Allen, director of the Dispute Resolution Center for Upside413, who served as a mediator between commissioners and tenants during the meeting.

"So you're looking for more transparency [from PHA]?" Allen asked.

The tenants answered in a chorus of yeses.

Tenants have begun the process of organizing a formal tenants union after PHA enacted, then tabled amid outcry, the policy that functionally banned them from having any items in outdoor common space, such as planter boxes, lawn furniture and grills.

The policy, and the speed with which it was rolled out, concerned tenants who said they would lose hundreds of dollars if they were forced to get rid of their outdoor items.

Enforcement of the policy ultimately was postponed, and the Board of Commissioners plans to discuss it again at its upcoming meeting on June 23.

On Friday, tenants said they wanted to make their voices heard without fear of speaking in front of the housing authority's staff.

At the meeting, two dozen tenants from five Pittsfield housing developments addressed the problems they've experienced.

Tenants pointed to maintenance issues and dilapidated property while speaking in front of the board of commissioners for Pittsfield Housing Authority. Although the meeting primarily discussed the recently tabled policy concerning use of outdoor common spaces, many residents expressed other frustrations too.

Multiple tenants brought poster boards or printouts with pictures showing problems in their units such as mold, sinks detached from walls and windows that won't open. They also offered pictures of property that would be affected by the new policy, as well as allegations of lease violations by PHA and its staff.

By the end of the meeting, tenants and commissioners agreed that the proposal to completely ban grills should be revisited, and McCarthy said tenants should be permitted to have grills as long as they follow fire safety rules.

Despite the tension at the beginning, tenants said they saw the meeting as a good first step toward advocating for their interests.

"This isn't done," Young said. "We're going to continue to push until all of those things are addressed and corrected."