Street roots., June 12, 2009, Image 1

JU N E 12, 2009
A DUET, FOR
MUSICIAN AND
WRITER
A n interview with Steve Lopez, the
author behind 'The Soloist’
CELEBRATING
a d ec a d e o p
_
.
...
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Page 10
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Education ♦ Dialogue ♦ Independence
It arrived late May to
nearly 300 Section 8
recipients in Northwest
Oregon, giving them
30 days to avoid
becoming homeless
BY JOANNE ZUHL
S T A F F W R IT E R
his sümmer, unlike the past, held promise
for Jennifer Cherry. After two years on a
B
waiting list, Jennifer and h e r family finally
, P H O T O S B Y K EN H A W K IN S W W W .K E N H A W K IN S .C O M
Jennifer Cherry stares out her door with the letter from the Northwest Oregon Housing Authority in hand. Shéwas one of 285
households that received letters (shown below) from N0HA, terminating their Section 8 rental assistance. The assistance paid for 90
percent of her rent. The terminations were the result of reduced funding through the federal Housing and Urban Development because
NOHA’s capacity fell short of HUD guidelines.
ACT
NOW
Demand HUD meet the
full demand of housing
our poor, disabled
and elderly.
See page 16 7
H# » »
received their Section 8 voucher and in February
found a home. For her and her fiance, Jeff Crist,
and their three children, it meant they could move
out of her mother’s house, put her children in ,
good schools in Garibaldi, and concentrate ,on
recovering physically and finding jobs. They each
suffered disabilities that left them without work
Jennifer has a herniated disc in her neck and Jeff
is recovering from a collision with a logging truck
two years ago. But he had recently received his
certificate as a flagger and was looking to get on a
crèw this summer. Next month, Jennifer will go in
for surgery to correct her neck.
Yes, there was a lot of potential m the air, right
up to the moment Jennifer opened the letter from
the housing authority at the start Of June.
“Our funding has been reduced significantly
effective June 1, 2009 through Dec. 81, 2009. Our
only option at this time is to terminate rental
assistance for a minimum of230 program
participants.... We apologize for the inconvenience
this will cause your family...”
The “inconvenience” poses an insurmountable
financial barrier to her family. Jennifer and her
fiancé’s combined income is $700 a month
through disability assistance. Their rent is $984,
of which N0HA paid about 90 percent
“It has taken so long to get where we’re at, and
then to just be pushed out,” Jennifer says, in
between silence and tears. “It’s taken us two
years to get this far, and in one month we’re
supposed to be homeless again?”
A total of 285 letters were sent Out to Section 8
recipients like Jennifer in Columbia, Clatsop and
Tillamook counties, all managed by the Northwest
Oregon Housing Authority, or NOHA. That’s
equal to the entire population of Manzanita, or
other rural towns that pepper that region of the
state — roughly 25 percent of NOHA’s Section 8
participants. It comes as a devasfating'blow to
renters who are among the disabled, elderly and
poor, and it has many people who work with the
vulnerable in the region scratching their heads at
to how such a catastrophic failure of bureaucracy
could occur seemingly without warning.
»or a would-be tenant, securing Section 8
housing assistance means navigating an