Street roots., June 26, 2009, Page 11, Image 11

in
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street roots
Education * Dialogue * Independence
P ER FEC T STORM , from page 10
Housing authorities across the country— the
local distributors x)f federal housing assistance —
are reporting sweeping cuts to their Section 8
rolls because of the latest round of binding from
HUD.
Walla Walla County Housing Authority in
Washington is lpoking at cuts to as many as. 150
families on Section 8 because of the lack of
adequate funding for 2009. In Florida, the
Brevard Family of Housing Authorities is
reporting that it might have to cut 200 to 250
families from the Section 8 program because of
thè funding shortfall. For the Raleigh County
Housing Authority in Beckley, W. Và., the number
is 156; about 26 families to be trimmed each
month, starting in July, through the rest of the
year.
The pinch is a $750 million "offset” determined
by Congress when it appropriated the housing ,
assistance program. In the simplest terms, the
offset is a funding gap that Congress intended
local housing authorities to pick up by tapping
into their Net Restricted Reserves (accrued-by
housing authorities in unspent Section 8 funds).
It wouldn’t be a bad idea — recoup money
allocated for Section-8 but never spent. Only in, 3
these times, the money had already been spent
Tony Bazzie, executive director of the Raleigh
County Housing Authority in Beckley, W. Va. sqys,
“There is a serious situation currently facing a
large number of housing authorities in that net
restricted assets, which can be used to cover
increasing HAP (housing assistance program)
costs, are dwindling and will disappear altogether
prior to the end of this calendar year. As a result
my agency and hundreds of others will have nò
choice but to reduce the number of families it
serves because our HAP expenses exceed the
amount of HAP dollars provided monthly by
HUD.... The fact that the voucher renewal
funding formula then requires HUD to use the
new leasing numbers to determine how much
we’llreceive in HAP funding the following year j .
results in a continually downward Spiraling of
families ttfat can be served.” ’ .
Those were Bazzie’s words in his June 4
testimony before the House Financial Services
Subcommittee on Housing and Community
Opportunity, chaired by Rep. Maxine Waters,
D-Calif. The hearings were on the Section 8
Voucher Reform Act, or SEVRA, which Water's
has, reintroduced to correct the funding problems.
For Waters, the situation has reached crisis
levels.
“We can’t wait until people are put on the
street,” Waters told Street Roots. “We’ve got to do
some kind of moratorium, until they can find sòme
discretionary money or find some funding to pay
for their vouchers. We can’t allow them to put
them out on the street.”
TTTaters says her new SEVRA legislation will
ensure that housing authorities have the
money they need to fulfill the program. The
housing authorities have run out of money, she
says, and she lays blame squarely on the previous
administration and its policies that gutted funds "
used for affordable housing, including the voucher
programs. Immediate action, and money, she
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C a l! f o r t i m e s a n d lo c a t i o n s .
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503-280-1611 English • 503-938-6333 Espanoi
says, are needed to correct the situation that the
Section 8 program'is now in’.-
“These people are going to be homeless if they
don’t have the Section 8 voucher support,”
Waters said. “Our bill will provide funding for all
of the 2,400 public housing authorities. We’ll _
make sure they have a reserve account so they
can cope with any unanticipated cost” g§
past when it has applied for these funds. That
does little to offset the $600,000-plus gap NOHA
is experiencing in current voucher obligations,
resulting in the termination of Jennifer and her
family along with 284 recipients in the region.
And the $100 million relief fund is a far cry
from the $750 million Congress offset in HUD’s
housing assistance programs that contributed to
the shortfalls and terminations. It was basically a
$750 million hole for the remainder of 2009 that
y the time Waters’ effort to reform Section 8
runs its course, Jennifer Cherry and her
Congress expected local housing authorities to
family may already be homeless. As of press time, fill. But risihg rent costs, low attrition rates on
people in the program, unemployment and the
they had a week to either fill the gap left by
combined economic malaise raided those coffers
nearly $900 a month in housing subsidies, or find
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some other place to live, which will most likely be many months ago.
Even with the federal relief money, Snell Says
a campground or a trailer park, if they found a
tit will not be until this fall at the earliest before -
trailer. With a herniated disk, Jennifer says her
people’s housing assistance will be restored.
doctor won’t let her work, but as she awaits
“It is a confluence of issues, getting together at
surgery in early July, she is still unable to draw .
disability assistance. Her fiance, Jeff, is recovering the same time,” said Ted Van Dyke, director of
government affairs for the Public Housing
from a collision with a logging truck two years
Authority Directors Association. “We probably
ago but is trying to get on with a flagger crew for
still don’t have an idea on how big this problem is.
work. Their income is $700 a month they receive
The person at HUD called it à perfect storm.”
from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.
So we’vè heard.
This, with three children and a rent payment of ;
nearly $1,000. They have a van, but it won’t hold
hen the news of the NOHA terminations
everyone; they don’t even have a tent. So they’re
reached th e state, the Oregon Housing and
collecting boxes and newspapers and packing up,
Community Services designated $50,000 in
but not without a fight. They’ve called every
homeless service funding to apply toward the
agency they know that might be able to offer
affected families. Thè funds are not being
assistance, and left messaged on congressional
'administered by NOHA, but rather by the regional
switchboards for Sens. Jeff Merkley and Ron
Community Action Team, based in St. Helens,
Wyden and Reps. David Wu and Kurt Schrader.
and its local team members in Clatsop and
“I’ve got a lot of things I’d like to say. But,
Tillamook counties. Legally, the money can only
really, what do you say?” Jennifer says. “Life’s
be used*to help families that have previously been
gotta, go on. There’s not much we can do about it.
homeless. Jim Tierney with CAT says he expects
... I’m waiting to get a letter from somebody
they’ll be able to help only a handful of families
Saying wo can help you for this next month and
with $50,000. He’s hoping for more state relief
give us a little more time.” ;
and a ruling from HUD that will reverse the
rying to buy some of that time is a nationwide decision to apply local reserves to the coming ,
year’s Section 8 vouchers.
group of organizations and advocates,
“I do think it would be a mistake to say HUD
including Street Roots. Dozens of groups have,
signed on to à campaign for emergency assistance owns all of this, but also a mistake to say the
to the families being terminated. Mefkley and Wu housing authority owns all of this. In this
situation, I think a little flexibility in everyone’s
wrote a letter to.HUD calling oh the use of
part to solve this is really a good idea-,” Tierney
contingency funds or other^resources to "address'
said. “The HUD system does not seem to be
the “crisis in Oregon.”
designed to help these small housing authorities
Wyden sent à letter to HUD calling on the
do well. To expect our little housing authority in
agency to “do everything in your power to help
Warrenton to adequately predict what its 1,100
keep these Oregonians in their housés and not
Section 8 households are going to do — that is in
’force them out to the streets.”
fact a system that is not crafted for them to
NOHA and nearly 1,000 other housing
behave responsibly,”
authorities across the country, have applied for
By law, NOHA cannot give out the names of
assistance to the $100 million pot of money
the people sëlected for termination from the
included in HUD’s budget for emergency
Section 8 program, so CAT has had to shotgun
situations — “unforeseen circumstances” such as
letters out to known Section 8 récipients to notify
higher rental costs. That’s nearly half of the
them of the $50,000 in state funds available. The
nation’s 2,400 housing authorities that dispense
deadline for applying for a portion of the money
Section 8 vouchers. Their hopes — and those of
was June 23. Even with that assistance, some
their clients — rest in the hands of MigUel A.
landlords are requiring renters who lost their
Fontanez, HUD’s director of financial
Section 8 to reapply for their unit — something
management for the Section 8 program.
that could disqualify people even if they’ve got
?“At least some relief is coming,” said Fontanez,
the money to pay the rent, Tierney said.
who on the day Street Roots talked to him had,
“It’s another spinoff of this disaster that’s not -
been signing the forms approving additional
obvious on the front end,” Tierney said. “There
funding for troubled housing authorities. The
are going to, be a bunch of losses. The landlords y
money is expected to be distributed within days.
are going to lose money. They’re going to be
“Some relief is going out very soon.”
stiffer about leasing to Section 8 again. There’s a
If all those who applied receive relief, that ,
lot of fallout that just isn’t apparent”
amounts to about $10,000 per housing authority, ,
which is about what NOHA has received in the
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