Section 8 of the 1937 Housing Act (42 USC Ã,§ 1437f), often called Section 8 , as repeatedly amended, authorizes payments for rental housing to personal property land in the name of about 4.8 million low-income households, in 2008, in the United States. The lion's share of this section is the Preferred Voucher program which pays most of the rent and utility of approximately 2.1 million households. The US Department of Housing and Urban Development manages the Section 8 program.
The Housing Options Coupon Program provides rent-based "tenant" assistance, so tenants can move from one unit to at least the minimum quality of housing to another. It also allows individuals to apply their monthly vouchers to home purchases, with more than $ 17 billion going towards such purchases each year (from ncsha.org analysis). Maximum allowed voucher is $ 2,000 per month.
Section 8 also endorses various "project-based" rental assistance programs, in which the owner reserves some or all of the units in the building for low-income tenants, in exchange for federal government guarantees to make a distinction between the tenant's contribution and the lease in the owner's contract with the government. A tenant leaving a subsidized project will lose access to project-based subsidies.
The US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) have created a program called Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing (VASH), or HUD-VASH, which distributes about 10,000 vouchers per year at a cost of approximately $ 75 million per year for veterans of the US armed forces who are homeless and vulnerable. This program is designed to install HUD-funded vouchers with VA-funded services such as health care, counseling and case management.
Video Section 8 (housing)
Histori
The federal housing assistance program began during the Great Depression. In the 1960s and 1970s, the federal government created a subsidy program to increase the production of low-income housing and to help families pay their rent. In 1965, Rent Housing Program Section 236 amended the US Housing Act. This subsidized program, the predecessor of the modern program, is not a pure housing allowance program. The housing authority selects eligible families from their waiting lists, places them in housing from the main list of available units, and determines the rent to be paid by the tenants. The housing authority will then sign the lease with the private landowner and pay the difference between the rent of the tenant and the market rate for the unit of the same size. In agreements with private landlords, the housing authority agrees to perform the maintenance of the building and the regular leasing function for Section 236 tenants, and annually reviews the renter's income for program eligibility and lease calculations.
The Housing and Urban Development Law of 1970 introduced the federal Experimental Housing Benefit Program (EHAP) and the Community Development Corporation and confirmed greater spending on housing subsidy programs and rented supplements for middle-income households.
In the 1970s, when research showed that the worst housing problems affecting low-income people were no longer sub-standard housing, but the high percentage of income spent on housing, Congress passed the Housing and Community Development Act of 1974, subsequently amending the Law -The US Housing Housing. 1937 to make the Program Part 8. In Part 8 of the Program, the tenants pay about 30 percent of their income for rent, while the rest of the rent is paid with federal money.
Part 8 of the program initially has three subprograms - New Construction, Large Rehabilitation, and an existing Housing Certificate program. The Moderate Rehabilitation Program was added in 1978, the Voucher Program in 1983, and the Project-Based Certificate program in 1991. The number of units that can be subsidized by the local housing authority under the Section 8 program is determined by the funding of the Congress. From the beginning, some parts of 8 programs have been deleted and new ones created, although Congress is constantly renewing existing subsidies.
The 2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act came into force on December 26, 2007, allocating $ 75 million to the HUD-Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing (HUD-VASH) voucher program, authorized under section 8 (o) (19) of United States Housing Act of 1937. This new program combines HUD Housing Choice voucher rental assistance for homeless veterans with case management and clinical support services provided by the Veterans Affairs administration at its own medical center as well as in the community.
Maps Section 8 (housing)
Summary
The main Part 8 program involves a coupon program. Vouchers can be "project-based" - where their use is limited to certain apartment complexes (public housing agents (PHA) can reserve up to 20% of such vouchers) - or "tenant-based", where tenants are free to select private sector units , not limited to any particular complex, and may be anywhere in the United States (including Puerto Rico) where PHA operates the Section 8 program.
Under the voucher program, individuals or families with coupons find and rent out units (either in certain complexes or in the private sector) and pay part of the rent. Most households pay 30% of their income adjusted for Section 8 housing. Adjusted income is total (household) gross income minus deductions for dependents under 18 years of age, full-time students, disabled people, or elderly households, and certain disability assistance and medical expenses.
There is an asset test other than the income earned. In certain amount, HUD will supplement the income even if the tenant Section 8 does not receive interest income from, for example, a bank account. HUD calls this "the calculated income of the asset" and, in the case of a bank account, the HUD sets a standard "Savings Saving Rate" to calculate the income taken into account from the asset. By increasing the total income of the lessee, the amount of income calculated from the asset may affect the lease portion rented by the lessee.
PHA pay the landlord the remainder of the lease. Each year, the federal government sees the rental fees charged to private apartments in different communities, as well as utility costs (heat, electricity, etc.) in the community. The Fair Market Rents (FMRs) are the amount (rent plus utilities) for medium-quality apartments of different sizes in a particular community. For example, the 2012 FMR for 1-bedroom housing in San Francisco is $ 1,522 and in New York is $ 1,280 while in many other places less than $ 500.
The Owner can not impose a Section 8 tenant fee over a reasonable lease and can not receive payments outside the contract.
In addition, landlords, though required to comply with a fair housing law, are not required to participate in the Section 8 program. As a result, some landlords will not accept tenants of Section 8. This may be attributed to several factors such as:
- does not want the government to be involved in their business, such as conducting a full examination of their premises by government workers for HUD Housing Quality (HQS) Standards and the possibility of necessary improvements
- desire to charge unit rental fee above FMR
Depending on state legislation, refusing to rent to a renter solely for the reason that they have Section 8 may be illegal. Landlords can only use public facilities to disqualify tenants (credit, criminal history, evictions in the past, etc.).
However, other landlords are willing to accept tenants of Section 8, because:
- Large pool available from potential tenants (waiting list for new tenants Part 8 is usually very long, see below)
- generally request regular payments from PHA for its share of the lease
- tenant incentives to keep property well (PHA requires renters not to damage rental properties In many cases, tenants may be excluded from the program if they owe money to the owner).
Whether based on vouchers or projects, all subsidized units must meet the HQS, thus ensuring that the family has a healthy and safe place to live. The increase in private ownership of the building owner is an important byproduct of the program, both for each family and for larger community development purposes.
Applicants
Applicants may apply for a Section 8 housing voucher at each district or city administration office in their state, and although the regulations vary according to their respective authorities, in general, residents from certain areas receiving vouchers from the jurisdiction in which they may reside use vouchers anywhere in the country, but non-residents of jurisdiction must stay in jurisdictions that issue vouchers to them for 12 months before they can move to a different area. Also, priority for vouchers is often reserved for those residing in the service area of ​​the housing authority.
In many places, the PHA's waiting list for part 8 vouchers may be thousands of extended families, waiting three to six years to get vouchers is common, and many lists are closed for new applicants. The waiting list is often opened briefly (often for only five days), which can happen as little as once every seven years. Some PHAs use the "lottery" approach, where there are as many as 100,000 applicants for 10,000 places on the waiting list, with places awarded by weighted or non-weight lotteries, with priority sometimes given to locals, disabled people, veterans and people old. There is no guarantee that anyone will receive a place on the waiting list.
Family obligation
Families participating in the program must comply with a set of rules and regulations, often referred to as "family obligations", to maintain their vouchers, including accurately reporting to PHA all changes in household income and family composition so that the amount of their subsidies (and applicable) can be updated. In recent years, the Office of the Inspector General of HUD has spent more time and money to detect and prevent fraud.
Earned Revenue Retained
There is a provision for people with disabilities who have Section 8 subsidized houses to freeze their rent for a certain time if they work part-time under a certain amount of money. This is called Generated Income or Earned Income Income (EID) and set under US 24 CFR 5.617, "Self-reliance incentives for persons with disabilities - Prohibition of annual income increase". This is enforced as part of the Housing Quality and Work Responsibility Act 1998 (QHWRA) (Sec.: 508 (b); 42 USC 1437a (d).) It requires the Public Housing Authority and some owners, in calculating the lease, for a while " ignore "the increased incomes gained when certain residents of certain housing and disabled participants in certain resettlement programs go back to work or work-related programs. The idea is to foster self-reliance for those who are subsidized and disabled and other assistance.
Study
Howard Husock, vice president for policy research at the conservative Manhattan Institute, strongly denounces Section 8 in a 2003 book on housing policy as a vehicle for exporting social problems within the city to the suburbs.
Hanna Rosin, an American journalist, argues that Section 8 has caused crime to become more evenly distributed across the US metropolitan area, with no net decline. This is the core thesis of his article published by The Atlantic in 2008, where he links Section 8 with a wave of crime in the Memphis, Tennessee, metropolitan area. Rosin's article attempts to position Memphis as a particularly troubling example of a national trend: "Still, researchers across the country see the same archetype: projects that descend on inner cities and crime push out, in many cases destabilize city ​​or surrounding area. "Rosin's article is very influential among politicians in the cities who claim to be negatively affected by Section 8, such as Lancaster, California.
Rosin's article was later criticized by Greg Anrig in an article published on The American Prospect. In the article, Anrig accused Rosin of placing a large number of errors on housing policies for the reported increase in crime. This article refers to the fact that Rosin has never made conclusive arguments that those who participate in Section 8 are responsible for higher crime rates, since those who receive housing support are subject to screening based on prior drug use and criminal activity. Rosin instead relies on a hot map of crime created by Richard Janikowski and Phyllis Betts who has reportedly said they are "[...] amazed - and deflated - to see how perfectly two sets of data fit together."
Janikowski and Betts then ruled out any relationship between the housing voucher and the increased crime in the area in a later letter to the editor for the Atlantic. Rosin failed to mention that there was a consistent reduction and increased crime from inner cities to the inner rim margins in most metropolitan areas due to the changing population. Anrig argues that economic factors are more likely to be responsible for an increase in crime in Memphis, as male unemployment almost doubled between 1990 and 2000. Anrig also refers to Moving to Opportunity (MTO), a random policy experiment. The study concluded that there was no increase in violent crime for participants of subsidized housing or their neighborhood in the five tested cities; Memphis is not part of the research. Although the participants were far more likely to live in poorer areas when given the opportunity to leave, the family still received simple academic and psychological benefits. In fact, according to a paper prepared for the US Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Office for Policy and Research Development rather than increasing crime, those who use housing vouchers are more likely to move to areas where crime increases.
See also
- Discrimination in granting Section 8 housing
- Title 24 of the Federal Regulatory Code
- Hills v. Gautreaux (1976) - the US Supreme Court case enforcing the use of article 8 vouchers to improve housing discrimination in site selection.
- Subsidized houses
- Gemeindebau
References
Further reading
- Clark, Krissy, "Puting Out" Not Welcome 'Mat ", The California Report, July 22, 2011
- Fernandez, Manny, "Bias Visible as Landlords Bar Vouchers", The New York Times, October 30, 2007
- HUD, "Section 8 Tenant-Based Housing Assistance: Reconsideration After 30 Years", March 2000.
- Graves, Erin [1] Room for Improvement, Qualitative Meta Analysis of Voucher Program, 2015.
External links
- Housing Voucher Options Office HUD official website
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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