Jul 31 Housing News- Fed's Raid Section 8 Complex

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Smoke & Mirrors Fog The Unfolding HUD Section 8 Scandal

July 31, 2004

Even though Congress opposed the Bush administrations plans to gut the Section 8 program for FY 2005 due to the backlash of opposition from around the nation, the funding that was restored to the program (On July 22) was shifted from other existing HUD programs that were already in place to assist the elderly and disabled communities. This only created a whole new group of victims and was little more than a bait and switch. Congress needs to fully restore the $2 billion that was granted to HUD for housing needs which was recently shifted to Homeland Security. Stealing the housing resources originally granted to assist the poor, elderly and disabled by shifting those resources to Homeland Security does not make life any safer for the thousands that may lose their housing as a result of the shell game taking place.

As of yet the April 22 HUD announcement that created $100's of millions in funding shortfalls for Section 8 vouchers across the nation has not been resolved, and the negative effects from the shortfalls are still taking place at this moment. A few of the recent HUD created disasters can be read about in the recent stories below about "Section 8 Rent Doubled" or "Housing vouchers in jeopardy" & "Woodbridge extends July housing aid", where a law suit was filed to restore 72 vouchers to Section 8 families of Woodbridge. Many Woodbridge tenants became homeless despite the help that came, but was by then to late...

In the last story down below, the stereotypes of the Section 8 program are still being promoted by those that want you to believe that the failed capitalist system can dig it's way out of the housing crisis it has created by creating housing people no longer can afford.

In another nightmare creeping across the nation, subsidized tenants are being treated like prisoners in concentration camps, while subsidized corporations are being handed the keys to the US Treasury to raid any time they want! The Fed's subdivide American renters between rich and poor! Recently as the Section 8 renters across the nation organized to fight the funding shortfalls that devastateded the Section 8 program, the Fed's appear to be retaliating by stepping up their raids to invade & search the homes of the poor that are involved in the program.

Now that the Fed's have seen how fast Section 8 tenants organized against the HUD/Bush cuts to the program, the dogs have been unleashed to go after them and some of the effects may be seen in the stories "Rents Double For Section 8's" & "Feds Raid Section 8 Complex."

Don't miss the story below about the fascist Federal Agents that raided 50 rental units in San Dimas! "After discovering the apartment complex was fully subsidized by HUD, the team has worked over the past three months with the Office of Inspector General agents visiting the property, gathering intelligence and checking residents for warrants."

Landlords are not the only crooks gouging the Section 8 program for all it's worth, and the story about the embezzeled $400 k tells of an inside job taking place.

Even the non-profit housing organizations have been gouging the Section 8 program. Non-profit's get 0 interest rate loans or very low-interest rate loans through various Fed/State programs for their housing projects meant to create low-income housing that requires them to keep the rents low. They get around the regulations calling for low-rents by later filling up the properties with tenants that have Section 8 vouchers, and then demand that high rents should be payed by the local housing authorities. The tenants still pay low-rents, but the housing authorities get gouged in the process. In some cases, the non-profits actually charge higher rents than the neighboring for-profit landlords do to their tenants because the housing authorities are willing to pay the high rents being charged. The effect is that when non-profits fill their buildings up with tenants that have vouchers from various programs, we actually lose affordable housing originally meant for low-income renters that do not have vouchers to assist them. This has corrupted the system, and enriched the non-profits that become empire builders.

Check it out below for some of the latest in tenant/housing news from across the nation...

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Groups Fight Cuts to Federal Housing Benefits for Seniors  

WASHINGTON — Jewish social-service agencies and advocacy groups are mounting a last-ditch lobbying effort to reverse congressional cuts to a housing program for the elderly that benefits thousands of Jewish seniors.

Click below for full story...

http://www.forward.com/main/article.php?ref=nir200407281003

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To Really Live on the Edge  

Section 8 is supposed to make life affordable for low-income families. But in Hartford, thousands qualify but are stuck on a waiting list. Six-year-old Shakira Collazo never has to worry about waking up alone. Three of her four sisters share her room, packed in a pair of bunkbeds.

Click below for full story...

http://hartfordadvocate.com/gbase/News/content?oid=oid:75867

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Federal Agents Raid Section 8 Complex!

Federal, local authorities check apartments
 
San Gabriel Valley Tribune - Jul 26 1:04 AM
SAN DIMAS -- Morning began a bit differently for residents of Villa San Dimas on July 13, when special agents from the Department of Housing and Urban Development Office of Inspector General and deputies from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department conducted compliance checks at the apartment complex.

Click below for full story...

http://www.sgvtribune.com/Stories/0,1413,205~12220~2294557,00.html

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Section 8 Rents Doubled
July 30, 2004

Housing authority doubles rent for those in voucher program  
Observer-Reporter 
Washington County low-income residents soon will see their rent doubled for federally subsidized Section 8 housing. Meanwhile, the county's housing authority is planning to make a more concentrated effort to determine who is eligible for minimum-rent housing.

Click below for full story...

http://www.observer-reporter.com/286294361412642.bsp

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Housing vouchers in jeopardy
 
Berkshire Eagle - Jul 23 11:43 PM
NORTH ADAMS -- Numerous families served by the North Adams Housing Authority are in jeopardy of losing their federal rent assistance vouchers, and possibly their homes, if an appeal filed by authority officials is denied.

Click below for full story...

http://www.berkshireeagle.com/Stories/0,1413,101~7514~2291690,00.html

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Woodbridge extends July housing aid

Home News Tribune - Jul 20 10:09 PM
WOODBRIDGE: Township housing authority commissioners voted 5-0 Monday night to restore the 72 Section 8 housing vouchers for the month of July that were terminated June 30 -- temporarily averting a lawsuit filed by 14 of the affected families.

Click below for full story...

http://www.thnt.com/thnt/story/0,21282,1008229,00.html

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August, September vouchers renewed
 
Home News Tribune -7/31/04 
WOODBRIDGE: Using a loan from the Woodbridge Affordable Housing Corp., the Woodbridge Housing Authority will restore the housing vouchers for 72 families whose Section 8 vouchers were terminated for August and September.

Click below for full story...

http://www.thnt.com/thnt/story/0,21282,1015982,00.html

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Edison woman charged with embezzling $400K
 
Home News Tribune - Jul 29
PERTH AMBOY: A former Section 8 housing program assistant with the Perth Amboy Housing Authority was arrested yesterday and charged with embezzling more than $400,000 in federal housing subsidies, according to U.S. Attorney Christopher J. Christie.\

Click below for full story...

http://www.thnt.com/thnt/story/0,21282,1015220,00.html

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Section 8 Tenants are not 'Disorganized Poor,' Leader Says

SUNIA ZATERMAN Executive Director Council of Large Public Housing Authorities Washington, D.C.
The New York Sun
July 27, 2004


Howard Husock's antipathy toward poor people,particularly single mothers, is deeply disturbing ["A Better Housing Reform," Opinion, July 22, 2004].

In his article, he turns the current debate over Section 8 housing vouchers into a platform for his particular worldview.

To Mr. Husock, a homeless shelter is "that great school of dependency." Section 8 tenants "are fragmented. There are no husbands, and so there's not as much control over the children."

Mr. Husock describes these same tenants as "the disorganized poor" who "degrade their environment." Single women have babies and feign homelessness in order to get subsidized housing.

With a mix of anecdotes, out-ofcontext numbers, and factual inaccuracies, he manages to disparage everyone associated with public housing, as well as the program itself. But in the real world, things are different.

Sixteen percent of all voucher holders, and 31% of all public housing residents, are elderly.

People with disabilities hold 22% of all Section 8 vouchers and make up 32% of all public housing residents.

Forty-three percent of nonelderly public housing residents obtain their primary source of income from wages; 49% of families with vouchers get their primary income from wages.

Section 8 and public housing play a crucial role in providing assistance to millions of Americans who cannot find affordable housing. Affordable is commonly defined as taking up no more than 30% of household income.

Mr. Husock contends that "with smart zoning laws and building codes" the private market could provide housing for all income levels.

Today, however, a minimum wage worker would have to log 160 hours a week to afford a twobedroom apartment in New York.

It is time to change the premise of the debate and stop arguing about whether or not the government has a role to play in the housing market.

Clearly, it does. America has a strong history of governmentsponsored mortgage systems, of providing tax credits for developers and tax breaks for homeowners.

Subsidized housing is one more example of using federal resources to maintain the housing pipeline. That pipeline is under siege.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has slashed funding for the Family Self-Sufficiency program, which has been successful in helping people find better jobs and move out of public housing.

If the administration's Fiscal Year 2005 budget is approved, it will end the award-winning HOPE VI program, and cut $1.6 billion from Section 8.

Unfortunately, we're already getting a preview of what cuts in housing vouchers will mean: In response to HUD's retroactive budget cuts, waiting lists are being closed; vouchers are being recalled, and rents are going up.

In the end, this is even more disturbing than Mr. Husock's polemics.