BRUNSWICK
In an effort to stabilize its funding stream from the federal government, Brunswick Housing Authority on Thursday submitted its application to switch from public housing to a modified form of the Section 8 program, called Rental Assistance Demonstration.
If approved, the new revenue source won’t bring the local authority more money, but it would make the amount of money it does get more predictable.
BHA Executive Director John Hodge said that would be almost as good, because federal public housing subsidies that are supposed to fund maintenance and improvement of the units are inadequate, declining, and subject to congressional whims.
Section 8 housing contracts — while less lucrative — are more stable, he said.
Amending the plan also would make Brunswick’s 191 units eligible for home improvement loans from private commercial lenders. The authority would be able to use its three properties —
Woodlawn Tower and Terrace, and Perryman Village — as collateral for loans to do much-needed maintenance and modernization.
Despite promises from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development when the facilities were built in the 1960s and ‘70s, funding for their upkeep has been in decline ever since.
There are about 3,200 local housing authorities throughout the United States.
Fiscal Year 2010 appropriated $2.5 billion to maintain them all, but by fiscal year 2013, federal capital-needs funding had dropped to $1.7 billion.
Seventy-seven housing authorities in 24 states and Puerto Rico, representing thousands of housing units, already have applied for the RAD conversion. But the process takes about a year to complete, and there are numerous steps along the way that have to be verified by HUD officials.
“At this point, it’s still an informal application, which HUD could accept or reject,” Hodge said. “But I’m feeling fairly confident that they’ll accept it, and once they do we’ll have 90 days to submit a physical needs assessment that addresses our capital needs both immediately and over the next 20 years, as well.”
BHA also will have to submit a financing plan within 180 days spelling out how it will pay for whatever capital needs are identified by the previous assessment.
“I love the irony,” Hodge said. “We have to submit a financing plan to the agency that made it necessary for us to try to change the funding program, because it didn’t give us enough money to address our needs.
“But what it means is that we’ll go out and get a loan, do the work, and pay off the loan over 20 years.”
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