Federal housing funds in doubt

City freezes its voucher program, leaving thousands of families in limbo

The Houston Housing Authority is closing its voucher program to new families through the end of the year amid uncertainty about federal funding, dimming housing prospects for thousands of low-income families.

The freeze announced Wednesday hobbles one of Houston’s largest affordable housing programs and means more than 28,000 families on the voucher waiting list will not be offered a subsidy for at least nine months.

The city agency also plans to revoke vouchers from another 900 families whose chosen homes have yet to pass inspection. The cuts are not expected to impact the roughly 18,000 Houston families whose homes already are subsidized through the Housing Choice Voucher Program.

“It’s awful news,” housing agency President Tory Gunsolley said, adding that he does not know how long the pullback will last.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development ordered the freeze last Friday to help close a projected $9 million shortfall in the local voucher program, which is federally funded.

“Your housing authority is expected to take every possible action to reduce costs,” HUD analyst Karen Schleper wrote in a letter to Gunsolley.

Housing agencies nationwide potentially are facing similar constraints as rents rise — making the voucher program more expensive — and federal funding remains

stagnant.

Congress last year extended funding through Friday at 2016 levels. By continuing to fund the voucher program at that rate through the end of the fiscal year, Congress would leave more than 100,000 vouchers unfunded, 7,210 of them from Texas, according to the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

“People had hoped it would not come to this,” said Madison Sloan, who specializes in fair housing for the advocacy group Texas Appleseed. “In the face of such overwhelming need, this is awful.”

Beyond the families on the Houston Housing Authority’s waiting list, roughly 400,000 lowincome Harris County families were spending more than 30 percent of their earnings on housing as of 2013, according to the most recent federal data, up from 250,000 in 2000.

The voucher program is designed to assist those earning less than 50 percent of the area’s median income — $24,250 for an individual and $34,600 for a family of four.

Families who receive a voucher typically put 30 percent of their earnings toward rent, and the voucher covers the gap, usually about $620 per month in Houston.

The freeze also hinders local efforts to reduce homelessness, as many of those who recently received a voucher were chronically homeless.

Eva Thibaudeau, director of programs for the Coalition for the Homeless of Houston/Harris County, said she no longer expects Houston to be able to meet Mayor Sylvester Turner’s pledge to house 500 chronically homeless people by September.

At most, Thibaudeau said, she thinks the city will be able to house another 100 people, on top of the 100 housed since March.

“We’re devastated,” she said. “It really puts the breaks on the great strides that we had been making.”

Marc Eichenbaum, special assistant to the mayor for homeless initiatives, echoed Thibaudeau.

“The inability to issue vouchers could severely impact the region’s ability to reduce homelessness,” he said.

Gunsolley said the housing authority plans to begin Thursday notifying the 900 families whose vouchers it is rescinding.

Beyond that, he’s waiting on more concrete federal budget news.

“We still don’t know what the target is that we’re shooting for, and yet we’re driving down the road and running the program,” Gunsolley said. “If the budget that comes in winds up being significantly different in one direction or another, that will change our plans.”