U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office

Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800

Fax: (202) 512–2250 Mail: Stop SSOP, Washington, DC 20402–0001

35–403 PDF 2007

THE SECTION 8

VOUCHER REFORM ACT

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

HOUSING AND COMMUNITY OPPORTUNITY

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

MARCH 9, 2007

Printed for the use of the Committee on Financial Services

Serial No. 110–11

(

(II)

HOUSE COMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES 

BARNEY FRANK, Massachusetts, Chairman

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York 

LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, Illinois 

NYDIA M. VELA ́ ZQUEZ, New York 

MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina 

GARY L. ACKERMAN, New York 

JULIA CARSON, Indiana 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

DENNIS MOORE, Kansas 

MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts 

RUBE ́ N HINOJOSA, Texas 

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri 

CAROLYN MCCARTHY, New York 

JOE BACA, California 

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts 

BRAD MILLER, North Carolina 

DAVID SCOTT, Georgia 

AL GREEN, Texas 

EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri 

MELISSA L. BEAN, Illinois 

GWEN MOORE, Wisconsin, 

LINCOLN DAVIS, Tennessee 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

PAUL W. HODES, New Hampshire 

KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota 

RON KLEIN, Florida 

TIM MAHONEY, Florida 

CHARLES A. WILSON, Ohio 

ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado 

CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut 

JOE DONNELLY, Indiana 

ROBERT WEXLER, Florida 

JIM MARSHALL, Georgia 

DAN BOREN, Oklahoma 

SPENCER BACHUS, Alabama 

RICHARD H. BAKER, Louisiana 

DEBORAH PRYCE, Ohio 

MICHAEL N. CASTLE, Delaware 

PETER T. KING, New York 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California 

FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma 

RON PAUL, Texas 

PAUL E. GILLMOR, Ohio 

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio 

DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois 

WALTER B. JONES, JR., North Carolina 

JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

GARY G. MILLER, California 

SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia 

TOM FEENEY, Florida 

JEB HENSARLING, Texas 

SCOTT GARRETT, New Jersey 

GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida 

J. GRESHAM BARRETT, South Carolina 

RICK RENZI, Arizona 

JIM GERLACH, Pennsylvania 

STEVAN PEARCE, New Mexico 

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas 

TOM PRICE, Georgia 

GEOFF DAVIS, Kentucky 

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina 

JOHN CAMPBELL, California 

ADAM PUTNAM, Florida 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

MICHELE BACHMANN, Minnesota 

PETER J. ROSKAM, Illinois

JEANNE M. ROSLANOWICK, Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

(III)

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HOUSING AND COMMUNITY OPPORTUNITY

MAXINE WATERS, California, Chairwoman

NYDIA M. VELA ́ ZQUEZ, New York 

JULIA CARSON, Indiana 

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts 

EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri 

AL GREEN, Texas 

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri 

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York 

GWEN MOORE, Wisconsin, 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota 

CHARLES A. WILSON, Ohio 

CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut 

JOE DONNELLY, Indiana 

BARNEY FRANK, Massachusetts 

JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois 

STEVAN PEARCE, New Mexico 

PETER T. KING, New York 

PAUL E. GILLMOR, Ohio 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

GARY G. MILLER, California 

SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia 

SCOTT GARRETT, New Jersey 

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas 

GEOFF DAVIS, Kentucky 

JOHN CAMPBELL, California 

(V)

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hearing held on: 

March 9, 2007 ................................................................................................... 1

Appendix: 

March 9, 2007 ................................................................................................... 61

WITNESSES 

FRIDAY, MARCH 9, 2007

Cabrera, Hon. Orlando J., Assistant Secretary, Public and Indian Housing, 

Department of Housing and Urban Development ............................................. 9

Charlton, Janet S., President, Triton Advisors, Inc., on behalf of The National 

Leased Housing Association, The National Apartment Association, and The 

National Multihousing Council ........................................................................... 50

Crowley, Sheila, President, The National Low Income Housing Coalition ......... 46

Day, John E., President, DuPage Housing Authority and Executive Director, 

Kendall Housing Authority ................................................................................. 35

Godfrey, Richard, Executive Director, Rhode Island Housing, on behalf of 

The National Council of State Housing Agencies .............................................. 37

Hiebert, P. Curtis, Executive Director, Keene, New Hampshire Authority, 

and Vice President for Legislation, The Public Housing Authorities Directors Association .................................................................................................... 32

Ramirez, Saul N., Jr., Executive Director, National Association of Housing 

and Redevelopment Officials (NAHRO) ............................................................. 30

Sard, Barbara, Director of Housing Policy, Center on Budget and Policy 

Priorities ............................................................................................................... 48

Sperling, Andrew, Director of Legislative Advocacy, National Alliance on Mental Illness, on behalf of The Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities Housing Task Force ...................................................................................................... 52

Tegeler, Philip, Executive Director, The Poverty & Race Research Action 

Council .................................................................................................................. 54

Zaterman, Sunia, Executive Director, Council of Large Public Housing Authorities ................................................................................................................. 33

APPENDIX 

Prepared statements: 

Miller, Hon. Gary G. ........................................................................................ 62

Sires, Hon. Albio ............................................................................................... 67

Cabrera, Hon. Orlando J. ................................................................................. 68

Charlton, Janet S. ............................................................................................ 74

Crowley, Sheila ................................................................................................. 80

Day, John E. ..................................................................................................... 86

Godfrey, Richard ............................................................................................... 92

Hiebert, P. Curtis ............................................................................................. 98

Ramirez, Saul N., Jr. ........................................................................................ 107

Sard, Barbara ................................................................................................... 127

Sperling, Andrew .............................................................................................. 143

Tegeler, Philip ................................................................................................... 149

Zaterman, Sunia ............................................................................................... 155

(1)

THE SECTION 8 

VOUCHER REFORM ACT 

Friday, March 9, 2007

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HOUSING AND

COMMUNITY OPPORTUNITY, 

COMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES, 

Washington, D.C. 

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:27 a.m., in room 

2128, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Maxine Waters [chairwoman of the subcommittee] presiding. 

Present: Representatives Waters, Lynch, Cleaver, Green, Clay, 

Sires, Ellison, Murphy; Biggert, Shays, Miller, and Capito. 

Chairwoman WATERS. This hearing of the Subcommittee on 

Housing and Community Opportunity will come to order. 

We are going to allow opening statements for the record, but 

without objection, all of our members’ opening statements will be 

made a part of the record. We are going to allow 10 minutes on 

either side. 

We do not have an indication from our members over here who 

wish to have opening statements, but we will allow 2 minutes each, 

if you wish. 

The Chair will yield herself 5 minutes for an opening statement. 

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I want to thank Chairman 

Frank and Ranking Member Biggert for making sure that this subcommittee hearing was placed on the calendar so early. I also want 

to thank the other members of the subcommittee who are here 

today, given the importance of Section 8 Voucher Reform Act 

issues, and I would like to welcome the new members of the subcommittee. We have not had an opportunity to meet together before. 

We have a few members who were present at the hearing that 

we had in New Orleans, but most of our members have not met 

in subcommittee before. 

As you know, the past several weeks have been busy as the committee sought practical solutions to speed the rebuilding process in 

the Gulf region. 

H.R. 1227, the Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007, which 

the committee passed on Wednesday, is a major step towards assisting the people of the Gulf with their affordable housing needs 

and in rebuilding their lives. 

Today we begin the process of tackling one of the most important 

Federal housing programs in the Nation. 

2

The Section 8 Voucher Program serves some 2 million households. Last year, I was an original cosponsor of the Section 8 

Voucher bill, H.R. 5443, which the committee passed, although the 

House did not take up the measure. 

The Section 8 Voucher Reform Act of 2006 represented the most 

comprehensive reform to the Section 8 Voucher Program that we 

have seen in several years. 

The major provisions of the voucher bill, including targeting, inspections, tenant rents, and move to work, represented a major 

step in the direction of reform. 

I share this with you because I believe that this year we can pass 

the Section 8 Voucher Act using a similar strategy, with bipartisan 

support. 

It is important that we move forward on Section 8 voucher reform if for no other reason than to restore our committee’s legislative responsibility for the program. 

Many important aspects of the program, like the funding formula, have had to be addressed by the appropriators, because we 

did not reauthorize our own program. 

Just a month ago, the funding formula was placed in the continuing resolution, and of course it had not been heard in committee, the subcommittee or the full committee. A program of this 

importance to communities all over the country needs to be thoroughly scrutinized. 

I hope that we can lay the foundation to develop consensus 

around affordable housing programs that work for the Nation’s 

poor, working families with children, and the elderly, as well as the 

disabled. 

We also must include public housing authorities and HUD by 

moving a Section 8 voucher reform once it is introduced. 

The Section 8 Voucher bill addresses a number of provisions that 

are important to me. One is the need to improve the mechanisms 

for inspections of rental units. Most would agree that tenants need 

protections and that these protections should meet current housing 

quality standards. The Voucher Reform Act requires inspections 

every 2 years. 

Any time a unit passes inspections related to another Federal 

program, like the home program, the idea would be to not have to 

inspect the unit as long as it occurred in the preceding 12 months, 

saving time and money and making the rental unit available for occupancy as soon as possible, while protecting the health and welfare of the tenant. 

This would be a major improvement over current practices. 

Another major provision of Section 8 voucher reform is related to 

rent reform and income reviews. Tenants will not pay more than 

30 percent of income for rent. This is essential to ensure that those 

traditionally served by the program will continue to be served. 

We consider incentives for work by allowing income increases of 

less than 10 percent to be disregarded as well as last year’s income. 

We also exempt the income of full-time students attending college in income calculations. PHA’s would also recertify income 

every 3 years where the major resource of income is fixed. 

Another important aspect of Section 8 voucher reform is the 

issue of targeting vouchers to those most in need. Under the bill 

3

passed last year, 75 percent of new vouchers would go to families 

below 30 percent of income. Vouchers would be authorized for the 

next 5 years. 

The bill to be introduced will contain a similar provision. In addition, under current law, medical expenses in excess of 3 percent of 

a tenant’s income for elderly and disabled are deductible for income 

calculations. The Voucher Reform Act will raise the threshold from 

3 percent to 10 percent for the elderly and disabled. 

As you know, the CR we just passed included a measure to 

change the Section 8 funding formula. The CR changed the funding 

formula to base funding in 2007 using the PHA’s most recent 

verifiable 12-month period of voucher spending based on leasing 

and cost data. 

As a result, the actual voucher allocation would occur annually 

instead of being based forever on the 2004 allocation formula. 

I believe that the voucher reform is so essential to our ability to 

assist the poor working families with children and the elderly and 

disabled to have decent, safe, and affordable housing. 

Of course, we would all like to fund a voucher program that supported everyone who needs a voucher, but that is not possible. We 

can make needed improvements to the program while restoring 

faith in the voucher program for the tenants who are in need of affordable housing as well as for our PHA’s. 

I hope that my colleagues will support the Section 8 Voucher Act 

when it is introduced to ensure that these goals are met. 

Part of achieving the goal of voucher reform begins with this 

hearing and the witnesses’ testimony. I hope that the witnesses 

will share their insight on this important issue so that we can 

begin to reform the program. 

At this time, I would like to yield 5 minutes to our ranking member, Congresswoman Biggert, for an opening statement. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Thank you. Thank you, Chairwoman Waters, and 

I want to welcome all of today’s witnesses here, and to thank you, 

Chairwoman Waters, for holding this important hearing to examine 

the Section 8 housing choice voucher program. 

I think that we on the subcommittee are acutely aware of the 

many difficult management and budget challenges inherent in this 

government program. It’s my hope that we can take this opportunity to work together as we contemplate the future of Section 8. 

While homeownership is a desired goal for all Americans, there 

are many in today’s society that are not yet ready to own their own 

home, and we must therefore continue to pursue alternatives to 

make sure that affordable rental housing is available, and we must 

encourage recipients of rental housing assistance to move towards 

self-sufficiency and we must make sure that the assistance is there 

for those who truly need it. 

As you know, the Section 8 housing assistance program is the 

major vehicle for providing rental assistance to low income families 

and individuals, helping over 2 million low income households, elderly, and disabled persons secure affordable housing in the private 

market. 

This program represents the Nation’s largest low income housing 

assistance program and today’s Section 8 program has become the 

largest component of HUD’s budget. 

4

The rising cost of providing rental assistance is due in varying 

degrees to the expansion of the program, the cost of renewing expiring long-term contracts, and rising costs in housing markets 

across the country. 

The day of reckoning is coming fast. If we do not address the increased costs of this program, it will consume the HUD budget. It 

is already affecting the funding of other programs within the department. I trust that we can use today’s hearing to engage in productive discussions and to help us find common sense solutions to 

reforming the Section 8 program. 

Not a day goes by that I don’t talk to a constituent or an organization concerning the problems inherent in this program, such as 

long waiting lists, lack of affordable Section 8 voucher housing, 

lack of local program flexibility, and various PHA funding concerns. 

The longer we wait to address some of these concerns, the greater the risk is, not just to Section 8 but to other HUD programs that 

surely will be cut to pay for it. 

I hope that we can draft language to address some of the funding 

shortfalls that occurred as a result of language placed in the most 

recent continuing resolution. 

Over 1,200 public housing authorities, over half of the PHA’s in 

our Nation, including all of those in the Gulf Stream and all of 

those in my district and at least some in the chairwoman’s district 

will take a hit in fiscal year 2007. The Chicago suburbs are hard 

hit by this new formula. Each housing authority in all three countries in my Congressional district will receive a funding cut this 

year. The housing authority and county will lose $8 million. Jolie 

will lose $1.1 million, Aurora and DuPage will lose over $1 million. 

These are not just dollars. These are families and seniors who 

are being hurt here. With this bill, proposed cuts to Section 8 housing funds, more than 100 families in DuPage County, about 150 in 

Will County, and thousands across this country will be kicked to 

the curb in 2007. 

With that said, my hope is that we will move this bill through 

the committee process. We can make modest changes to the voucher funding formula to provide incentives for agencies to operate in 

an efficient, cost-effective manner while serving the maximum 

number of low income tenants. 

We also should work to modify inspection rules, and to give agencies more flexibility, which will encourage owners to rent to voucher holders and preserve essential tenant protections. 

To reduce burdens on agencies, landlords, and tenants, I would 

support efforts to streamline rent determination and other procedures for the Section 8 program. 

Finally, we should promote local incentives that encourage recipients of rental assistance to move towards self-sufficiency. 

As we seek ways to improve America’s communities and 

strengthen housing opportunities for all citizens, particularly our 

poor, I recognize that the issue of reforming programs like Section 

8 can be contentious. However, politics is the part of the possible, 

and I believe that today’s hearing is a good first step on the road 

to reforming this country’s largest rental assistance program, Section 8. 

5

Again, I welcome all of today’s witnesses and look forward to 

your testimony. 

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I yield back. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

The gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Lynch, is recognized for 

2 minutes for an opening statement. 

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and Ranking Member Biggert, for holding this hearing. I also want to thank all of the 

panelists and the under secretary for attending. 

I have gone down to New Orleans previously on earlier Code Ls. 

I did not make that one. But I have the perspective of a former tenant of HUD housing. I grew up in the Old Colony Housing Projects 

in South Boston with my mom and dad and my five sisters, so I 

have that bias, as a former tenant. 

I must confess also that when I completed law school, I went 

back to the housing projects and represented tenants, my former 

neighbors, as free legal counsel on matters of asbestos and lead 

paid in apartments, people being underhoused. 

And by the way, I think that had a lot to do with me getting 

elected. You never know how many friends you have in this world 

until you start doing free legal work. 

But that being said, I do believe that there’s a real struggle in 

this country about U.S. housing policy, and I think we have greater 

struggles than we had when I was living there because of the huge 

disparity in what is earned by the families in many of our housing 

projects and in Section 8 tenant-based units versus what it might 

cost them to move to private housing. 

I still live—I haven’t moved far—two blocks from the housing 

project that I grew up in, and yet the rents in my area two blocks 

away are a couple of thousand dollars a month, and that’s just beyond the hope and the reach of a lot of families in public housing, 

and we’re going to talk about that hopefully a little bit later on. 

The bottom line here is, I think we can do better. I know we can, 

and we have to, not only in the situation post-Katrina, but also just 

in our general housing policy. 

I respect the people who come here before us today, and I think 

we could benefit from your counsel, and we could use your help, 

and I hope we can work in a constructive way to really recognize 

that the Federal Government does have a rightful place to play in 

national housing policy, and we want to get to that. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you. I yield back. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you very much. 

The gentleman from California, Mr. Miller, is recognized for 2 

minutes for an opening statement. 

Mr. MILLER. Thank you. 

Over the years, Congress has grappled with the issue regarding 

the skyrocketing costs of Section 8 programs, under-used vouchers, 

and the general management of the program. 

The cost of the program is growing so rapidly that HUD’s other 

programs, including public housing, homeless programs, CDBG, 

Hope VI, and many others are suffering as a result. If Section 8 

is to remain viable, we must take steps to reform the program. 

6

During this time of budget constraints, Congress is struggling to 

renew existing vouchers. As we try to reform this program, we 

must remain mindful that it is not feasible for the Federal Government to continue to increase funding for the program without enacting meaningful reforms. 

The Section 8 program must be implemented in a way that is fiscally responsible. With this goal in mind, in the 109th Congress, 

I introduced H.R. 1999, the State and Local Housing Flexibility Act 

of 2005, to help the Section 8 voucher housing program work better 

and remain available to those in need. 

Specifically, this legislation would improve the delivery of housing assistance to families in need by providing flexibility to the 

local public housing authorities, PHA’s, and holding them accountable for results. 

Additionally, the legislation would allow PHA’s to serve as many 

families as possible within their grant amount, rather than being 

held to a specific number of vouchers. 

Rather than H.R. 1999, the committee passed a different bill to 

make changes at the margins of the Section 8 program. While H.R. 

5443 made important improvements to the inspection process and 

income verification process, the bill did not truly address the fundamental weakness in the Section 8 program. 

If we pass a bill this year, let us pass one with true reforms, not 

just one that gives the perception that reform was accomplished. 

We can do much more than merely provide changes on the margins. We should encourage PHA’s to cooperate, and to operate in 

an efficient, cost-effective manner to serve the maximum number 

of low income tenants. 

For example, eligible PHA’s should have a chance to be innovative in their efforts to move families to self-sufficiency. Further, we 

must address the long list of waiting lines for the Section 8 assistance. The average length of time families spend on the waiting list 

for subsidized housing in the United States is more than 2 years. 

In cities like Los Angeles, the waiting list is 10 years. 

I undoubtedly must yield back. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

We’re going to be keeping a very tight schedule today; I know 

people have planes to catch. 

So the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. Cleaver, is recognized for 

2 minutes for an opening statement. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I will forego any 

opening comments and have questions later. 

Thank you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. All right. The Chair will extend additional 

minutes for those members who are present in the room at this 

time. 

We had originally talked about 10 minutes on each side, and if 

the ranking member would like, we could expand the gentleman 

from California’s time— 

Mr. MILLER. May I finish my comments? That would be great. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Yes, you may. 

Mr. MILLER. Thank you, very much. 

Let’s see. I think I know where I’m at. 

7

We should encourage PHA’s to operate in an efficient, cost-effective manner to serve the maximum number of low income tenants. 

For example, eligible PHA’s should have the chance to be innovative in their efforts to move families toward self-sufficiency. 

Further, we must address the long list of those waiting for Section 8 vouchers. The average length of time that families spend on 

the waiting list for subsidized housing in the United States is more 

than 2 years. In cities like Los Angeles, the waiting list is 10 years. 

How can we justify a situation where one person is given unlimited Federal housing assistance while another, who might have 

greater needs, is on the waiting list and forced to fend for themselves for almost 10 years? 

The answer is not to allow this program to continue to grow out 

of control. Rather, we must reform the program so that participants can transition to self-sufficiency within a reasonable period 

of time, giving more families the ability to benefit from our Nation’s temporary helping hand. 

I believe we have worked in a positive, bipartisan manner thus 

far, and I look forward to working with my colleagues on both sides 

of the aisle on a bill that truly reforms the program. 

As we move forward, we must remain mindful that it is not feasible for the Federal Government to continue to increase funding 

for the program without enacting meaningful reforms. With this 

goal in mind, we must seek bipartisan ways to make existing housing programs work better and remain available for those in need. 

I yield back the balance of my time. Thank you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. 

The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Al Green, is recognized for 2 

minutes for an opening statement. 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. And I thank you 

for hosting this hearing. It is important. Once again, you have 

demonstrated your desire to make sure that every person has a 

place to call home. 

Madam Chairwoman, I believe that H.R. 543 is going to prove to 

be a very important piece of legislation. It will change the funding 

formula such that the money divided among housing agencies will 

be fairly divided, such that some will not be shortchanged while 

others are over-compensated. 

It will preserve the income targeting provisions, the 75 percent/

30 percent provisions, but it also will have flexibility such that in 

areas where incomes are unusually low, we will be allowed to use 

the Federal poverty line, which in some cases may cause additional 

families to have opportunities, who are indeed still within poverty 

guidelines. 

It will streamline the inspection requirements and cause more 

landlords to lease. It will expand the existing authority from 30 to 

40 for the moving to work agencies. And it will permit a voucher, 

and this may be most important, to be used for down payment by 

a first-time home buyer. 

We want to give everybody an opportunity to experience the 

American dream of homeownership. 

Madam Chairwoman, I am so honored that you have brought 

this piece of legislation to our attention, and I believe that it will 

8

help many persons who otherwise would not have an opportunity 

to have a place to call home. 

I yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. 

And the gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. Shays, is recognized 

for 2 minutes. 

Mr. SHAYS. Two minutes? Thank you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Yes. 

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

First, let me congratulate you on this opportunity to chair what 

I think is an important committee for Congress, and I know you’re 

going to do a terrific job. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. 

Mr. SHAYS. And I’d like to just say to members that we on this 

side of the aisle have argued for years that we don’t want people 

living in public housing being warehoused, and we’ve argued that 

we should participate in the market, and Section 8 vouchers enable 

you to participate in the market. 

The challenge now is that it has become quite expensive because, 

in a sense, you don’t own the property, and so we’re having to pay 

for inflation, whereas when we used to own public housing, we 

didn’t have to deal with the inflation aspect of housing as much. 

And so it’s just a recognition, I think, on our side of the aisle. 

We have to recognize that costs will continue to go up. 

But our choice was to put people in a place where others might 

live who have income and have resources and have a young child, 

for instance, grow up in a unit that’s not public housing, but in a 

unit where he might see someone, like in the case of where I live, 

go to UBS to work and get in his BMW to drive in to work instead 

of driving to make sales of drugs. 

Bottom line, I believe in Section 8 vouchers. I think we need reform. And I’m happy that we’re looking at this issue. 

Thank you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Sires, 2 minutes. 

Mr. SIRES. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Congratulations for holding this hearing. I’m looking forward to 

working with you on this issue. 

Mr. Assistant Secretary, I am a former mayor, and a former 

speaker of the New Jersey Assembly, and I have to tell you that 

the housing issue, whether it’s Section 8 or any other issue, is probably the number one issue facing people of poor means in American 

today. 

It just seems that they have no place to live. It seems to me that 

we haven’t done anything lately regarding senior housing, or the 

disabled. And reforms are great, and all of these directions are 

great, but only if it leads to more opportunity. It just seems that 

with all of these reforms, we have less and less ability to give people housing. 

Just yesterday I received a call from one of the citizens in my 

district, Jersey City. They have to lay off 34 people because of all 

the cuts. 

9

People talk about drugs and housing. People talk about the insecurity in housing. But yet we cut the funding for all those places 

to make it secure. 

I don’t know whether the intention is to turn it over to the local 

municipality or the State, but that seems to be the direction we’re 

going. In New Jersey, it got so bad that I, as speaker, had to institute our own Section 8 program. 

The cuts here, the decisions here, impact not only New Jersey or 

other States, but the local level. 

So I will urge you, you know, reforms are great, but if we’re 

going to cut the ability for people to have housing, I mean, I am 

not for reform. We have to provide—the Federal Government, in 

my opinion, has a role in providing housing for the most needy and 

seniors. 

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

I yield to the gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. Murphy, 2 minutes, for an opening statement. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

As the sole representative of the second row this morning, it’s a 

great honor to be able to serve on this committee with you, a freshman member. 

Mr. SHAYS. If the gentleman would yield, we’d let him sit in the 

first row over here. 

[Laughter] 

Mr. MURPHY. I’m finding it very comfortable on this row, Mr. 

Shays. 

Madam Chairwoman, coming from Connecticut, we have great 

successes and great challenges in the area of housing policy, and 

it was why I asked to serve with you on this committee. 

We have successes in partnering Section 8 vouchers with social 

services in our support of housing units, and I look forward to a 

conversation about how the Federal Government can help States 

that are doing supporting housing well continue to do that. 

But we have challenges with homeownership. In one of the richest States in the Nation, we have some of the lowest rates of homeownership, and so what I think is so productive about the discussion when it comes to Section 8 reform is the means that we can 

use Section 8 as a pathway to homeownership. That, in Connecticut, would mean so much to many of our low income citizens. 

But more than that, it is an honor to be able to serve on this 

committee, and I look forward to the work that we’ll do on this 

issue and others. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

We will now call our witnesses. 

For the first panel, I think we have one witness, the Honorable 

Orlando J. Cabrera, Assistant Secretary of Public and Indian Housing, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. 

Welcome, Mr. Cabrera. 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE ORLANDO J. CABRERA, ASSISTANT SECRETARY, PUBLIC AND INDIAN HOUSING, DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT 

Mr. CABRERA. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

10

Good morning, Madam Chairwoman, Ranking Member Biggert, 

and members of the committee. Thank you for inviting me to speak 

today. 

I wanted to start by apologizing. I am getting over the flu. I’m 

not contagious, but I might struggle a little bit sometimes with my 

voice, so I’ll take a break from time to time, if it’s okay with you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Excuse me. If I may, we do not have your 

written statement. You will be recognized for 5 minutes, and we’d 

like to have you follow up with a written statement to us. 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes, Madam Chairwoman, we will submit a written statement. I believe I spoke to one of your staff, and I think 

we’ll get that to you within 30 days, if that’s acceptable to you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. 30 days? 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes, please. 

Chairwoman WATERS. I need it before then. 

Mr. CABRERA. Okay. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Could you get it to us in 10 days? 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes, Madam Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. I think that’s sufficient. 

Mr. CABRERA. My name is Orlando Cabrera, and I’m Assistant 

Secretary for Public and Indian Housing at the Department of 

Housing and Urban Development. 

As you know, our portfolio includes a housing choice voucher program, which is the focus of this statement. In recent years, we have 

seen many positive outcomes in the HCV program. Budget based 

allocation of vouchers has provided predictability for public housing 

authorities. 

We have used tools that help us assure that we are serving those 

whom Congress intended to serve. Improper payments have been 

reduced significantly, down to $1.2 billion from $3.5 billion annually, resulting in HUD’s removal from the Government Accountability Office’s high-risk list of government programs. 

But we also see areas that could make the housing choice voucher program even more resilient and vital. We would like to suggest 

that the platform for assuring that vitality is the continued route 

towards simplification and away from regulation. The vast majority 

of public housing authorities are good stewards of Federal funds. 

HUD believes it is good policy to encourage and incentivize that 

good stewardship in the HCV program. 

If the central theme is simplification, then we would suggest that 

this committee, as authorizers, craft and pass language that mirrors the budget based allocation set forth in appropriations law in 

recent years. 

The budget based system works. PHA’s have noted that the predictability of funding has helped them administer their program. It 

allows the PHA’s to maximize the number of families that they can 

help in their communities. 

We would also suggest simplifying rent calculations compared to 

what the current methodology is. The current one-size-fits-all for 

income and rent we suggest should be revisited. It is very costly 

to administer and it encourages the under-reporting of income. 

One stakeholder group has published a chart that could not better illustrate the complex labyrinth that is rent-setting. I’d like to 

11

show that to you momentarily. This is the methodology for rent-setting in Section 8. It is extremely cumbersome. 

Local PHA’s—oh, I’m sorry, and Madam Chairwoman, we’re willing to have more copies of these delivered to the committee for 

their review. 

Local PHA’s— 

Chairwoman WATERS. Without objection, they will be submitted 

for the record. 

Mr. CABRERA. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Local PHA’s know their markets better than we do here in Washington. We should let them use the information they know about 

their communities to better serve the voucher holders they serve. 

We would suggest simplifying the definition of income for purposes of calculation and then give PHA’s a parameter of rent-setting tools, like flat rent, income-tiered rent, rent based upon percentage of income as determined by the PHA, current Housing Act 

rent calculation if the PHA elects, but always providing a safe harbor for the elderly and the disabled. 

Performance standards should be established that can independently verify how well PHA’s are utilizing Federal funds in order to 

assure adequate oversight of PHA’s. 

We would encourage focus on four essential pillars: effective utilization of funds, financial solvency of the PHA, physical condition 

of the units, and timely and accurate financial and data reporting. 

We would ask that you consider deregulating small PHA’s, PHA’s 

with a cumulative total of less than 500 public housing units and/

or vouchers, by allowing them fungibility with both Section 8 and 

Section 9 money. They still would need to meet performance standards and report data. 

Provide those PHA’s statutory relief, and allow them the 

fungibility so they can work those funds to the fullest extent for the 

benefit of their communities. 

Our sense is that there is some support for asset testing, as well. 

We agree that asset testing would be a useful tool to assure that 

Federal funds are going to those who Congress intended to serve. 

We agree that biennial, as opposed to annual, income certifications and unit inspections, would reduce administrative costs and 

be helpful, but would suggest that, with certain exceptions, relying 

on initial and then not conducting subsequent income certifications 

would work well for the elderly and disabled population. 

In conclusion, we would suggest that simplification is the route 

to greater effectiveness of the housing choice voucher program, not 

merely regulation. 

Thank you for your invitation. 

I will be happy to answer any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Assistant Secretary Cabrera can be 

found on page 68 of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. 

The Chair yields herself 5 minutes for questions. 

Mr. Cabrera, as a result of the updated voucher formula for 

2007, and the structure that is contained in this bill, should the bill 

prevent the recapture of pre-2007 program reserves at least 

through 2008, if not permanently? 

12

Mr. CABRERA. I don’t believe that we have proposed the recapture of the undesignated fund balances, and we have no intent of 

proposing the recapture of those undesignated fund balances. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Is the proposed permanent 2 percent reserve level high enough to run the voucher program responsibly? 

Mr. CABRERA. I would answer the question in a different way 

than a fixed number. 

One of the issues is, what’s the appropriate reserve for the agency that is in question? A reserve number for the New York City 

housing authority may not be the one that would apply to a smaller one or a different large city, so I would say that in some cases, 

I’m sure a 2 percent reserve would be fine, but in some cases, you 

may need a greater or a lesser reserve than that. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

That’s all that I have by way of questions, and I would yield to 

the ranking member, Ms. Biggert, 5 minutes for questions. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Thank you. 

The President’s fiscal year 2008 budget proposes to eliminate the 

cap on the number of families each PHA is allowed to assist in 

order to assist at least 180,000 additional families. 

Could you explain the current difficulties with the cap and how 

it affects PHA’s that may have funding reserves but are currently 

unable to spend them? 

Mr. CABRERA. The undesignated fund balance is an amount of 

money that most PHA’s have, 200 out of 2,400, and it is split into 

two parts. 

One is that which is outside of the cap and can still be used, and 

that which is, or might be, within a cap. Every PHA is different. 

There is no uniform rule. And so for those that are now, that have 

hit their cap in terms of the ability to issue more vouchers, by having the cap there, we are impeding them from moving forward and 

leasing more. 

Removing the cap would give them the flexibility to lease more, 

but it would also impose on them, as we would want to impose on 

them, the obligation to be good, responsible financial stewards of 

Federal funds. And so they would be able to determine for themselves to what extent they would lease more beyond that cap. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. But aren’t they the ones that really have been 

good stewards and have gotten, you know, all the vouchers out to 

all those that they can, and so it seems like right now we are penalizing them, and particularly with this continuing resolution, 

where they have lost their funding because they’ve had the reserves while they’re waiting to be able to not have that cap limitation? 

Mr. CABRERA. The cap is impeding the ability of many very good 

performers from reaching further. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Okay. 

Then in recent years, Congress has changed the way that the 

voucher program is funded, moving from a formula that was based 

on the number of units that a PHA was under contract was HUD 

at their current per-unit cost to a dollar-based formula established 

by the number of units under the lease on a given date, adjusted 

by the inflation formula. 

What further improvement could be made? 

13

Mr. CABRERA. The biggest improvement that could be made is 

providing PHA’s with predictability. 

Re-benchmarking every year is going to, I think, impose an enormous burden on PHA’s, and also open some real issues with respect to how vouchers are used and utilized, such that, for example, we may be put in a position where the over/under-payments 

that we have just been taken off the high-risk list for at HUD, that 

that might become an issue again. 

Our suggestion would be that there would be a baseline and 

every 3 years, triennially, the re-benchmarking would be revisited 

based upon that baseline. It would be a periodic thing. 

That way, PHA’s could plan, they could understand, they would 

understand that number is not immutable, it changes with time, 

depending upon what needs might be, and I think it addresses well 

the needs of particular PHA’s. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Does the current draft, does it revert back to a 

unit based formula, then? 

Mr. CABRERA. No, that would be a budget based formula where 

you would be re-benchmarking triennially, every 3 years, is what 

we would probably recommend most strongly. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Okay. Thank you. I yield back. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Okay. Thank you, very much. 

Before yielding to Mr. Lynch, I’d just like to be sure of what you 

said about the reserves or the— 

Mr. CABRERA. Undesignated fund balance? 

Chairwoman WATERS. Yes. 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Did you say that you absolutely support 

PHA’s being able to hold onto their reserves and to spend them— 

Mr. CABRERA. We do. We’ve included that, Madam Chairwoman, 

in our financial audit. 

As I recall, we have a footnote that says that the undesignated 

fund balances belong to the PHA’s. 

Chairwoman WATERS. All right. 

Mr. CABRERA. Now, as a matter of policy, that is what we believe. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Mr. Lynch, 5 minutes. 

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Under Secretary, again, thank you for coming. 

Mr. CABRERA. Mr. Lynch, thank you for the promotion. 

Mr. LYNCH. I’m sorry, Mr. Under Secretary, yes. 

You know, if I listen to my housing tenants in my district—

again, I think I have 22,000 families who are classified as extremely low income, and I have 13,000 who qualify under very low 

income, according to ho HUD standards—they feel, and the advocates for these tenants feel that there’s been a real retrenchment 

over the last 7 years regarding national housing policy, some would 

even say abandonment. 

We’ve seen it in this committee, and you heard from the ranking 

member, who’s talking about the millions of dollars that will not 

be there for folks in her district, as well, who live in public housing. 

14

It just seems that right now, and for the last 7 years, we’ve been 

operating the public housing systems in the United States as housing of last resort, the nowhere-else-to-go housing. 

You have to realize, at least what I see broadly happening here, 

is we have, you know, 46 million people without health care, so 

that at any point, a family could be put in a disastrous, catastrophic situation that would require them to go to housing of last 

resort, or there’s no job security, so we see people constantly being 

tossed out of work and then they have to get on a list for public 

housing, and also there’s no retirement security, no pension security in this country anymore for a lot of people, so we see a lot of 

seniors getting stuck at the end of their working lives. 

And it’s just troubling to see the development of our disinvestment in our public housing projects. 

Again, with those numbers that I talked about with the very low 

and extremely low in my district, I still have the highest private—

well, it’s the third highest in the country—the rental markets, the 

private rental markets. 

So there’s really no other opportunity for them to move into private housing. And yet HUD itself defines affordability as spending 

no more than 30 percent of income on housing, and in my district, 

half of the extremely low income households are paying greater 

than 50 percent, so they’re well beyond what the guidelines would 

be. And 20 percent of the very low income housing are in the same 

boat. 

My first question relates to the average rent burden for these 

voucher holders. Are the numbers we see in my district common to 

those across the country, and what can we do about that? 

And my second question relates to the goal of decentralizing concentrations of poverty. When we have the situation where folks are 

struggling, just like when I lived in the housing projects, folks were 

struggling, it just seems that it builds upon itself, you know, a feeling of some level of despair. The jobs aren’t there. You know, it’s 

just a very difficult situation. 

I have places in my district, Dorchester, Roxbury, the City of 

Brock—those are in Boston but also in Brockton—where 

gentrification and increasing rents are really concentrating people 

in very poor areas. And, you know, at the same time, we have a 

deficit of over 10,000 rental units that are needed for extremely low 

income families. 

I just want to know if you’re doing anything that helps this situation to give families an opportunity to maybe diversify rather than 

being all together and generally in areas where the job opportunities are not there? 

Can we get people out of those developments and give some of 

those families a chance to move out, decrease the pressure in those 

areas, and connect these people with the jobs that will get them 

out of those situations and just ease the suffering in some of these 

developments? 

Mr. CABRERA. First, you need to know something that will illustrate for you why I’m answering this in a particular way. 

I’m from Boston. I grew up in Allston, just west of you. But the 

thing is, we moved to Florida, so I rediscovered R in the alphabet. 

Mr. LYNCH. I have not. 

15

Mr. CABRERA. I know. I noticed that. 

Mr. LYNCH. Sometimes we have an interpreter up here. 

Mr. CABRERA. I still remember. I don’t need interpreters. 

So the next thing is that I grew up near Fidelis Way, so I’m familiar with the stresses of Boston. 

The third thing is that in Allston-Brighton, as you know, as you 

drive up Comm Ave, you have all those brownstones, used to be 

where my friends lived, and they used to be walkups, and they 

used to—I remember when my father, the rent went up from $180 

a month to $200 a month, and I remember him going to our landlord, who lived on the second floor, and they had this pitched—they 

were two very close friends, and they had these pitched battle. 

So— 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

I yield 5 minutes for questioning to the gentleman from California, Mr. Miller. 

Mr. MILLER. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

I just think this program is growing out of control, and it’s not 

efficient, and yet the basic need of reform, we have about 10 million households out there in different need of housing assistance, 

and they’re on a wait list of a minimum of 2 years, in the Los Angeles area 10 years. 

And can we justify a situation where one person is given unlimited Federal housing assistance while another one is put on a wait 

list, who might have a greater need? 

Mr. CABRERA. Well, one of the ways to address that, Congressman, is that—and we’re beginning to explore this—is to start looking at the wait lists and using the tools that we use in order to 

verify income when folks get the voucher, to basically, periodically, 

move folks off the wait list who would not otherwise qualify at that 

point in time, and that would thin out the wait list to assure that 

the people on it actually qualify for the voucher. 

Mr. MILLER. We placed limits on TANIF in 1996. Do you think 

we should impose the same limit requirements on those who receive Section 8 vouchers? 

Mr. CABRERA. I don’t recall the limits on TANIF from 1996, Congressman. I’d like to request your indulgence and ask— 

Mr. MILLER. Do you think we should impose time limits on 

vouchers? 

Mr. CABRERA. Oh, time limits. Oh. 

I think that the PHA’s should have—I understand the question, 

and I apologize—the PHA’s should have the flexibility to decide for 

themselves if they want to impose time limits, yes. 

Mr. MILLER. I thought that when I introduced a bill 2 years ago, 

trying to go in that direction. 

Moving to work, currently we only allow about 32 of the PHA’s 

out of the 3,000 to get involved in the move to work program. 

Could you give us your observation on the move to work program? 

Mr. CABRERA. Moving to work is a program that allows the 

funging, the combination of Section 8 money, housing choice voucher money, and Section 9 money, operating fund and other funds, 

and it gives them the ability to use the whole pool of money to address housing needs in the community in whatever way they really 

want, as long as it’s within the contract of MTW. 

16

So my view of that is, it’s worked for the most part extraordinarily well— 

Mr. MILLER. Are we serving more families on that move to work 

program? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think more families are being served, and I 

think, coming back to your first point, not only that, but we have 

more efficient PHA’s being run. 

Mr. MILLER. In the current system, PHA’s are forced to skip low 

income working families who have been on a waiting list for years 

in order to meet the existing targeting requirements that we face 

out there. 

Do you think Congress should change the current targeting requirements, and if you do, how would we go about doing that? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think that, on the Section 8 side, the targeting 

is 75 percent of vouchers for folks at 30 percent of AMI and below, 

while on the public housing side the target is 40 percent of units 

for folks at 30 percent of AMI and below. 

I think that there—I can certainly understand that certain stakeholders would feel extremely committed to the idea of keeping the 

75 percent number. I do believe it impedes a PHA’s ability to fully 

function. I think giving some flexibility—I’m not saying a set number, but some kind of criteria, maybe a tiered criteria, maybe a set 

of options—would better serve people. 

I think at the end of the day, you’re still serving the same demographic, but you are serving them in a more flexible way. 

One of the reasons that we’re married to this particular demographic is simply the standards set by Congress. The 30 percent of 

AMI is not regulatory, it’s statutory. 

And so therefore, one of the things we should begin talking about 

is maybe it’s not 30, maybe it’s 40 percent of— 

Mr. MILLER. So allowing more flexibility for PHA’s based on their 

local needs— 

Mr. CABRERA. Without question. 

Mr. MILLER.—local determination? 

Mr. CABRERA. Without question. 

Mr. MILLER. Yes. 

Portability. We’ve discussed that in the past, and there’s been 

some debate, because it’s cumbersome for the housing authority. 

Sometimes a housing authority will have a person move to an 

area that really costs them two vouchers, based on the cost of that 

area. 

Do you think Congress should limit portability moves to issues 

such as job, medical, and education, and do you think it should be 

even limited to an area that’s within the same cost range? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think portability is an issue that we need to visit. 

Portability, I think, is as much an issue of the reimbursement as 

it is the fact that there is portability. I think one of the things that 

would be helpful is looking at ways for the PHA that is carrying 

the burden to be more quickly reimbursed for having gone out and 

done the port, but at the end of the day, I would worry about restricting PHA’s too much on portability on the one hand. Certainly, 

having wide open portability or imposing that on PHA’s really is 

putting them in an uncomfortable position. 

Mr. MILLER. But some kind of justification? 

17

Mr. CABRERA. Yes. 

Mr. MILLER. Okay. Thank you. 

I yield back. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Cleaver, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Mr. Cabrera, I was outside. I may have missed. Hopefully, you 

didn’t address this in your opening statement. 

My first question is, do you believe that we are currently operating with sufficient Section 8 certificates? 

Mr. CABRERA. Vouchers, you mean? 

Mr. CLEAVER. Yes. The voucher is certified, so I call them certificates. 

Mr. CABRERA. Congressman, we have proposed the budget that 

we always propose. That is what we believe, is that we are funded 

appropriately for the voucher program, yes. 

The voucher program has increased in funding every year since, 

well, since its inception— 

Mr. CLEAVER. I know, since 1974. 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes. 

Mr. CLEAVER. That’s not my question, though. Let me ask it another way. 

Is HUD satisfied that there are sufficient vouchers to handle the 

people who need housing, the poor who are in need of housing? 

Mr. CABRERA. The President’s budget is $16 billion for fiscal year 

2008, and assuming we remove the caps and assuming that we— 

Mr. CLEAVER. Okay, I’m sorry— 

Mr. CABRERA.—the answer is yes, I think we can do it well. Sure. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Okay. Sometimes I’m not as articulate as I should 

be, so I’ll try it again. 

Is HUD satisfied that there are sufficient dollars available in the 

budget to provide sufficient housing for the poor and that we don’t 

need any additional vouchers? 

Mr. CABRERA. Okay. 

Congressman, respectfully, I have answered the question, and 

with the assumptions that I gave you, that is the answer. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Respectfully, you haven’t. I mean, very respectfully, you haven’t. 

And if you could just say we don’t have sufficient dollars or we 

think— 

Mr. CABRERA. The answer is not a yes or no question. We have 

made a proposal within the concept of appropriation, we have provided the parameters upon which we can expand Section 8— 

Mr. CLEAVER. So you don’t need any additional dollars for vouchers? 

Mr. CABRERA. Assuming that we get the caps removed, the answer is that—we are getting additional dollars for vouchers. Assuming the caps were removed and those things that have been 

proposed are put in place— 

Mr. CLEAVER. Enough to sufficiently house people who need 

them? 

Mr. CABRERA. In accordance with the budget that’s been proposed, yes. 

18

Mr. CLEAVER. Okay. You made up your mind before you left that 

you weren’t going to answer that question, before you left the HUD 

building, so that’s fine. Maybe you’ll answer this one. 

Is there any way we can address the problem that many of us—

I’ve served as a mayor, as well—have to deal with: if we concentrate the Section 8 housing in one area, it’s generally because 

the amount of money for each unit is insufficient to move them into 

other neighborhoods that may be more socio-economically upscale, 

so consequently, we always end up placing the Section 8 certificates in the same neighborhood, because that’s the amount of 

money per voucher that will allow us to secure housing. 

So is there a way that we can actually accomplish the spreading 

out of Section 8 that would be supported by HUD in terms of raising the amount that each voucher is worth? 

Mr. CABRERA. The answer—well, I’m not sure of the question, 

but I’m going to try to answer it. 

Section 8 has two components to it. One is the tenant-based rental assistance program. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Yes. 

Mr. CABRERA. That is a voucher held by a person, and they can 

go anywhere they want. 

So the fact that folks are concentrated or not concentrated is a 

function of whether the landlord will or will not accept the tenantbased rental assistance. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Except that the landlord will not accept a voucher 

in Hollywood, and so therefore everybody lives in another section 

of the community. 

Mr. CABRERA. Right. 

Mr. CLEAVER. And so how do we talk about dispersing the residents all over a community when only one section of the community will have landlords who will accept the voucher? 

Mr. CABRERA. I would say, Congressman, that I don’t—you know, 

the idea that Congress would impose on landlords the obligation to 

accept all vouchers, I think that—that’s what I think you’re saying, 

and I’m not so sure that— 

Mr. CLEAVER. That’s not what I said. I said what can HUD do? 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. 

Shays. 

Mr. SHAYS. I’d be happy to yield a second. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Thank you so much. Well, a little more than a second, but I did want to clarify just one thing about the questioning 

before. 

I was talking about the draft legislation, not what is currently 

being done on the unit versus the budget. 

And as you mentioned, the appropriators have made changes to 

the Section 8 program that moves us from the unit based to a 

budget based program. 

But I think that HUD, and you have indicated that you have a 

concern about the draft proposal that we’re working on that takes 

us back to the unit based pricing. 

Can you explain your concerns and how you think that this draft 

proposal does that, takes us back to the unit-based? 

19

Mr. CABRERA. The draft proposal— 

Mr. SHAYS. In 20 seconds. 

Mr. CABRERA. In 20 seconds, the draft proposal does go back to 

a unit based system. 

It basically says every year you fill out and add to the number, 

the dollar number, the units that are out. That’s a huge difference 

from where we are right now. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Okay. 

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. 

When you were in dialogue with Mr. Lynch, you guys started to 

wax eloquent about Massachusetts, and that happens all the time, 

and you never answered his question. 

But it was—I’m being serious. 

Mr. CABRERA. I can continue if you’d like. 

Mr. SHAYS. No. I want to know afterwards, the rest of the story. 

Mr. CABRERA. Sure. 

Mr. SHAYS. But what I would like to know now is, the bottom 

line is, and this is a serious problem, aside from the fact that Section 8 consumes so much of HUD’s budget, we’re really finding a 

lot of families who are having to pay more than 30 percent. 

I’d like a short answer to the question, are you trying to identify 

towns where this is a common practice, where they’re simply, you 

know, seeing that happen, number one, and number two, if you 

are, are you trying to identify the tenants? 

Mr. CABRERA. Where someone is paying more than 30 percent of 

their income? 

Mr. SHAYS. Yes. 

Mr. CABRERA. No, there is no current effort that I know of where 

we are undertaking some survey of who’s inside or outside the 

band of affordability. 

And that would happen by market. That’s—that is—that’s a very 

different issue than— 

Mr. SHAYS. Okay. 

But the issue is that some tenants are ending up paying, and I’d 

like to know if this is endemic in certain parts of the country, and 

if it’s the practice of the housing authority that’s allowing this to 

happen. 

Secondly, another concern I have is that it’s my understanding 

that in some cities they’re really not paying the fair market rate, 

they’re really pushing the landlords to much lower, and I guess we 

should say that’s good if they get a good deal. 

Is that a case that’s happening? 

Mr. CABRERA. In most cities, the problem is that the way the fair 

market rents are being—this is one of the things I was trying to 

say earlier. 

The way fair market rent is calculated now, it is essentially a 

data collection, and it’s 2 years old. 

Mr. SHAYS. Okay. Let me leave it with that. 

Mr. CABRERA. And it’s 2 years behind the times. 

Mr. SHAYS. Okay. 

The last point, the GAO removed from high-risk series the FHA 

and the rental property. Len Wolfson didn’t ask me to ask this 

question, but it seems to me you should be congratulated, so let’s 

assume he did his job and asked me to ask that question. 

20

Mr. CABRERA. Thank you, Congressman. 

Mr. SHAYS. And by the way, he does a great job for you. 

Mr. CABRERA. Thank you, very much. 

Mr. SHAYS. So tell me about it, about being removed. 

Was it a long effort? Do you want to talk about it, or are you 

just— 

Mr. CABRERA. It was an effort of years and countless people who 

did wonderful work at HUD, and absolutely had nothing to do with 

me, and I couldn’t be more proud of them. They did a terrific job. 

Mr. SHAYS. Great. Ms. Biggert, would you like any more of my 

time? 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Thank you, Mr. Shays, I would. 

I still am concerned about this issue. 

Could you explain your concerns about going back to the unit 

base? 

Mr. CABRERA. In broader than 20 seconds? 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Yes. 

Mr. CABRERA. The unit based system will, it’s not a geometric 

progression, but it’s a much faster progression if you do a unit 

based system, because there are issues of how vouchers are issued 

annually. 

So you will have a situation where there is no regulator, not in 

a legal perspective, but in a financial one, on what or how vouchers 

are issued, and if there is one, there isn’t a very solid one. 

This is what the problem was before. That’s where you saw the 

very much more vertical increase in Section 8 budgeting. 

With budget based Section 8, with that, what you had was a situation where PHA’s were given money based on a baseline with an 

annual adjustment factor, with a couple of other factors, and they 

were told, ‘‘Here is your budget, serve the folks that you need to 

serve within your budget.’’ 

So one of the things that they were also told there, though, regrettably, in my view, is that, ‘‘Oh, incidentally, we’re going to cap 

a portion of this. We’re going to cap your undesignated fund balances and you can’t exceed the issuance of vouchers if you hit that 

cap.’’ 

And if that’s removed, I think it gives quite a bit of leeway for 

particular PHA’s to move forward and house more people. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Green of Texas, 5 minutes. 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Sir, thank you for appearing today. 

Mr. CABRERA. Thank you. 

Mr. GREEN. Under your formula, would any agencies receive a 

cut? 

Mr. CABRERA. Under the appropriation formula? 

The issue is not cut or increase in terms of a cut. The issue is 

the distribution of money going to various PHA’s, depending upon 

how their vouchers were utilized. 

Mr. GREEN. Would any agency receive less than the previous 

year? 

Mr. CABRERA. Congressman, the answer is yes. 

21

Mr. GREEN. And would you kindly give some indication as to how 

your proposal would address first-time homeowners using vouchers 

as a down payment? 

Mr. CABRERA. We don’t have a proposal, Congressman, but in 

SEVRA, first of all, Section 8 has been used for homeowner assistance for the last 5 years, 10 years, so once the commitment is 

made, they have 10 years worth of Section 8 vouchers which they 

can use to redeem mortgage payments. 

This codifies that policy, as I recall, that was previously in an appropriations act. 

Mr. GREEN. With reference to persons who are in exceedingly low 

income areas, how do you propose addressing persons who are in 

these very low income areas, and because they are making—they 

are using 30 percent of their local median income, you still would 

miss persons who are working full-time and may be below the poverty line. 

How would you address those persons? 

Mr. CABRERA. The 30 percent of income is a statutory thing. 

That is, the purpose of Section 8 is to defray the cost between 

fair market rent and what the person can pay. 

So that’s just part of how the voucher works. 

Mr. GREEN. With reference to the Federal poverty line, do you 

see a means by which that can be incorporated? 

Mr. CABRERA. The poverty line, I saw that language in the Act, 

and I thought, ‘‘I need to think more about that,’’ and I’m happy 

to answer that question later, but it’s a relatively new proposal, 

and I’m trying to figure out in my head, which is going to take me 

a little bit, what the implication of that is. 

And if you’ll indulge me, I’m happy to talk about that or respond 

to you in writing as to what the effect of that would be. 

Mr. GREEN. Please, if you would. 

Mr. CABRERA. I’ll be happy to. 

Mr. GREEN. Madam Chairwoman, I’ll yield back. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Ms. Capito. 

Ms. CAPITO. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Five minutes. 

I will yield time to the ranking member, if she still has additional questions. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Thank you, very much. 

I just have one quick question, and then I’ll yield back to the 

gentlelady. 

Re-benchmarking every year, and I think you’ve talked about 3 

years, is there any middle ground, or could you— 

Mr. CABRERA. Two? 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Well, that would be one, two, three, but do you 

think that is enough time? 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes. No, I think re-benchmarking every 3 years 

would work. 

Re-benching annually I think, and I’m not presuming to speak on 

behalf of those organizations that represent PHA’s, but my sense 

of life is that they will tell you that would, to a large degree, create 

some rather significant stress in the PHA community. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Thank you. I yield back. 

22

Ms. CAPITO. Thank you. 

I’d like to ask a couple of questions. 

We hear a lot about the waiting list and the length of the waiting 

list, and the immovability of the waiting list. 

What kind of measures is HUD doing or helping to assist with 

the PHA’s to move or weave through these waiting lists to make 

sure that they’re verifiable, that they’re still active, and that they 

are an accurate representation of those who are still in need? 

Mr. CABRERA. Congresswoman, the waiting lists are very static, 

and what we’re trying to do now is use a tool that we use when 

the voucher is administered to verify income, to assure that the 

voucher holder is within the income bandwidth on the waiting list 

to make sure that periodically the waiting list is checked, to assure 

that people who are on the waiting list still qualify for vouchers. 

Ms. CAPITO. I have another two areas of concern with housing in 

general and some Section 8 issues. 

One involves the elderly. I mean, I represent West Virginia, and 

we have one of the most elderly populations in the country. 

And we have a real challenge finding the ability for our elderly 

to find sufficient housing that’s not only affordable, but is safe and 

accessible for the elderly. 

What kind of initiatives are, either through this program or 

other programs, are you pursuing in a rural kind of setting? 

Mr. CABRERA. Vouchers for the elderly are under a different section, Section 811, but at the end of the day, elders are a huge component of all vouchers. 

Frankly, we’ve just undertaken those things that Congress has 

told us to do with respect to housing the elderly using vouchers. 

One of the things we did do is to try to consolidate the effort between HHS, Health and Human Services, and us, to make us more 

like a one-stop shop, so that we can port all of these services together. 

One of the issues with elders is services, and so we’re making 

pretty significant efforts in trying to package that or create that 

package. 

Ms. CAPITO. Okay. My final question is on the substandard quality of some housing that is either, (a), uninhabitable, or is being 

lived in and still doesn’t meet up to your biennial or annual inspections. 

I think we learned during the Katrina hearings that, I can’t remember the exact percent, Madam Chairwoman, but it was very 

high, a lot of the units that were not being—that were uninhabitable, and I think we’re having that across the country. 

What’s the solution to that? I mean, you know, we talked about 

one-on-one replacement, we talked about, in this new bill, we’ve 

talked about biennial inspections instead of annual inspections. 

What’s your perception of that? 

Mr. CABRERA. In the case of New Orleans, most of that issue 

with respect to housing quality, as I recall the testimony, was with 

respect to the public housing units. This is on Section 8. 

So really, when we talk about Section 8, we’re talking about the 

private market, and there the housing quality inspection is actually 

pretty good. 

The issue, though, is twofold. 

23

Number one, funding inspections is key, and that is something 

that we would encourage. 

The second thing, though, is uniformity of inspection. 

Very often, what winds up happening is that if we do have inspections, we find things that are just, not just—it’s not that 

they’re innocuous, it’s that they’re inapplicable to a housing setting. 

The best example I can give you—this is someone who recently 

spoke to me; this happened 4 days ago. 

There was a landlord, and they were very brave. They said, ‘‘I 

have a unit. I take the Section 8 voucher. You need to know the 

ceiling fan was off of the ceiling, the electrical box door was torn 

off, an outside outlet had live exposed wire, and the inspector cited 

me for not having 6 inches of caulking on my kitchen window, but 

nothing else.’’ 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentlelady’s time has expired. Thank 

you. 

Mr. Clay of Missouri, 5 minutes. 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Welcome to the subcommittee, Mr. Cabrera. 

Mr. CABRERA. Thank you. 

Mr. CLAY. You know, the Section 8 Voucher Act will eliminate 

some of the stranglehold that the Administration put on the Section 8 program in 2004. 

The program will return to funding a set number of vouchers 

rather than providing a lump sum that mostly resulted in drastically decreasing the numbers of vouchers funded. 

This Act will target vouchers to extremely low income families, 

increase tenant protections, and have quality inspections of both 

rental and privately owned assisted housing. 

And the proposal does much more than this. I say that because 

I represent St. Louis, and we are finding a disproportionate percentage of privately owned assisted housing contaminated with 

lead paint. 

When housing is inspected, I wanted to know, does HUD inspect 

for the presence of lead contamination in the home, and still allow 

tenants to move into the units? 

And as you are aware, lead is a very serious health hazard, especially to children. 

Just what is HUD’s policy in regard to that when they find lead 

present in a unit? 

Mr. CABRERA. Congressman, I’m going to ask that you let me ask 

my staff. I don’t know whether on the sheets, the checklist that 

they use for inspections, lead is on there. 

May I be excused for just a minute? 

Mr. CLAY. Sure. Sure. Please. 

Mr. CABRERA. HUD does not require it on the checklist. The 

landlords are required to check for lead on their properties, particularly when the property is older than 1978. 

I think there’s a disclosure, as I recall, in most leases. There is 

a provision, though, where if a child has an elevated, I don’t know 

what the standard is, but an elevated level of lead, then they have 

to be moved out of the unit. 

Mr. CLAY. I see. And as you are aware, a lot of the local communities have lead ordinances which require inspection. 

24

I would really love to see HUD put in place some kind of coordination with those local communities or States in order to protect 

these young children who inevitably are exposed to lead. 

I would really, really like to hear more on that from your agency. 

Let me ask you about a question that Representative Green also 

asked, about homeownership. Has there been any movement or decision by your agency to increase the number of tenants who are 

actually using their Section 8 vouchers for mortgage down payment 

or to pay that mortgage? 

I heard you say earlier that right now there are about 5,000 

homeowners nationally. Are there any plans to expand on that program? 

Mr. CABRERA. That program exists now, and to the extent that 

it can be fully utilized, we’re great proponents of homeownership. 

We will continue to keep promoting homeownership. 

Mr. CLAY. Okay. And so you would be willing to— 

Mr. CABRERA. I would be willing— 

Mr. CLAY.—look at another opportunity, another— 

Mr. CABRERA. The issue with the Section 8 voucher and homeownership is simple. 

It’s fitting the value of the property that someone might be able 

to buy and anything else they can get in terms of trying to buy that 

property and the voucher. That’s a financing issue. 

But wherever the opportunity comes up, we’re happy to promote 

it. 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you for that response. 

What has been your agency’s overall reaction to this proposed 

law? 

Mr. CABRERA. Well, it’s much of what I noted in my opening 

statement, Congressman. 

It’s basically that we believe we should stay on a budget based 

system. We believe that the issue is simplification more than anything else. We believe that PHA’s are good stewards of their 

money, and that they know their markets better than we know 

their markets, and so therefore, we need some rent flexibility and 

some flexibility with respect to how income is certified. 

We believe that with all of those tools, I think everybody wants 

just a better business model, and that’s what we’re proposing, is a 

better business model to get and to serve more people. 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you for your response. 

I yield back. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Sires from New Jersey. 

Mr. SIRES. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Mr. Assistant Secretary, do you have a breakdown of the people 

who get Section 8—say seniors, veterans—do you have any, of the 

total? 

Mr. CABRERA. Congressman, every quarter, we report to Congress on exactly what that breakdown is. We’re happy to provide 

you a copy of that. 

Mr. SIRES. Would you? 

I guess I am looking for a way to make the Section 8 program 

more senior friendly, more disabled friendly, and more veteran 

friendly. We’re obviously going to get more veterans. What recVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:33 Jun 13, 2007 Jkt 035403 PO 00000 Frm 00030 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\35403.TXT HFIN PsN: TERRIE
25

ommendations would you give this body that would make that possible, in your eyes? 

I know that Section 8 is broad, and I saw the formula that you 

put up. I can see it from here. 

But what recommendations would you give us to make it more 

friendly for those folks? 

Mr. CABRERA. For the veterans? 

Mr. SIRES. Veterans, seniors, and disabled. 

Mr. CABRERA. I think on the elderly side, what I noted earlier, 

about packaging things in a particular way is important, and this 

also would apply to folks who are disabled. 

The issues, housing folks who are elderly and housing folks who 

are disabled, are similar in many ways, mostly have to do with not 

just the housing but the services package that comes with it. 

So trying to coordinate what is done with someone who is a 

voucher holder with all of the other things that they might receive 

I think has value. I think it would work well. 

For example, someone who is elderly, they typically are receiving 

Social Security, up to a certain amount, or they’re getting Medicare 

help, and there’s a package of services that they’re getting. 

And coordinating that with the unit that they’re in, so that the 

unit, for example, lends itself to the services that they might need 

is something that has value, and we’re working, and we’ve been 

working on, for quite a while. 

On the veterans’ side, we—yesterday we opened the—this is a 

broader issue, but we’ve just started a housing locator 2 weeks ago 

at HUD, and so we’re opening the housing locator to all veterans, 

period. 

That means when they come home, they can look for a place to 

live if they need one, and the locator will provide whether or not 

it’s a Section 8, it’s a landlord that accepts Section 8 or if it’s a public housing unit or if it’s just a market unit. 

Beyond that, the issue on Section 8 is a budget based issue, so 

a lot of that would probably need to be worked within the concept 

of the budget of Section 8. 

Mr. SIRES. Do you recommend that, if you’re a veteran or a senior, that it be weighted a little more than the rest of the components of the formula? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think as a senior, you’re getting vouchers under 

a different program already, so that’s a given. 

VASH is the program for homeless veterans, and it’s a pilot program, and it’s been around since 1991, so that’s a discrete program. 

My sense of life is that there would be considerable stress 

about—from a lot of quarters—about the fact that there are a lot 

of families who need housing. 

I’m not sure that—I think when issues, in terms of vouchers or 

anything else, start falling into areas of set-aside, that people tend 

to react pretty strongly. 

Mr. SIRES. Thank you. 

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Mr. Murphy of Connecticut. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

26

I wanted to return for a moment to the subject that Mr. Lynch 

and Mr. Shays, I believe, brought up, although I was out of the 

room when you may have answered his questions, and it’s obviously a parochial concern that you understand, being originally 

from Massachusetts and Connecticut. 

Obviously, we have one of the highest costs of living in the Nation, but we also have some of the greatest disparities of wealth. 

We have some very poor people living in our cities with some relatively—some very high housing costs where we have, as Mr. 

Lynch said, people paying 50 percent of their income in housing. 

And I guess I want to understand, when you talk about flexibility 

for PHA’s in trying to maybe deal with some of the nuances geographically, that sounds to me, coming from Connecticut, as a 

means to spread, to have a PHA spread vouchers out to fewer people, maybe understanding that the amount they need might be 

more, so that fewer people might end up getting served in Connecticut and more people might get served somewhere else. 

And so I guess my question is, as we’re trying to address the sort 

of higher cost of living areas, is it a matter of just giving flexibility 

to PHA’s or is this a matter of increasing the sort of end strength 

of the money that we put into the program? 

Mr. CABRERA. No, I think it’s a matter of the flexibility in the 

PHA’s. 

I don’t think that it follows that it would be fewer people at all. 

I think one of the issues that is faced by most PHA’s is that they 

administer. The cost of administering the whole income certification process, the whole rent-setting process is enormous for them. 

And I think on the one hand—I mean that from an administrative perspective. 

I really wasn’t addressing that issue. I was trying to say, for 

PHA’s, first of all, PHA’s know far better and can tell you more 

acutely what their economics are than we can. 

The fair market rent standards that are used for the payment 

standard in the Section 8 program are 2 years behind today. That’s 

the way it’s designed, statutorily. They know their markets more 

recently, they know the data in their markets more recently than 

that. 

And so what we’re trying to say is, let them use the data locally 

that they have to set these standards. I’m not saying don’t look at 

them. I’m just saying give them the flexibility to use an alternative 

set of data in order to make these calls. 

And in terms of income certification, currently what we have is 

income with any number of deductions and additions and things 

that affect income in so many different ways, in so many permutations, one way on one day, one way on another. Trying to simplify 

what that is would be enormously helpful to PHA’s. 

So most of the issue I was really addressing was the administration of the housing choice voucher program by PHA’s. 

Mr. MURPHY. And for a moment, I just want to turn to the issue 

of supportive housing, which is a major topic in Connecticut. We’re 

beginning to do it very well, to try to partner some essentially 

State-funded social programs with some federally funded social programs with Section 8 vouchers. 

27

And this is maybe by means of just educating me on what our 

Federal Government is doing to help partner with States’ efforts to 

try to put together Section 8 vouchers with some critical social 

services that hopefully are eventually going to lead, be part and 

parcel of our effort to move towards homeownership, move towards 

some type of income growth for these individuals, to just talk for 

a moment about what the Federal Government may be able to do 

to help a State like Connecticut on supportive housing issues. 

Mr. CABRERA. Again, just reiterating what I noted earlier, we’re 

very much in agreement that, to the extent—so much of that has 

to do with accessibility to the overall menu of subsidy available to 

a person. 

And so one of the things that we’ve been focused on is trying to 

create a spate of options for someone who needs supportive housing, whomever they might be, so they don’t have to go to the various windows, that you go to one place. 

And that is the single biggest effort that we’re taking in that regard. 

Mr. MURPHY. And that would be within that voucher? 

Mr. CABRERA. It would be within the entire spate of—no, not 

within the voucher. It would be within the—remember, these are 

different subsidies, so it can’t be within the voucher. 

But to coordinate, for example, with HHS or with any other component out there that is the provider of that service, that’s really—

it’s an issue of essentially everybody integrating with one an other 

in order to make sure that whomever the recipient is of the subsidy, they’re getting what they should be getting, they’re getting 

what is offered to them, and they’re aware of it. That’s a big issue, 

is awareness. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Ellison for 5 minutes. 

Mr. ELLISON. Madam Chairwoman, thank you. 

Thank you for coming today. I just have a few questions, but I 

don’t have much time. 

Currently, the policy of HUD with regard to verifying whether or 

not the units have lead in them is such that HUD relies on landlords to find out whether there’s the presence of lead; is that correct? 

Mr. CABRERA. That’s Federal law, yes. 

Mr. ELLISON. Yes. Well, let me ask you this. 

Given that landlords sometimes—you know, the Federal Government can’t really adequately know whether landlords are doing 

this all the time, and given the high risk and the serious danger 

lead presents to developing children, what are your views on 

whether HUD should have a role on verifying whether there’s presence of lead in the units, in Section 8 units? 

Mr. CABRERA. The—first of all, all the lead issues at HUD are 

in another office. I’ll answer your question, nonetheless. But that 

isn’t within PIH. 

We essentially will do what Congress tells us to do. At the end 

of the day, the Act itself says that the landlord has that responsibility. 

28

Mr. ELLISON. Yes, I’m aware of that. And the way I framed the 

question to you was not what does the Act say. 

Mr. CABRERA. Right. 

Mr. ELLISON. I told you what I understood it to say. 

Mr. CABRERA. Right. 

Mr. ELLISON. I’m asking you your views on protecting children, 

and between the landlord and HUD, you know, what’s your view 

on the relative power to make sure that we have lead-safe homes 

for those kids? 

Mr. CABRERA. There are limits to what HUD can do because of 

the Act, and so therefore, that’s why I’m answering in that particular way. 

Mr. ELLISON. Yes, but I am asking you in terms of looking toward the future and protecting children, as a professional at HUD, 

what are your views on the relative ability between the landlord 

and HUD to make sure we have kids in a lead-safe environment? 

Mr. CABRERA. Congressman, I’m happy to have that conversation 

with you some other time, but right now, I really can’t, not because 

of any other reason, than I really, I haven’t really thought about 

it. 

Mr. ELLISON. Okay. You know, that’s a fair answer. 

Mr. CABRERA. It’s not that I haven’t thought about lead generally. I have concerns about lead. 

But I’m talking about thought in the context of Federal laws— 

Mr. ELLISON. I appreciate you saying that you haven’t thought 

about it. That’s a fair answer. Because, I mean, I’m— 

Mr. CABRERA. It’s not that I’ve thought less. 

Mr. ELLISON. Right. 

Mr. CABRERA. It’s that I’m happy to think with you on it, but I’d 

have to go back, look at where we are in terms of the Federal law, 

give you an idea from a policy position, which at this point in 

time— 

Mr. ELLISON. Yes. Well, let me just tell you— 

Mr. CABRERA.—very difficult for me to do. 

Mr. ELLISON.—I’m presently thinking about what we can do to 

protect kids from toxic substances like lead. 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes. 

Mr. ELLISON. I’m trying to think creatively on what more we 

could do, since it is so detrimental to our children, and I just 

thought, as a person in your position, you might have some 

thoughts you could share. 

Mr. CABRERA. And I would be happy to have those thoughts with 

you, if you’d like to meet— 

Mr. ELLISON. Well, I’m here. Could you share with us now? 

Mr. CABRERA. As I said, I can’t do that right now. I’d have to actually think about it first. 

Mr. ELLISON. Okay. Well, we’ll get together on that. 

Mr. CABRERA. That would be great. 

Mr. ELLISON. My next question has to do with the adequacy of 

the Section 8 program. 

I know that in Minneapolis, where I’m from, you know, we have 

long waiting lists. 

What are your views on the adequacy of the program to fulfill 

the housing needs of people around the country? 

29

Mr. CABRERA. The waiting list issue, we—actually, I had an earlier question on this. 

One of the things we’d like to do is to provide greater tools to—

waiting lists are very static. We’d like to provide tools that would 

give the public housing authority the ability to monitor that waiting list periodically. 

So one of the issues that I think we would come up with there 

is to get a better idea of who is on the waiting list, how long, and 

whether they even qualify for the voucher at certain points in time. 

The second issue on waiting lists has to do with essentially what 

each PHA wants. 

Waiting lists really are developed according to the local prerogative of that PHA, so it’s largely administered by them. 

Mr. ELLISON. Do you recommend that we just have more Section 

8 vouchers to sort of reduce these waiting lists? 

Mr. CABRERA. No, not in the way that you’ve just framed the 

question, I would not. We are pretty committed to a budget-based 

system, because it works. 

Mr. ELLISON. Yes, but I mean, isn’t the real issue housing people? 

Mr. CABRERA. The real issue is running an effective program 

using Federal dollars to house as many people as you can within 

a budget. 

Mr. ELLISON. Yes, but the real issue, the reason the program exists, is because there are people who are without housing who need 

it, right? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think issues can be framed in a variety of ways. 

That would be the way I would frame this issue. 

Mr. ELLISON. So in terms of me asking you is the number of Section 8 vouchers adequate to meet the housing needs of poor Americans, you’re just not willing to say yes or no? 

Mr. CABRERA. No, actually, I answered earlier, given the budget 

that we proposed in 2008, assuming— 

Mr. ELLISON. But without regard to the budget, without regard 

to the budget— 

Mr. CABRERA. Oh, just generally? 

Mr. ELLISON. Yes. 

Mr. CABRERA. No, I think it is adequate. 

Mr. ELLISON. You think it is adequate? 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes. 

Mr. ELLISON. Okay. 

Let me ask you this. One of the things about our public housing 

in Minneapolis again is that just maintenance, the ability to maintain and keep the property up. 

Have you thought about whether or not the HUD appropriation 

to help public housing meets just the physical plant needs of public 

housing is adequate? 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired, and I 

would like to ask the gentleman if it is okay for him to respond to 

you in writing on that last question. 

Mr. ELLISON. Certainly, Madam Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. Certainly, you will do that, 

Mr. Assistant Secretary. 

Mr. CABRERA. I will be happy to do it, Madam Chairwoman. 

30

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

With that, we have completed the first panel. 

We would like to thank you, Mr. Cabrera, for being here today, 

and we look forward to getting your written testimony for the 

record. 

Mr. CABRERA. Absolutely. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and 

members of the committee. 

Chairwoman WATERS. I will call up the second panel. Thank you 

very much. 

For our second panel, we have: Mr. Saul Ramirez, executive director of the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment 

Officials; Mr. Curt Hiebert, executive director, Keene, New Hampshire Authority, on behalf of the Public Housing Authorities Directors Association; Ms. Suniz Zaterman, executive director, Council of 

Large Public Housing Authorities; Mr. John E. Day, president, 

DuPage Housing Authority; and Mr. Richard Godfrey, executive director, Rhode Island Housing. 

Welcome. Let us get a proper introduction for Mr. Day from our 

ranking member. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

I just wanted to welcome Mr. John Day to the committee. He’s 

traveled to Washington from the windy city, Chicago, and he is a 

housing leader in my southwest suburban Congressional district, 

and for over 2 decades has helped thousands of my constituents 

and thousands of others throughout Illinois secure safe and affordable housing. 

He’s the president of the DuPage Housing Authority in the district and he’s served in this capacity since 1995. He’s also executive 

director of another nearby housing authority, Kendall County 

Housing Authority, and he sits on the legislative board of the Public Housing Authorities Directors Association, PHADA, where he 

has served for 2 years. 

In addition, he has worked for the Illinois Housing Development 

Authority and was involved in the administration of low income 

housing tax credit programs, and he is a past president of the 

Northern Illinois Council of Housing Authorities, and NAHRO, the 

Illinois Chapter. 

I’m delighted that he is here today. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. 

Without objection, your written statements will be made a part 

of the record. You will each be recognized for a 5-minute summary 

of your testimony. 

With that, we will start with Mr. Ramirez for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF SAUL N. RAMIREZ, JR., EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF HOUSING AND REDEVELOPMENT OFFICIALS (NAHRO) 

Mr. RAMIREZ. Thank you very much, Madam Chairwoman, Ranking Member Biggert, and the rest of the members of the committee. 

We appreciate the opportunity to be here, and on behalf of the 

22,000 agency and individual members that NAHRO represents, 

many of them agencies since 1933, as one of the Nation’s oldest 

and largest not-for-profits representing officials that operate and 

31

produce affordable housing the redevelopment, it is indeed our 

pleasure to be here and speak to these comments. 

I will keep my comments even shorter than the 5 minutes to 

move the discussion along, to say that we appreciate it being entered into the record in its entirety. 

We’re here to express our support for SEVRA. 

It does several things that are important for stabilizing a program that for the last 3 years was thrown into a series of gyrations 

that have caused an imbalance of funding amongst agencies, some 

getting more than they can spend, others getting less than they 

need in order to meet the needs that they have out there. 

We also believe that instituting this 12-month formula as it was 

under the House Resolution 20, that it does stabilize the program 

further. 

At this time, unfortunately, HUD has not put this into effect yet, 

and is still funding in many ways under the current, and the 

former amounts that were there before. We have seen as a result 

of the current funding formula that still has not transitioned itself 

to what was authorized by Congress a loss of over 150,000 vouchers 

as a result of this imbalance that was created with this formula. 

We also believe that SEVRA, under its—under what’s being proposed does create an adequate way of reallocating resources for 

housing agencies. It allows with the reintroduction of maximized 

leasing the opportunity for agencies to be able to meet their demands. 

It further addresses the challenges of administering the program 

and allows agencies to be able to not just deal with the day-to-day 

challenges but also deal with very specific challenges within their 

communities, such as the hard to house and others, that was eliminated through appropriations in prior years. 

It does go forward to creating additional rent simplicity and 

allow for household recertifications that are much more effective 

for our operations as providers of affordable housing. 

It also creates additional flexibility in housing, and quality inspections. 

And as to the effective date of this law, should it move forward, 

we would recommend that if we were able to get this going and get 

it through, that it take effect January 1st of 2008 in its entirety. 

There are other topics in SEVRA that we have addressed in our 

written testimony, such as the additional reforms that HUD can do 

now. It’s great to hear that they still want to create additional reforms, but yet to date, 7 years later, many of them have not been 

put into effect, which they could have. We’ve submitted those for 

the record as well. 

We look forward to getting that done as soon as possible, to create greater flexibility. 

The moving to work program. We appreciate that SEVRA has addressed it. Our priorities are to take care of those that are existing 

now, to make this a permanent legislation through those that are 

existing, and work to expand it to create greater flexibility for 

those who want to pursue it. 

And finally, on public housing reform, we have some additional 

recommendations that we’ve made to help improve SEVRA that we 

would hope that the committee would take into consideration as we 

32

move forward, and finally say that our goal here is not just to 

maintain the program, but to work on building the program to 

allow for additional housing program to occur in our Nation, one 

that is sorely lacking, as there are more people in our Nation now 

who need housing than ever before and are not being met by these 

challenges. 

And with that, Madam Chairwoman, again, thank you for having 

the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials 

here before you, and I will be pleased to answer any questions you 

may have for me. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Ramirez can be found on page 

107 of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Mr. Curt, is that Hiebert of Hiebert? 

Mr. HIEBERT. Yes, it is, Madam Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Mr. Hiebert, executive director, Keene, 

New Hampshire Authority. 

STATEMENT OF P. CURTIS HIEBERT, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

KEENE, NEW HAMPSHIRE AUTHORITY, AND VICE PRESIDENT FOR LEGISLATION, THE PUBLIC HOUSING AUTHORITIES DIRECTORS ASSOCIATION 

Mr. HIEBERT. Chairwoman Waters, Ranking Member Biggert, 

and committee members, my name is Curt Hiebert. 

And I congratulate you. It took my wife 6 months to get my 

name correct. 

I’m executive director of the Keene— 

Mr. SHAYS. Before or after you were married, sir? 

[Laughter] 

Mr. HIEBERT. We were only on a first-name basis before we were 

married. 

[Laughter] 

Mr. HIEBERT. I’m executive director of the Keene Housing Authority in Keene, New Hampshire, and also vice president of 

PHADA, which is the Public Housing Authorities Directors Association, and I’m here to speak on behalf of the PHADA members. 

Our association was founded in 1979 and represents over 1,800 

housing authority chief administrative officers. 

We’re grateful that this subcommittee is interested in pursuing 

this bill. It is a wonderful reform initiative that started during the 

last Congress and remains a matter that all of us are interested 

in. 

The draft bill language that PHADA has reviewed reflects significant improvements over the bill reported last year, and in general, we support the legislation. 

We’re especially pleased with the treatment of assets, the treatment of base housing allowance income, and other provisions, including the Section 8 inspections provisions, the simplification of 

the medical deduction, elimination of imputed income from assets, 

and the other things are very attractive changes. 

There are a couple of items which we have some concerns about 

and would be glad to work with the committee to seek to rectify 

them. One of them is the effect of the rent reforms on public housVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:33 Jun 13, 2007 Jkt 035403 PO 00000 Frm 00038 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\35403.TXT HFIN PsN: TERRIE
33

ing. We did some analysis of figures coming back from the Office—

the Budget Office, and did an analysis and an estimation that 

these could potentially cause between $100- to $200 million loss of 

revenue to public housing authorities, so we think this bears some 

extra scrutiny and would be glad to work with you on that. 

Another thing that we would like to see that was not in the draft 

is what was retained in the bill last year, which was the moving 

to work, and I would like to echo some of the things that were said 

by Mr. Ramirez. 

We would like to see the permanence of the program. We would 

like to see it expanded. We would like to see an evaluation portion 

put into that to be able to analyze some of the things that have 

been done very innovatively by some housing authorities. 

I’m speaking on a non-biased basis, having been an MTW agency 

since 1999. 

But we would like to see this not continue to be such an exclusive club with just less than 1 percent of the housing authorities 

involved with the flexibility that’s enabled by moving to work, but 

instead increased, and would be glad to work with you on that language, as well. 

We also, PHADA supports the Section 8 provisions that return 

the program’s funding allocation system to a unit and cost basis 

with provisions for modest reserves, allowances that help agencies 

recover utilization loss since 2003, and help agencies absorb local 

housing market availability. 

I’ll be glad to answer any questions that you may have, and 

again, PHADA is glad to support the efforts of this subcommittee 

in working on this bill. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hiebert can be found on page 98 

of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Now, I must ask Ms. Zaterman, is it Sunia or Sunia? 

Ms. ZATERMAN. It’s neither. It’s Sunia. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Sunia. 

Ms. ZATERMAN. Even simpler. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Ms. Zaterman, executive director of the 

Council of Large Public Housing Authorities. 

STATEMENT OF SUNIA ZATERMAN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

COUNCIL OF LARGE PUBLIC HOUSING AUTHORITIES 

Ms. ZATERMAN. Yes. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, Ranking 

Member Biggert, and members of the subcommittee. 

My name is Sunia Zaterman, and I’m the executive director of 

the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities. We’d like to thank 

you for the opportunity to present CLPHA’s views on the SEVRA 

bill. CLPHA represents 60 of the large public housing authorities 

in the country, and on any given day, our members are serving 

more than a million households. They manage almost half of the 

Nation’s public housing stock and administer 30 percent of the Section 8 housing assistance program, and we estimate there are likely to be another million households waiting behind those households trying to get in. 

We welcome this new Congress and your renewed emphasis on 

the central importance of preserving, protecting, and expanding afVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:33 Jun 13, 2007 Jkt 035403 PO 00000 Frm 00039 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\35403.TXT HFIN PsN: TERRIE
34

fordable housing opportunities. Public housing authorities are facing unprecedented budget and program challenges, primarily the 

issue of inadequate resources. 

Over the past 6 years, we have lived with the implementation of 

Administration policies and funding levels that are essentially 

death by a thousand cuts, forcing housing authorities to struggle 

to keep their doors open while continuing to serve community 

needs. 

Despite a very difficult budget and regulatory environment over 

the past 6 years, housing authorities such as Boston, Atlanta, the 

District of Columbia, and a long list of others, have utilized tools 

like Hope VI and the moving to work program to greatly improve 

their public housing infrastructure and the delivery and administration of local housing programs. 

We believe SEVRA marks a significant step forward in simplifying the administration and funding of the Section 8 voucher program. We support the provisions requiring inspections every 2 

years and allowing authorities to rely on other governmental inspections. We welcome administrative changes to rent-setting and 

income determination, making it easier, without impacting funding 

levels. 

Given that public housing is currently operating at an historic 

low of 83 percent of operating need, and the Administration proposes in their fiscal year 2008 funding to fund public housing at 

80 percent of operating need, we are very concerned that these rent 

simplification provisions could lead to further reductions in operating funds and could have the unintended effect of serving fewer 

families. 

We appreciate that these concerns have been taken into account 

and understand that the bill’s costs are significantly lower than the 

CBO’s estimates from last year. 

We remain committed to working with the subcommittee to realize rent simplification without exacerbating the chronic underfunding of public housing programs. We are pleased that the subcommittee has introduced a formula that will be more accurate by 

using leasing and cost data from the preceding calendar year, 

thereby removing a 2-year lag in funding. 

We must move back to a unit-based funding system. The bill indicates that unspent voucher funds will be recaptured on December 

31, 2007. CLPHA recommends delaying the recapture of unspent 

voucher funds until the end of calendar year 2008. 

HUD has yet to tell PHA’s how much money they will receive 

under a new 12-month formula, and PHA’s are very concerned 

about implementing aggressive lease-up plans without knowing 

how much money will be available to cover new voucher obligations. 

A 1-year delay would give PHA’s enough time to increase leasing, 

spend down fund balances, and align their programs to the new 

formula, and ultimately serve more low income families. 

CLPHA strongly endorses the subcommittee’s inclusion of a 1-

month reserve for the first year of the formula. An adequate and 

stable reserve allows housing authorities to mitigate and protect 

against funding risks in a program that is driven by a number of 

market factors completely outside the control of the PHA. 

35

We strongly encourage the subcommittee to allow PHA’s to maintain a 1-month reserve during each year of the program. For a program of this size and scale, a 1-week reserve is simply too small. 

While the bill does not yet include—the revised bill does not yet include a moving to work section, we are hopeful that the final 

version of the bill will include a provision to permanently authorize 

and expand the program. 

MTW is our laboratory for innovation, and more PHA’s should 

have access to these tools. A review of the current MTW sites 

shows that they have raised the standard of housing services, used 

program flexibility to create jobs, added affordable housing stock, 

served more households, and helped families build savings. 

They have also shown that they can operate and manage in a 

way that’s accountable without needless and time-consuming HUD 

bureaucratic measures that add costs but add no value. 

The concerns about tenant protections, targeting and rigorous 

evaluation, should be addressed in the MTW provision. That is why 

we have submitted suggested language to address these concerns. 

Thank you very much for the opportunity to testify and we look 

forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Zaterman can be found on page 

155 of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Mr. John E. Day. 

STATEMENT OF JOHN E. DAY, PRESIDENT, DuPAGE HOUSING 

AUTHORITY AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, KENDALL HOUSING AUTHORITY 

Mr. DAY. Chairwoman Waters, Ranking Member Biggert, and 

members of the committee, I would like to thank you for this opportunity to address you today. 

And thank you, Mrs. Biggert, for the wonderful introduction you 

gave me. 

My name is John Day. I’m president of the DuPage Housing Authority, the DHA, and also the executive director of the Kendall 

Housing Authority, the KHA. Both of these are suburban Chicago 

countywide housing authorities which administer only a housing 

choice voucher program. 

Currently, due to portability, the DHA is administering about 

2,900 vouchers while Kendall is at 200. The authorized cap for 

DuPage is 2,571 and 160 for the KHA. 

Among various programs that we participate in are family selfsufficiency, homeownership, development and preservation of affordable housing, and an employment program through a business 

incubator in our offices. 

Overall, the proposed legislation has many positive items for a 

PHA and I support its passage. 

There are a few areas I would like to discuss further. 

In terms of operations, there are some very positive things with 

respect to inspections, being able to pay for units that had failures 

of non-life-threatening reasons will allow a PHA greater flexibility 

in helping to minimize the disruption of voucher holders’ lives. 

Some even end up having to rent two units while the repairs are 

being performed, and only one unit can be subsidized at a time. 

36

This last year, the DHA performed nearly 4,500 inspections. 

1,146 of those failed due to non-life-threatening violations. 242 of 

those were new move-ins whose lives were disrupted. This can also 

be used as a tool to recruit new landlords. 

As for biennial inspections, last year 65 percent of the DuPage 

Housing Authority units passed on their first time. Our inspection 

staff knows who the good landlords are and who are the ones who 

need more work. 

There’s also a check and balance with respect to administrative 

reviews on this, so I believe this is very helpful. 

As for income reviews, last year interim recertifications was a 

substantial part of what we had to do. We did over 2,000, almost 

half of our total income reviews. The majority of these were for reductions. This will significantly reduce the paperwork that is involved that we have to deal with. 

About 42 percent of our households are on a fixed income. The 

vast majority are either elderly or disabled. 

By having reviews of their income once every 3 years, the net result will be reduction of administrative responsibilities, about a 14 

percent saving in staff, overall staff time. 

I keep mentioning administrative relief to PHA’s. There is concern in the public housing industry, in talking to others in the 

field, that if you reduce some of the efforts we have to make, 

there’s the possibility there will be a reduction in fees to follow. 

I would say that if we free up staff time, as I hope this legislation will, it will allow us to do other efforts and initiatives that we 

wish to do, those being working more on portability and also increasing our outreach to landlords. 

The DHA is one of those housing authorities that will lose money 

because of the continuing resolution. We have unspent balances 

which we would like to do. However, before we can do this, we need 

to know that we can go over our cap. We have people on a waiting 

list, we’re pulling names off a waiting list constantly. We want to 

use our funds up, but the question is, can we go over that cap? 

The last item I’d like to talk about is portability. 

Mrs. Biggert will join me in saying DuPage County is a desirable 

place to live. Since 2003, we’ve had people port into DuPage County with their vouchers from 38 other States and from 30 other 

housing authorities within Illinois. Just last year, we had 509 total 

ports into DuPage County, while we had 188 porting outs. 

To put it in perspective, about one out of every five voucher users 

in DuPage and Kendall Counties are ports from another county. 

Now, as I understand, there’s a proposed amendment which 

would require absorbing all incoming portable vouchers. The problem we have with this is, because, as you can see from the large 

number of ports in we have, we would never pull anyone from our 

waiting list, and I don’t think that’s fair to the residents of DuPage 

County, just continuing having the ports. 

Now, if a PHA absorbs incoming portable vouchers and receives 

funding for those new voucher holders in next year’s allocation, I 

think this solution, or this problem would be overcome. 

In closing, I ask for your consideration of one additional item. 

37

When the legislation is approved, and I’m optimistic about that, 

please leave the program alone for 3 years so PHA’s can truly 

make it work. I am confident you will be pleased with the results. 

I would also like to extend my appreciation to Arthur Donner, 

who is sitting behind me, the chairman of the DuPage Housing Authority Board of Commissioners, for joining me today. 

Thank you again for this opportunity, and I’ll be glad to address 

any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Day can be found on page 86 of 

the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Mr. Richard Godfrey, Rhode Island Housing. 

STATEMENT OF RICHARD GODFREY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

RHODE ISLAND HOUSING, ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL 

COUNCIL OF STATE HOUSING AGENCIES 

Mr. GODFREY. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and Ranking 

Member Biggert. 

I also want to thank you, Madam Chairwoman, for joining 

NCSHA at our town hall meeting earlier this week to talk about 

housing issues, and also for meeting with my counterpart from 

California, Terry Parker, and our executive director, Barbara 

Thompson, so that we can explore housing reform going forward. 

I also had the opportunity this week to speak to my two Congressmen, Congressman Kennedy and Congressman Langevin, and 

they are extremely supportive of the efforts that you are taking 

and the direction of this bill. 

I also yesterday spoke with the heads of our two largest public 

housing authorities, Providence and Newport, and they are very 

supportive of the direction of this bill. 

I have submitted detailed testimony that addresses the direction 

of the Act, but I do want to address a couple of questions which 

were raised today by various Congressmen. 

And with all due respect to my good friend, Orlando Cabrera, I 

can tell you that there are not enough vouchers in America today, 

and going to a budget based formula instead of a unit based formula has reduced the number of vouchers in Rhode Island by 20 

percent over the past 2 years. 

There have also been some questions raised about the validity of 

waiting lists. Well, we opened our waiting list 3 years ago, and the 

last time we did that was 10 years ago, and 10 years ago people 

camped out for 5 nights just to get on the waiting list for a voucher. 

Three years ago, we thought we had a better system. We had an 

open application period and then we moved to a stratified lottery 

where we pre-screened the residents and then drew a lottery, so 

our least fortunate wouldn’t have to get in line. 

Notwithstanding that new system, people camped out again, because they were so desperate for a unit. And when all was said and 

done, people who applied are having to wait 10 years for a voucher. 

And I spoke to the people who were on line, and there were 

young women with children, there were grandparents, and it’s very 

hard to tell them, ‘‘You know, you need housing today, but the earliest I can get to you is 10 years from now.’’ 

38

And unfortunately, immediately after we went through that 

waiting list system, you went to a budget based formula. That 

budget based formula pushed that waiting list from 10 years to 15 

years. 

So the people I took onto the list in 2005 are going to have to 

wait until 2019 before they can get a housing unit. Those women 

with children, those children will be grown, and those grandmothers will not likely be with us anymore. 

We then talk about moving to work. Well, you need a place to 

move to. In Rhode Island, we have people who are living in shelters 

and going to work. The average wage earner in Rhode Island earns 

$10 an hour. If you work 40 hours a week at $10 an hour, you 

would have to pay 60 percent of your income for the average rent 

in Rhode Island. 

HUD’s formula, they call it fair market, but it is neither fair nor 

market. We need flexibility, but for too long, flexibility has meant 

there’s nothing left to cut, and we can’t have that anymore. 

We need flexibility, but we also have to have new programs, new 

programs to have an affordably housed America, so that when I 

walk the waiting lines and I talk to people, I don’t have to say, 

‘‘Gee, I’d love to help you, but it has to be 2019.’’ 

Madam Chairwoman, I want to thank you and I want to thank 

Chairman Frank for moving so quickly in bringing a new vitality 

and hope to housing in America. 

For too long, we have been on the defensive, and we’ve had cuts 

and hurtful regulations. 

But in speaking to my delegation this week and in speaking to 

my counterparts across the country, there is a new hope. 

It’s been a long, cold winter in Washington, and I’m not just referring to the weather. There is a warm breeze coming. I hope it 

blooms into housing for all Americans. 

Thank you, very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Godfrey can be found on page 92 

of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you very, very much. 

I will yield to myself 5 minutes for questioning. 

Let me just say to all of the panelists, I was talking with some 

of the staff back here about unit base versus what you guys are all 

complaining about, and I’m going to pay special attention. 

They tell me we have something of a hybrid that is being proposed in the bill. 

Everybody is shaking their heads like, ‘‘Well, tell me about this 

hybrid that I don’t really, really understand at this point,’’ that I’m 

going to pay very special attention to. 

Let me start with Mr. Ramirez. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. In brief, the formula that’s being proposed in 

SEVRA goes a long way to rectifying a simply dollar based program 

where you’re really capped at a dollar amount and unable to reach 

the number of families that you could with those dollars. 

And again, the current distribution formula has shown to prove, 

or the one that was in effect for the last year has shown to prove 

to be very ineffective and creating a substantial imbalance. 

SEVRA goes a long way to recalibrating and establishing with 

this 12-month view a fair distribution of those dollars, still senVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:33 Jun 13, 2007 Jkt 035403 PO 00000 Frm 00044 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\35403.TXT HFIN PsN: TERRIE
39

sitive to the budget, but recognizing that we’re trying to reach 

more families to serve. 

Chairwoman WATERS. But am I to understand that’s not good 

enough? 

Mr. RAMIREZ. Well, certainly it does not go as far as the legislation prior to it being amended several years ago, which was a completely unit based system that allowed for full funding on those 

bases, but it does go a long way to bringing some stability and also 

maintaining some rigor on the funding side. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. 

Ms. Zaterman. 

Ms. ZATERMAN. I just want to add, prior to 2004, when we moved 

to what was essentially a snapshot formula, housing authorities 

had a contract with HUD. It identified how many vouchers they 

had. 

And they understood that within the fair market rent and payment standard constraints, that every one of those vouchers would 

be funded, and at that time, housing authorities were utilizing 97 

percent of those vouchers, meaning 97 percent of that allocation 

was out on the street being used by housing authorities and households who were eligible. 

Currently, we have an average of 90 percent utilization. 

In 2004, Congress said, ‘‘You have a snapshot. We’re going to 

look at a 3-month period of what you were leasing in this 3-month 

period and your funding is based on that amount. 

‘‘Regardless of who’s on your waiting list and what you need in 

your community, you are only going to get this amount of money. 

You decide how many households you are going to serve.’’ 

What this does is move us back to more accurate leasing data instead of a very isolated short period of time, but it does not get us 

all the way back to a unit based system that says the Federal Government has said, ‘‘You can serve X number of households in your 

communities and we will provide the funding in order to do that,’’ 

and that is really our goal. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Got it. All right. 

Mr. Godfrey, it has been implied that your waiting lists may not 

be really what you think they are, that there are people on the 

waiting lists, names that you have, who are perhaps not eligible, 

you need more income verification, perhaps they have dropped off, 

and they don’t require your assistance anymore. 

How good are your waiting lists? 

Mr. GODFREY. How good can a waiting list be if it’s 7 years old? 

And that’s part of the problem. 

When we talk about years on the waiting list, that takes into account all of the checking that comes down the line. 

In fact, that actually understates the length of time, because as 

a person moves to the top of that waiting list, we start the screening early for eligibility, so that means we sift off those who are no 

longer income-eligible. 

But what the 10-year waiting list means, or the 15-year waiting 

list means is, if you’re on the bottom of that list, it’s going to take 

you 10 years to find an apartment. 

So yes, there are a lot of people on there who, when the time 

comes, may or may not have been qualified 7 years ago, but it 

40

takes 10 years to get from the bottom of the list to even being considered for an apartment, and then the tragedy is, because of the 

FMR’s in Rhode Island, it takes that person 6 to 9 months, and 

we’ve been having people turn them back because they can’t find 

a landlord who will take the voucher at the FMR. It’s just too low. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Ms. Biggert. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Mr. Day, what would it mean if you, with the HUD budget calling for removing the voucher cap so that the unspent balances can 

be used for the vouchers that you have above the cap, but right 

now, we have the CR, which is really going to take away that pool 

of money that you have reserved for those people that are capped 

so that you can’t give them out? 

Mr. DAY. Yes. I’m sorry, the— 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Could you explain how this policy, number one, 

without removing the cap, will help you better anticipate costs and 

improve services, but also what does it mean with the CR now that 

has said that that money has to be returned? 

Mr. DAY. The CR calls for us to return approximately $950,000. 

That’s equating to between 100 and 110 vouchers less we will be 

able to help people 

We won’t necessarily have to put people out in the street, but 

what it means is it’s going to be longer for people coming off of our 

waiting list because we don’t have that pool of funds. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. How many people do you have on the waiting list? 

Mr. DAY. Right now, approximately 1,100, but we have not taken 

names on our waiting list since 2002. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. 2002? 

Mr. DAY. Yes. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. So that means that those people that you could 

serve if the cap were limited right now, you would be able to give 

them the vouchers, but you can’t do that, and then the pool of 

money will be gone. 

How long would it then take you to get back a reserve to be able 

to—or you’d have to increase your numbers then to get the funding 

for 2008? 

Mr. DAY. My estimation is close to a year. 

We have a turnover in our program of approximately 1 percent 

a month. In addition, something I’ll add, something I was notified 

of yesterday, and it was not discussed earlier, on absorption of 

portability. 

I was notified yesterday that a neighboring housing authority absorbed 78 of our ports. We now have to make up those numbers, 

also, and I have to do that, in our position, also losing additional 

money, so I’m kind of getting it from both sides. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Okay. 

How about the moving to work housing, would you like to be included in that? 

Mr. DAY. I’d like to be the first person in line. Thank you. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Okay. 

And why aren’t you now? Is it because it’s a smaller public housing, or just that there were so many, just so many housing authorities that could be in it? 

41

Mr. DAY. Initially, and Mr. Hiebert can better answer that, because he is one, I believe it was in 1998 or 1997, that HUD offered 

this as a demonstration program. We did not make application at 

that time. 

I’ve watched it since then. I’ve been very impressed with a lot of 

the results and abilities to help eliminate a lot of the obstacles in 

helping to provide quality services to our clients. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Okay. 

Maybe, Mr. Hiebert, you could tell me a little bit more about 

that. 

Mr. HIEBERT. Yes, thank you. 

It was originally authorized in a bill in 1996, the Secretary was 

authorized to engage up to 30 housing authorities. I believe two 

were added since that point and a couple have left and done different programs. 

But there have been slots available right now that aren’t being 

used, but we would like to see more of them added. 

Some of the things that have happened, for instance, just quickly, since 1999, in 1999, 47 percent of the families in my family 

housing were working full-time. Now 65 percent are. Income has 

increased by almost 30 percent in our families because we have 

policies that don’t discourage it. 

We consistently have right around 105 to 108 percent utilization 

of Section 8 because of the flexibility allowed. 

I’m not saying that to promote the policies of Keene Housing Authority, but what I’m promoting is the fact that we were able to 

recognize our local conditions, our local demographics, our own 

waiting list, our own employment situation, and everything about 

our community. Other communities should have that ability, as 

well. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. What would happen if you leased up over your 

cap? 

Mr. HIEBERT. We would serve more people and that would be the 

only consequence. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Mr. Day? 

Mr. DAY. If you keep the cap in place and I lease up above that, 

I have to pay for that out of our administrative fees. 

Mrs. BIGGERT. Okay. Thank you. 

I yield back. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Let’s see. Who do we have next here? 

Mr. Cleaver. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

Mr. Ramirez and I have worked together over the years. It’s good 

to see you. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. Good to see you, too, sir. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Frankly, you answered all the questions that I 

asked the under secretary a few minutes ago, so I appreciate it 

very much. 

The only remaining issue for me is the issue of scattered site 

housing with the Section 8 vouchers. 

Do any of you have any recommendations on how we solve the 

problem of having vouchers actually only allow us to move into the 

poorest neighborhoods and then the demands from the public is, 

42

you know, ‘‘It’s okay, we don’t mind having Section 8 in our community, but we want them scattered out.’’ 

And you can’t scatter them because the vouchers won’t allow you 

to move into property outside of the lowest income, the lowest property area of a community. 

Mr. HIEBERT. I have a brief answer to that one, and it’s under 

the moving to work flexibility. 

Our contract is directly with our participants, and not with the 

landlords. They are allowed to choose where they want to go. There 

aren’t restrictions on the units that they may choose. 

And if they want to be closer to where they work or where their 

kids go to school, they have the ability to do that and the freedom 

to do that under our program. 

Mr. CLEAVER. But do you have—Mr. Ramirez. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. I would go one step further in the interim, and 

that is that it’s a matter of dedicated resources, in trying to reach 

as many people that are served. 

Currently, the vouchers can only go so far within the community, 

and as you move into other parts of the community that cost more 

to rent, that the subsidy cannot go deep enough to be able to 

house— 

Mr. CLEAVER. Yes. 

Mr. RAMIREZ.—families that can be served there. 

So it’s, one, a question of resources, and two, I’ve seen many an 

agency around the country through our membership really get 

quite aggressive in trying to attract landlords throughout the entire community, and as a result, it has produced some fruit, but it’s 

really a question of resources and having a community make the 

difficult choice of do we serve more in pockets of the community 

that can house more or do we serve fewer and spread those families throughout? 

So it does come down to resources being— 

Mr. CLEAVER. Resources. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you. 

I yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Mr. Shays. 

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

I’m wrestling with the fact that as I listen to people being on the 

waiting list for 5, 10, or 15 years, it sounds more like they’re trying 

to join a golf course or get a boating dock space. 

If they’re so desperate to be in housing now, describe to me 

where they’re living, and am I to assume that after 5 or 10 years, 

they still qualify for public housing? 

Mr. GODFREY. You can’t say one thing over another. 

Many of the people are living in overcrowded conditions or substandard conditions. We have people who are working full-time, 

and living in homeless shelters. 

So there are a lot of conditions that people are living in that are 

not suitable. 

Or they could be paying 60, 70, or 80 percent of their income for 

rent, which is more often the case. They’re paying an extremely 

high amount. 

43

And over the course of the waiting list, there are many people 

who do move off, who no longer qualify, who have a more stable 

situation. 

But there are others, especially the elderly or the disabled, or the 

homeless veteran, whose opportunity for increasing their income 

does not come along, so they remain on the list forever, because 

their income is relatively static and will be for the foreseeable future. 

Mr. SHAYS. The Administration has continually tried to get rid 

of Hope VI grants because they say people aren’t using them, and 

they’ve actually been a Godsend in more expensive parts of the 

country, because frankly, you can attract all income levels, and you 

can rebuild an area. 

And I literally have young men and young kids who live in housing facilities that—I used UBS employees, but these kids literally 

have at these housing units a pool, a workout room, and if they go 

to the workout room, they’re not listening to young men and 

women talk about drug deals. They’re talking about how they made 

money in some deal that was legal. 

And what I wrestle with is that when we decided to go to vouchers, we lost ownership, and so we just see as inflation goes up, and 

so big surprise, that half of HUD’s budget are Section 8 vouchers. 

So what is—isn’t there logic in getting housing authorities to 

own, in essence, so many units at a commercial site, and we buy 

into it, and then when one unit clears, maybe a rental person goes 

in, and then next time a rental person leaves, it’s someone under 

public housing. 

Wouldn’t that be a better formula than what we have now? 

Mr. RAMIREZ. May I? 

Mr. SHAYS. Sure. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. Quickly on two points. 

One, there’s a constant misperception that’s being promoted by 

some that this program has eaten up the HUD budget and that 

somehow it’s spiraling out of control in cost. 

And I would be glad to submit the GAO report that was put out 

recently that shows that year after year, adjusting for inflation, the 

Section 8 program has only grown by 4 percent. 

And so— 

Mr. SHAYS. That’s counterintuitive to me. 

I mean, adjusted for inflation, my units in Stamford could go up 

10 percent. That’s inflation. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. And the market, under the Section 8 program, 

would reflect that your increases in rent may have gone up 10 percent, but in Laredo, Texas, they went down 20 percent, and so it 

adjusts for the markets throughout the Nation. 

Mr. SHAYS. Well, what happens is, we get less units. That’s the 

bottom line. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. Well— 

Mr. SHAYS. I’m just making the point, though. So you made a 

point, and I accept, and I’ll look into it. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. We’ll submit it for the record, if you’d like. 

Mr. SHAYS. But I get to this issue of by not owning, we are like 

the person who is a renter all their life. They don’t enjoy the—

shouldn’t the taxpayer enjoy being—you get my point. 

44

Ms. ZATERMAN. If I could just— 

Mr. RAMIREZ. On the Hope VI, I’ll let Ms. Zaterman speak to the 

Hope VI. 

Ms. ZATERMAN. Thank you. 

I think the point that you’re raising is very critical. We need to 

move back to a balanced housing policy that addresses both the demand and the supply side. 

And we’ve invested a great deal in the voucher program. It’s a 

very successful program that addresses affordability, but it also has 

to be responsive to an inflated market. 

When we own units, we can control costs, and now we are at a 

point, the average unit cost for public housing is significantly less 

than it is to pay for a voucher. 

And so we would like to see, partly because we’ve had significant 

cuts, but it also is a way to control costs and control the property, 

and I think it’s very important that we look both through Hope VI, 

through perhaps targeted tax credit programs for public housing, 

and through the moving to work, where we can actually produce 

additional units, where we can control those costs over time. 

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Clay. 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

In reading testimony, I noticed a difference of opinion on the 

moving to work program, and Ms. Zaterman favors inclusion of the 

moving to work program in the legislation. 

Can you make the case for MTW? 

Ms. ZATERMAN. Well, I can make the case. I can go back to 1998 

when the Public Housing Reform Bill was passed and there was a 

bipartisan consensus that public housing had been saddled with 

unreasonable and burdensome regulations that did not add value. 

The whole moving to work notion is to say, in a local market, I 

have to live in my local market, I have to be responsive to my customers, my residents, and my local elected officials, and let me 

have a plan that responds to that. 

If I have too much public housing and not enough vouchers, I can 

fix the mix. If I need more supply and I need less vouchers, less 

tenant base, I can fix the mix. If I have a hot employment market, 

I can target training dollars. If I have a slow employment market, 

I can target dollars to provide self-sufficiency. If I have a big senior 

population, I can provide supportive services. 

Today, I can only spend my dollar the way HUD tells me I can 

do it, in a very prescribed, and often not very responsive, way. 

I believe—I know there’s concern about the program. I believe 

there is a way to balance those concerns by having tenant protections, by keeping targeting provisions to ensure that very low income households are served, and that housing authorities are accountable, both to their residents and to their local community, and 

still provide the flexibility that they need to operate within their 

local markets. 

Mr. CLAY. So in actuality, the working relationship is not really 

there between HUD and the housing authority, nor is the flexibility 

to allow a fluid program? 

Ms. ZATERMAN. I couldn’t agree more. 

45

Mr. CLAY. Yes, Mr. Ramirez. 

Mr. RAMIREZ. I would just add that on the flexibility side, that 

we had the assistant secretary earlier talk a great deal about creating flexibility and pushing for flexibility. 

There are things regulatorily that HUD can do now that they 

could have done 7 years ago to relieve that burden and create 

greater flexibility, and allow agencies to do more to serve low income families, seniors, and disabled in our Nation, and that has 

not happened to date, to the level that it’s talked about. 

And the words are much more rhetorical than the actions that 

come out of those words. 

Mr. CLAY. So the words sound good, but in actuality, they don’t 

apply? 

Mr. RAMIREZ. That is— 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you. Thank you for that response. 

I represent, as I stated earlier, the City of St. Louis, and on any 

given day in our public schools, about 20 percent of the student 

population happens to be homeless. 

Do we, through the voucher program and the long waiting lists, 

do we contribute to that homelessness, and what do your agencies 

do when it comes across your desk, when you see that? 

Perhaps we can start with Mr. Godfrey. 

Mr. GODFREY. You’re absolutely right. We have children who live 

in the shelters and they are on our waiting list, but they go to 

school every day from the shelter. 

One of the items which would help turn the voucher into a production program is to allow greater flexibility in terms of the 

project-basing. 

That way, we can work with our housing authorities to build 

more units, and bring all of the resources together, whether they’re 

tax credits, or HOMF, and build new units. 

And we have housing authorities, Providence Housing and Newport Housing Authority, who are willing to work with us, but as 

soon as they set aside project based units, it counts against them 

in their SEMAP score, and they lost those units. 

So they can’t participate in linking those units to production and 

to production of units which may provide the direct services that 

people need or in areas that are not deeply concentrated pockets 

of poverty. 

If we’re going to increase housing opportunities in the suburbs, 

then we need to be able to offer production so that we can have 

affordable housing there. 

And so the flexibility to not count project based units against you 

would help a lot. 

Mr. CLAY. Along those same lines, and perhaps you can take us 

there, Mr. Ramirez, or anyone else on the panel, has the replacement of units on a one-to-one basis kept abreast with the new development as it replaces public housing units, and Section 8 voucher units? 

Mr. GODFREY. I am pleased to say that in our Hope VI development—we have one Hope VI development in Newport, and as a 

State requirement, we required one for one, which was not an easy 

task to accomplish, but working with HUD, working with the local 

authority, we did it. We agreed to it up front. 

46

And so far, we have replaced 400 units out of the 500 units of 

public housing in this development, and we’re very proud of that 

record. 

Chairwoman WATERS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The Chair notes that some members may have additional questions for this panel, which they may wish to submit in writing. 

Without objection, the hearing record will remain open for 30 

days for members to submit written questions to these witnesses 

and to place their responses in the record. 

I would like to thank you all for coming today, for spending your 

time helping to educate us about what really goes on in the real 

world, so that we can incorporate that into our thinking and, thus, 

legislation. 

Thank you, very much. 

I will now call on the third panel. 

This panel consists of: Ms. Sheila Crowley, president, National 

Low Income Housing Coalition; Ms. Barbara Sard, director of housing policy, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities; Ms. Janet 

Charlton, president, Triton Advisors, on behalf of National Leased 

Housing Association and National Multihousing Council; Mr. Andrew Sperling, director of government relations, National Association for the Mentally Ill Consortium of Citizens with Disabilities; 

and Mr. Phil Tegeler, executive director of the Poverty and Race 

Research Action Council. 

Welcome. 

Thank you, very much. 

Without objection, all members’ opening statements will be made 

a part of the record. 

Let us begin with Ms. Crowley. 

STATEMENT OF SHEILA CROWLEY, PRESIDENT, THE 

NATIONAL LOW INCOME HOUSING COALITION 

Ms. CROWLEY. Thank you very much, Madam Chairwoman, 

Ranking Member Biggert, and members of the subcommittee, for 

the opportunity to testify today about your legislation to stabilize 

and strengthen the housing choice voucher program. 

Let me begin by expressing our sincere appreciation to you and 

the members of your staff who have done a really terrific job of 

drafting sound legislation for this Congress, the bills on the bipartisan legislation, H.R. 5443, introduced in the last Congress, as 

well as the considerable work done over the last 2 years by most 

of us testifying here today and many others who have been wanting to protect and improve the voucher program. 

The thoughtful process in which you have developed this legislation has produced a very good result, which will restore the credibility and the predictability of the program. 

And restoring the credibility and predictability of the program is 

essential to getting to the solutions that have been—to the questions that have been raised by many members of the committee 

today, which is, what do we do about all the people on the waiting 

lists? 

We have to get the voucher program back to a state of good functioning so that we can in fact begin to argue for increasing vouchers, and that’s the fundamental question. How do we grow the proVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:33 Jun 13, 2007 Jkt 035403 PO 00000 Frm 00052 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\35403.TXT HFIN PsN: TERRIE
47

gram as opposed to reduce it, which has been the effect of these 

policies over the last several years. 

Just a quick thing about the scope of need. 

Seventy-one percent of all extremely low income households in 

the United States pay more than half of their income for their rent. 

Those are households with incomes up to $16,860 in Los Angeles 

and up to $21,720 in DuPage County. 

These are people who are elderly, disabled, on fixed incomes, and 

people in the low wage workforce; 71 percent pay more than half 

of their income for their housing. 

Those are the people on the waiting list. That’s why they’re on 

the waiting list, because they cannot continue to sustain that kind 

of cost for their housing. 

Among the many positive attributes of this bill are that it corrects the funding crisis that was created by HUD’s snapshot formula. It simplifies the process for determining rent for each resident while incentivizing work and protecting elderly and disabled 

people with high housing costs. It streamlines the inspection process for owners who operate good properties. 

It maintains the housing choice voucher program’s income targeting to serve those with the most serious needs while adapting 

that to meet the needs of poor and rural communities. 

It assures that all units of public housing that are lost to demolition or opt out are replaced by vouchers, not just those units that 

happened to be occupied at the time that they were closed. 

It provides for recapture of unused voucher funds so that agencies that can use them are able to use them, and that we can work 

on the mobility and family self-sufficiency objectives of the program. 

It helps tenants with good rent payments establish themselves as 

good credit risks. 

And it facilitates greater use of the project based vouchers to 

support production of new rental housing. 

A major improvement of the proposed legislation is that it does 

not include the moving to work program. We strongly urge that you 

not include that as you go forward. 

Our friends in the public housing industry feel very strongly, and 

quite genuinely, that they need the deregulation from expanded 

moving to work in order to survive. 

If you’ve been paying the slightest bit of attention, you know that 

public housing as an institution has been under serious assault in 

the last 6 years. 

Systematic reduction of public housing funding streams has left 

many public housing agencies depleted and unable to maintain 

basic services and do even routine maintenance. This is unacceptable. 

The National Low Income Housing Coalition stands side by side 

with our public housing partners to demand restoration of sufficient funds for them to be able to do their jobs. 

However, we see expanding moving to work to other public housing agencies as an off-target response to the real problem of Federal disinvestment in public housing. 

Moving to work is a demonstration program. We do not quarrel 

with promoting innovation and we think that should happen, nor 

48

do we doubt that some moving to work sites have shown very good 

results. 

What we object to is the complete failure of HUD to do what the 

legislation intended. That is, to evaluate the experiments that moving to work PHA’s have undertaken. In the absence of evidence of 

effectiveness, how can Congress consider expanding it? 

At the very least, we urge the committee to hold a hearing specifically on moving to work, hear from PHA directors and tenants, 

from local officials and local housing advocates, from the HUD inspector general, who has lots of things to say about moving to 

work, and the researchers who have tried to assess its effectiveness. 

Form your own impressions of this program before considering 

expanding it. 

We oppose any expansion of moving to work until current programs are properly evaluated and lessons learned are incorporated 

into the expansion program. 

We look forward to working with this committee as you develop 

this bill for introduction, and support your efforts in getting it 

through the House and Senate. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Crowley can be found on page 80 

of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you. 

Ms. Barbara Sard. 

STATEMENT OF BARBARA SARD, DIRECTOR OF HOUSING 

POLICY, CENTER ON BUDGET AND POLICY PRIORITIES 

Ms. SARD. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and Ranking Member Biggert, for holding this very important hearing. 

My name is Barbara Sard, and I am director of housing policy 

at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. 

Thank you very much for holding this very important hearing on 

this extremely positive bill that will do a great deal to respond to 

and fix the problems that have occurred in the last several years, 

and many that had been in the program before that. 

What I would like to briefly address is some of the questions that 

have arisen concerning the voucher funding formula, briefly on 

rents, and then highlight some additional changes that we hope 

you will include in the bill when it is filed. 

You have heard a great deal already today about the real effects 

of the funding formula that was in use in the last 3 years. I think 

we’re now in the position where we have to move off of theory and 

look at what has occurred and how do we fix the problems: 

150,000 vouchers lost, $1.4 billion in unspent funds accumulated 

in the last 2 years, and our analysis shows that only one-third of 

that money is in reserve because it could not be spent, because of 

the authorized cap issue. Two-thirds was not spent and could have 

been. 

Why wasn’t it spent? That’s the big question. And the answer is 

that what has occurred in the last 3 years was a system without 

the right incentives. It was an inefficient distribution of money in 

which agencies got the same amount regardless of how they performed. That isn’t the way we ought to run a government program. 

49

The policy in SEVRA is comprehensive, it is multi-faceted, and 

it is balanced to get at the efficient distribution of money and the 

right incentives to control costs, while at the same time responding 

to some of the needs that have been expressed on the committee, 

that in areas of the country where costs grow faster, you have to 

meet that need or you shrink the number of vouchers, as Mr. 

Shays said, where you have concentrations of vouchers and you 

want to expand where they can be used, as Mr. Cleaver was mentioning. Those problems are addressed by the formula in SEVRA. 

There are a couple of issues that the members have raised that 

I think are important to look at more closely. 

In the 2007 funding resolution, it is true, as you said, Representative Biggert, that about half of the agencies get less than they 

would have under the old formula, but there’s the other half that 

get more, and that’s always the case if we don’t have more money 

to spend. 

And if you look at the fairness of the situation, the agencies that 

got less this year are those that have large, often very large reserves, and in every case that we have looked at, the reserves far 

exceed—far, far, far exceeded, like four times—the difference in 

funding, whereas the agencies that got more money are those that 

have been cut each year and were facing having to cut another 

13,000 vouchers, if the formula hadn’t been changed. 

But the important thing is that changing the formula is only a 

piece of what needs to be done. This committee really needs to 

make the voucher funding formula part of the permanent authorizing statute, and to do it in a balanced way that considers issues 

over time. 

There are a few issues that you’ve raised that I’d like to respond 

to. 

One is this question of should the formula be re-benchmarked 

annually, or every 2 years, or every 3 years? 

And there’s no magic answer to this. What I want to emphasize 

is the interrelationship between the answer to that question and 

other features of the policy. 

If you do not re-benchmark annually, that means you’re going to 

fall behind what is really needed to pay for the vouchers in use. 

And Mr. Cabrera actually told you why that’s the case, and the 

answer is that the inflation factors that HUD uses are 2 years out 

of date. 

So if you wait 2 years, you’re inflating on out of date data, and 

the inflation factors only look at rent costs in the market, they 

don’t look at tenant incomes. 

So if you’ve had a change in a community because a factory 

closes and you re-benchmark only every 2 years, you are doing 

nothing to make up for that agency’s added need for funding. 

Well, you could do that if you wanted to, but then the agency had 

better have a substantial reserve, or it is going to have to cut at 

exactly the time it needs more money. 

And one of the things that SEVRA does in a constrained fiscal 

environment is avoid the old policy of having to spend extra money 

to fund reserves. 

50

It creates a mechanism where the agencies that need the most 

money get it through a recycling process. That is the cost-efficient 

way to do it. 

And on the authorized cap issue, we are fully supportive of agencies being able to serve as many needy people on the waiting list 

as they can. 

The hard question is what does exceeding the authorized cap in 

one community do to another community? So maybe we can— 

Chairwoman WATERS. Unfortunately, we are going to have to go 

to the Floor. There is a vote going on. 

We have about 5 minutes to get up to the Floor, and I understand it is a series of votes, and it’s going to take us anywhere from 

30 to 45 minutes to get back. 

I would like to say to you that if you need to take a break, this 

would be the time to do it. 

We would hope that those of you, certainly, who have not testified, would stay. 

We would hope that those of you who have would stay so that 

we could ask some questions. 

I will return. At least several of us will return to complete the 

hearing with you. 

It’s unfortunate, but that is just the way it works. 

So thank you, very much. 

[Recess] 

Chairwoman WATERS. I would like to thank all of our witnesses 

for their patience. 

Unfortunately, we got into trouble on the Floor, and it took much 

longer than we thought that it would take, but I do appreciate your 

remaining here for this length of time. 

I think that, where were we? We were moving to Ms. Charlton. 

You had completed your testimony, right, Ms. Sard? 

Ms. SARD. Yes. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Sard can be found on page 127 

of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. So next we will have Ms. Janet Charlton, 

president, Triton Advisors, on behalf of the National Leased Housing Association. 

STATEMENT OF JANET S. CHARLTON, PRESIDENT, TRITON ADVISORS, INC., ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL LEASED HOUSING ASSOCIATION, THE NATIONAL APARTMENT ASSOCIATION, AND THE NATIONAL MULTIHOUSING COUNCIL 

Ms. CHARLTON. Thank you, Chairwoman Waters. 

My name is Janet Charlton, and I’m president of Triton Advisors, based in Rockville, Maryland, and I’m here today on behalf 

of three trade associations: The National Leased Housing Association; the National Multihousing Council; and the National Apartment Association. 

These groups represent the Nation’s leading players in today’s 

market rate and government assisted apartment industry. 

Due to the timing, I think I will totally digress from our prepared testimony. Obviously, since the members of the committee 

have copies of that, I hope that if there are any questions perVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:33 Jun 13, 2007 Jkt 035403 PO 00000 Frm 00056 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\35403.TXT HFIN PsN: TERRIE
51

taining to anything that’s in the written testimony, that you would 

contact us. 

And what I would like to do, basically, is focus on two comments 

that I’ve heard made today. 

Most of the day we’ve heard comments that, indeed, the waiting 

lists for the Section 8 Voucher Program are intolerable. 

And we’ve also heard that, and I’ve been in this business for 

quite a while, that HUD is somehow statutorily required to have 

their fair market rents lag 2 years behind current times. 

I’ve never seen that to be true, that they’re statutorily required 

to. That they lag 2 years behind, absolutely. That they even sometimes lag 3 or 4 years behind, absolutely. 

And what all of this has done is not allowed, not incentivized the 

private sector to become more involved with this program, 

If there are waiting lists, doesn’t it appear obvious that that’s 

due to the lack of product that’s out there for these people to use 

for their housing resource? 

Some of the comments that are in this bill are terrific, some of 

the provisions which would allow for decreasing some of the administrative burden that not only taxes onto the PHA’s and certainly 

disincentivizes the owners, because it’s much move expensive for 

an owner to rent to a subsidized tenant than it is to rent to a market rate tenant. 

If a market rate tenant walks into a unit, they want to take it, 

but they notice perhaps that, you know, there’s a bump in the door 

or there’s a slash in the screen, they ask the owner, ‘‘Sure, I’ll sign 

the lease, we’ll have an addendum that those will be fixed.’’ 

We can’t do that with subsidized residents. They have to then go 

back to the PHA, and the PHA has to come and inspect. They can’t 

sign a lease until it’s fixed. 

And then once the lease is approved, he still has to go through 

another burden of paperwork. 

So what do you have there? You have a family who doesn’t have 

any housing. You have an owner that’s there within a vacant unit, 

not collecting any rent, and owners don’t like to do that. It doesn’t 

incentivize them to even tolerate any of the delays in the program. 

So with the provisions in this bill that perhaps would allow for 

PHA’s to have the discretion, if indeed they knew the owner, if 

they knew the property, if it’s been inspected by another program, 

to alleviate those inspections, you might see more product coming 

on-line. I’m sure you would. 

If, in conjunction with that, you get the department to issue its 

fair market rents in a somewhat market coordinated manner—if 

the market can keep up with itself, why can’t HUD? They have the 

same computers. They have the same access to information. To 

allow this to go on and on and on has been unforgivable. 

There was no shortage of private participation in the program 

when there was a project based portion to Section 8. That’s how 

these properties were built. The Section 8 project based are indistinguishable from market rate properties. 

The voucher program can and should be allowed to operate in 

that exact same way, indistinguishable from market rate tenants. 

My final comment is—and again, there’s a number of other 

points in our testimony—in order for the Section 8 Voucher ProVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:33 Jun 13, 2007 Jkt 035403 PO 00000 Frm 00057 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\35403.TXT HFIN PsN: TERRIE
52

gram to work as effectively as it can, some changes should be recognized to tie the program closer to a low income housing tax credit 

program. 

It’s the only new construction deal in town. It makes not only 

new units available, but it preserves those units that certain existing owners are considering opting out. 

If you can increase the amount of project based Section 8 through 

attaching vouchers to these units, it will extend their affordability, 

it certainly creates a larger resource than what’s available now, 

and you’re bringing the private sector, the private sector owners 

back into the game, because without them, there’s not really a 

game going on. 

The residents are hurting, and we need to remember, at the end 

of the day, we’re housing people. 

The last comment, when I heard these comments made about, 

you know, the insufferable burdens that PHA’s go through with income certifications, you know, and the owners, the idea of going to 

a 3-year certification for fixed income residents is fabulous, because 

if I can only tell you the amount of fretting that goes on in an elderly property when these folks know they have to come up with 

their annual recert, and they’ve gotten a little increase last year in 

their Social Security, and is that going to put them over the top, 

are they going to have to move—you can’t believe the rumors that 

rifle through a property when things like that happen. 

And these people shouldn’t have to fret about those things in life. 

They have enough other things that they have to focus on. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

Ms. CHARLTON. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Charlton can be found on page 

74 of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Mr. Andrew Sperling. 

STATEMENT OF ANDREW SPERLING, DIRECTOR OF LEGISLATIVE ADVOCACY, NATIONAL ALLIANCE ON MENTAL ILLNESS, ON BEHALF OF THE CONSORTIUM FOR CITIZENS 

WITH DISABILITIES HOUSING TASK FORCE 

Mr. SPERLING. Thank you, Chairwoman Waters, and members of 

the subcommittee. 

My name is Andrew Sperling, and I’m the director of legislative 

advocacy for NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness. I’m 

here today representing the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities Housing Task Force. CCD is a coalition of national disability 

organizations representing both people with disabilities, their service providers, and their families. Among our organizations are 

United Cerebral Palsy, The Arc, United Spinal Association, Easter 

Seals, Lutheran Services, NAMI, and others. 

I’m here to deliver a message on behalf of the disability community and the CCD Coalition with respect to the SEVRA legislation, 

which we strongly support. Section 8 is an absolutely critical resource for people with disabilities, particularly people with disabilities who live on SSI and SSDI. 

In a couple of weeks, we’ll be presenting to this subcommittee 

our Priced Out report for 2006. This will be the fifth report we’ve 

done comparing SSI income levels to fair market rents. 

53

What we are finding is that a picture that we thought couldn’t 

get any worse, is actually finding a way to get worse. 

The affordability gap between what a tenant, someone living on 

SSI in the community, can afford to pay and fair market rents for 

zero and one-bedroom apartments has actually doubled since 1998. 

SSI is now at 18.2 percent of median income and falling. In order 

for someone living on SSI to rent a modest one-bedroom apartment 

at the HUD fair market rent, on average, nationally, that consumes 113 percent of their monthly income—113 percent of their 

monthly income. For an efficiency, it’s 101 percent. 

People with disabilities who rely on SSI for their basic needs, 

people with severe disabilities, are completely priced out of the 

rental housing market. They must have rent subsidies, and Section 

8 is a program that has to meet their need. It is the critical resource. 

As a coalition, our CCD coalition supports SEVRA. There are 

some long-overdue reforms to the Section 8 program that are part 

of this. We supported the legislation last year, and we look forward 

to supporting it again this year. 

It would bring about a more effective funding formula. It streamlines the process for rent determination, which is absolutely critical 

for people with disabilities whose incomes are static and not going 

up, because they’re on disability benefits, and maintains, very importantly, maintains the extremely low income targeting for the 

Section 8 program. 

Section 8 must remain targeted to those with extremely low incomes, particularly people with disabilities. 

A couple of other notes. I’d like to summarize my testimony, 

We support the project based reforms that were proposed last 

year by your colleague, Ms. Velasquez from New York. We believe 

that these reforms need to be a part of this legislation. We would 

urge you to include those in the legislation for this year. 

CCD also has very strong reservations about any expansion of 

the moving to work program. We recognize that this is now, as 

you’ve heard the testimony today, there’s lots of varying opinions 

on this. 

From the perspective of the disability community, representing 

people living on SSI at 18 percent of median income, allowing housing authorities the kind of flexibility to increase the rent burden 

on people with disabilities, allowing targeting of resources to higher 

income households, we believe is a very dangerous policy to go 

down, and would actually result in the Section 8 program serving 

fewer people with disabilities. 

I would urge this subcommittee not to include any kind of expansion of moving to work in the legislation. 

Finally, I want to note that there are now approximately 64,000 

vouchers out there that Congress made a decision over the years 

to target to non-elderly people with disabilities. These are 50,000 

vouchers that Congressman Rodney Frelinghuysen from New Jersey, your colleague, placed in the appropriations bill over a period 

of years. 

There are also tenant-based rent subsidies funded under the Section 811 program. There are approximately 14,000 of those. 

54

We at CCD have a number of concerns about the way HUD has 

tracked those vouchers to ensure that housing authorities continue 

to target those vouchers to people with disabilities upon turnover. 

There was guidance that was put out in 2005. We want to try 

and work with this subcommittee to make sure that housing agencies that have those vouchers continue to target them to people 

with disabilities upon turnover so those resources aren’t lost to the 

larger pool. 

Thank you very much, Madam Chairwoman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Sperling can be found on page 

143 of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

All right, let’s see. Who is our last witness here? 

Mr. Phil Tegeler. 

STATEMENT OF PHILIP TEGELER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, THE 

POVERTY & RACE RESEARCH ACTION COUNCIL 

Mr. TEGELER. Thank you, Chairwoman Waters. 

I’m with the Poverty and Race Research Action Council. We’re a 

civil rights policy organization in Washington, D.C. 

As several members of the committee have pointed out, a central 

purpose of the Section 8 program is to give families a meaningful 

choice to move to areas of lower poverty and higher opportunity. 

In this context, it is important to understand the damage done 

to this program in recent years. 

In our written testimony, we have included a consensus statement of over 50 national, State, and local civil rights and housing 

groups in support of Section 8 voucher reform. 

Footnote 1 of our written statement lists some of the restrictions 

to housing choice that have occurred under the current Administration. 

I’ll briefly summarize those, because it’s an important context for 

this discussion: 

Limits on exception rents that have limited the ability of families 

to move out to higher rent, lower poverty areas in recent years 

under HUD’s administration of this program; 

Cuts in mobility counseling all over the country. Small, efficient 

mobility counseling programs in many highly segregated metro 

areas closed down in the early years of this Administration and not 

re-funded; 

Financial disincentives to portability, the ability to move across 

jurisdictional lines and into higher rent jurisdictions. You’ve heard 

about that already; 

In some cases, explicit restrictions on portability by HUD on top 

of all of the bureaucratic barriers to moving across city and town 

lines, as you’ve already heard. 

We think the current draft bill begins to repair this damage, but 

respectfully, it does not go far enough. We support the new budget 

formula in the bill and especially the use of reallocated funds for 

excess portability costs. This is a very important provision and removes a major disincentive to portability on the part of housing authorities. 

But we urge the committee to go further in the following ways: 

55

First, to reform the portability system entirely to require mandatory absorption of vouchers by receiving PHA’s, eliminate the billing procedures, make it a cleaner and easier process for a family 

to move to a community of its choice; 

Secondly, reinstate the exception payment standards system so 

that families can move to higher rent areas, that there be a tiered 

system within metropolitan areas of different rent structures for 

different market, sub-markets within an area; 

Reauthorize the mobility counseling program that assisted families to find housing and move into housing outside the usual neighborhoods that were described earlier; 

Use deconcentration as a factor in the performance assessment 

of PHA’s, an explicit factor; 

Encourage cooperation and regional administration of the voucher program. 

Now, some States have already started to do this. Connecticut 

and Massachusetts are good examples of States that are experimenting with regional administration of vouchers to eliminate 

these border disputes and billing difficulties. 

We recommend that the committee consider some pilot programs 

and incentives for PHA’s to get together and cooperate more; 

Finally, looking forward, and perhaps this is beyond the scope of 

the present bill, but I think we need to ask what will this Congress 

do to build on the Moving to Opportunity program? 

What is the next Moving to Opportunity program going to look 

like? What dramatic steps is Congress going to take to help families move voluntarily to areas of greater employment opportunity 

and better schools? 

The answer is going to be found in the Section 8 Voucher Program. It’s the only housing program we have that offers this opportunity, and it is up to Congress to press HUD to make it more of 

a choice-driven program. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Tegeler can be found on page 149 

of the appendix.] 

Chairwoman WATERS. Thank you, very much. 

I do appreciate, again, the time that you have spent. 

As you can see, our members are not here. Our ranking member 

tried to remain, but she really had to catch a plane. She just had 

no other choice. 

But I think that, given the testimony that we have heard today, 

we have learned a lot about not only your thinking, but that of 

some of the others who testified before you. 

So I’ll just take all the time that I want to talk with you, since 

everybody else is gone. 

Let me just ask a few questions. 

A lot has been said about portability here today, and I was trying 

to focus on a discussion that I was involved in some years ago 

about portability. 

And it seems to me that the problem does not simply lie with 

HUD or with the housing authorities, but it seems to me that we 

had elected officials, some of them members of city council, and 

others, who were adamantly opposed to portability that would 

56

bring people into their communities that they thought should not 

be there. It’s called racism. 

Are you familiar with that part of the argument, that there are 

communities who do not wish to have Section 8 tenants in their 

community? 

Who would like to take that? 

Mr. TEGELER. I’ll start, Chairwoman Waters. 

The beauty of the Section 8 voucher program is that there is no 

city council or board of selectmen anywhere in the country that has 

anything to say about whether families can move into their towns. 

And not only that, because it’s a program that operates one family at a time, there is a chance for real integration to occur, there’s 

not a huge zoning battle and a 4-hour meeting at night about 

whether to rezone a parcel for a 20-unit development. 

The family has the right to move in, and the city or town has 

no say in the matter, and that’s the way the law is set up. 

And frankly, in my experience in my past life as a civil rights 

litigator, many towns are very happy with that arrangement, because they don’t want to have to decide, you know, how many of 

these low income families are going to be allowed into our community. 

It’s important that it not be something which is subject to local 

control. 

So that’s my one feedback there. 

Chairwoman WATERS. How many—well, I guess you all understand that the housing authority chiefs are appointed, are they 

not? And who are they appointed by? Mayors. Who votes on their 

confirmation? Members of city councils. 

I saw some of this and the influence of that in a particular area. 

Part of it was in my district. 

Yes, Ms. Sard, you’re trying to say something. 

Ms. SARD. I think you’re putting your finger on something very 

important, very subtle and difficult to get at. 

And while it is true that the Section 8 program has the potential 

to be kind of integration by stealth, there is still a lot that the administering agencies can do to promote it or to hinder it. 

The bill as drafted in the discussion draft goes very far toward 

solving the new problems, the new hindrances to portability that 

were created by the funding formula, but it doesn’t do anything to 

fix the problems that had been there from 2004 and earlier. 

And the truth is that this is a program that doesn’t accomplish 

as much as many of us would like to see to really promote choice 

of where people can live. 

There are several changes that could be added to the bill that 

would really advance these goals. 

One is the proposal that’s been discussed, to require housing 

agencies to absorb the vouchers that move in, using the funds that 

are recycled within the bill to help pay for that. 

And if you did that, then the issuing agencies wouldn’t have a 

disincentive to promoting portability, and the receiving agencies 

might be encouraged, because they would get more money. So that 

helps. 

Chairwoman WATERS. All right. 

57

Ms. SARD. But that doesn’t go far enough, either, and we strongly 

recommend that you add to the performance assessment section of 

the bill a specific requirement that performance be assessed on 

achievement of deconcentration of poverty objectives. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Very interesting. Okay. 

Ms. SARD. And we have a proposal, proposed language that we 

submitted to staff, which I’m happy to send again. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Okay. Very well. 

I’m very interested in that, because I think you make a good 

point. 

The other thing that was brought to my attention today that I’m 

very interested in, and you have to give me a better feeling and understanding of, is are housing authorities interested in building 

rental units? 

Ms. SARD. A number of them are. 

I think that the experience over the last 5 years with the 

changes that Congress made in 2000 in the project based voucher 

option has been one of the most positive and encouraging things 

that has happened in the low income housing world. 

And in order to encourage development, one of the things that 

housing authorities can bring to the table is the vouchers to project 

base to promote development. 

Some of them have other authority with other money, some of 

them don’t, but that’s a key thing that within this bill you could 

do to promote that. 

And in addition to the two provisions that people have spoken in 

support of that are already in the bill, there is a package of nine 

other changes to the project based voucher section that have been 

worked on by a very broad-based group of stakeholders that would 

make this aspect of the voucher program work even more effectively to promote rental housing development. 

Chairwoman WATERS. And that’s coupled with low income housing tax credits? 

Ms. SARD. In part, not only. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Not only? 

Ms. SARD. Not solely, but in part. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Okay. 

Ms. CHARLTON. The important part of taking the project based 

and attaching it to the property is the lending community. 

They’re not going to be able to build new construction, whether 

it be a housing authority, whether it be the private developer, unless you have that subsidy attached to the project. It can’t leave 

with the resident, or you’re not going to find a strong lender that 

will do for you what you need done. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Okay. We’ll pay a lot of attention to that. 

The other thought that emerged here today was housing authorities doing more to recruit and work with landlords. 

I suppose each housing authority is different. I suppose you don’t 

have any real money in the budget to really do a lot of outreach 

and training sessions and getting together and incentivizing. 

But what do you do? What do you do to get landlords interested 

in wanting to be a part of our Section 8 program? 

Ms. SARD. I’m happy to take that one. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Yes. 

58

Ms. SARD. There are housing authorities that have worked 

through this problem. HUD put out a publication, under the Clinton Administration, that pulled together some of the best ideas 

that housing authorities had come up with. 

It does cost money, which raises the question of the adequacy of 

the administrative fees. 

One of the reforms in the discussion draft would be to return the 

administrative fee in the program to a payment for units leased. 

Well, if agencies get paid for their success in leasing, then they’re 

going to do more to make sure they can lease. It’s just common 

sense. 

And that has been one, in my opinion, it’s been one of the biggest 

reasons for the decline in voucher use over the last 3 years, is that 

agencies were no longer paid for performance, and we have to go 

back to a pay for performance system. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Yes. 

Ms. CROWLEY. Two comments on how to get landlords to be more 

interested in the program. 

First, in terms of an incentive, the places where housing authorities operate efficiently, they get their inspections done quickly, they 

get their payments out quickly, they are good partners, are places 

where landlords are interested in doing that. 

So to the extent that housing authorities are incentivized to be 

good partners as opposed to being somebody that the landlord has 

to hassle in order to collect the rent, then that obviously is an important thing to do. 

The second thing is, getting back to your question about the 

issue of not accepting voucher holders, whether it’s moving across 

the country or moving into the neighborhood, is the ability to use 

rejection of a voucher holder as a tenant as a proxy for rejecting 

a person for some other reason. 

And there are a couple of States and a handful of jurisdictions 

where it is illegal to reject a tenant on the basis of their source of 

income. 

There’s no Federal protection along that line, and there isn’t, and 

in most places, there is no protection along that. 

So one of the things that would be a very useful thing to do, I 

think, is to really look at the fair housing community to develop 

testing programs where you can begin to really document, is this 

rejection of voucher holders based on their voucher holders or is 

there something else going on? 

And I think that would really give us—I mean, I have my instincts, I have my anecdotes. But that would give us a lot of really 

good data on which to develop future policy around how to make 

the voucher program work better. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Yes. 

Mr. TEGELER. Just briefly to follow up. 

Some of the other recruitment tools that have been used in the 

past, especially in high opportunity areas, some of the better functioning mobility programs have sometimes used one-time payments 

to landlords as an incentive device to recruit them into the program. 

Also, the idea has come up, which I think Barbara alluded to, of 

performance incentives to PHA’s, not just for their lease-up rate, 

59

but for their lease-up rate in high opportunity, low poverty areas, 

and reward PHA’s financially for doing that. 

Finally, and most importantly, it’s the rent structure that’s most 

important in getting entry into high opportunity communities, and 

as you know, the fair market rent system and the way it’s calculated, you know, goes to the mean in a particular region, and the 

inner city rents pull down the regional average, to the extent that 

in some metro areas, the FMR won’t even reach into some of the 

higher opportunity areas. 

And we’re not talking about, you know, single family bedroom 

communities. These are lower poverty areas that have lots and lots 

of rental housing. 

And if you had a more realistic rent structure in these metro 

areas, with tiers, as some States have done, of different rent levels 

for different areas, you could gain more access and successfully recruit landlords in those communities. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Well, you all have made it very, very clear 

that it is absolutely unacceptable for HUD to use data that’s 2 

years old to determine market rate of the value, so I think we can 

do something about that. 

I don’t know if it’s a tactic that’s used in order to reduce the 

number of participants or what, but I do think that that’s just too 

easy to conquer. 

So we’ll certainly take a look at that, also. 

Yes, were you trying to say something, Ms. Sard? 

Ms. SARD. I was just going to say that the excuses that HUD has 

had in the past, whether right or wrong, no longer apply, because 

starting in 2008, the data will be available from the American 

Community Survey to do both the fair market rents and the inflation factors on a much more current and local basis. 

And if we did not only current but also more local, we would address a number of these problems. 

Chairwoman WATERS. Well, I thank you all for your patience and 

for being here today. 

Some members may have some additional questions for the 

panel, and they may submit it to you in writing, so without objection, the hearing record will remain open for 30 days for members 

to submit written questions to all of you, and to place your responses in the record. 

And with that, this hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 2:53 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.] 

(61)

A P P E N D I X

March 9, 2007

62


35403.001
63


35403.002
64


35403.003
65


35403.004
66


35403.005
67


35403.006
68


35403.007
69


35403.008
70


35403.009
71


35403.010
72


35403.011
73


35403.012
74


35403.013
75


35403.014
76


35403.015
77


35403.016
78


35403.017
79


35403.018
80


35403.019
81


35403.020
82


35403.021
83


35403.022
84


35403.023
85


35403.024
86


35403.025
87


35403.026
88


35403.027
89


35403.028
90


35403.029
91


35403.030
92


35403.031
93


35403.032
94


35403.033
95


35403.034
96


35403.035
97


35403.036
98


35403.037
99


35403.038
100


35403.039
101


35403.040
102


35403.041
103


35403.042
104


35403.043
105


35403.044
106


35403.045
107


35403.046
108


35403.047
109


35403.048
110


35403.049
111


35403.050
112


35403.051
113


35403.052
114


35403.053
115


35403.054
116


35403.055
117


35403.056
118


35403.057
119


35403.058
120


35403.059
121


35403.060
122


35403.061
123


35403.062
124


35403.063
125


35403.064
126


35403.065
127


35403.066
128


35403.067
129


35403.068
130


35403.069
131


35403.070
132


35403.071
133


35403.072
134


35403.073
135


35403.074
136


35403.075
137


35403.076
138


35403.077
139


35403.078
140


35403.079
141


35403.080
142


35403.081
143


35403.082
144


35403.083
145


35403.084
146


35403.085
147


35403.086
148


35403.087
149


35403.088
150


35403.089
151


35403.090
152


35403.091
153


35403.092
154


35403.093
155


35403.094
156


35403.095
157


35403.096
158


35403.097
159


35403.098