Moving to Work (MTW) is a demonstration program for public housing authorities (PHAs) that provides them the opportunity to design and test innovative, locally designed strategies that use Federal dollars more efficiently, help residents find employment and become self-sufficient, and increase housing choices for low-income families. MTW gives PHAs exemptions from many existing public housing and voucher rules and more flexibility with how they use their Federal funds. [1] PHAs can use special funding formulas for MTW agencies and permit agencies to shift funds between the programs or to other uses. [2]
The program is operated by 39 PHAs nationwide. [3]
The Moving to Work (MTW) Demonstration program was authorized by the Omnibus Consolidated Rescissions and Appropriations Act of 1996. [4]
There are currently 39 MTW public housing agencies. Each agency has an agency-specific contract with the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), called the MTW Standard Agreement. The MTW Standard Agreement details the flexibilities granted to MTW agencies in order to meet program and statutory goals. In 2016, at the direction of Congress, HUD provided an extension of the Standard Agreements until the end of each agency's 2028 fiscal year. [5]
The current 39 MTW agencies are:
HUD announced that it plans various changes to MTW beginning in 2019: [2]
The Office of Public Housing Investments (OPHI), within the Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH) at HUD headquarters, oversees the MTW Demonstration. [1]
MTW agencies can combine Operating and Capital funds and Housing Choice Voucher funds and use them interchangeably. For example, an MTW agency could use public housing capital funds to issue additional vouchers or use voucher funds to develop more public housing to better fit the needs of its community. Agencies can funds innovative policies. For instance, an MTW Agency can use funds from its block grant to replace decaying public housing with mixed-income communities, increase the percentage of project-based vouchers to bring more affordable housing to compact markets, and reach special needs populations through the use of provider-based vouchers paired with supportive services. [6]
However MTWs must "assist substantially the same total number of eligible low-income families as would have been served had the funding amounts not been combined." [6]
Eleven PHAs operate under modified funding formulas that allow them to receive (2013) $7,900 per unit, versus $4,100 for the other 28. Some MTW agencies use voucher funds for other purposes, including renovation, developing new housing, providing services to housing assistance recipients, supplementing agency budgets for administration and operations, or accumulating reserves. Government Accountability Office studies have found that developing new affordable housing is generally less efficient than providing vouchers for use in the private housing market. [2]
The Community Development Block Grant (CDBG), one of the longest-running programs of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, funds local community development activities with the stated goal of providing affordable housing, anti-poverty programs, and infrastructure development. CDBG, like other block grant programs, differ from categorical grants, made for specific purposes, in that they are subject to less federal oversight and are largely used at the discretion of the state and local governments and their subgrantees.
Alphonso R. Jackson served as the 13th United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). He was nominated by President George W. Bush on August 28, 2004, and confirmed by the Senate on August 31, 2004. Jackson announced his resignation on March 31, 2008.
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The Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH) is an agency of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Its mission is to ensure safe, decent, and affordable housing, create opportunities for residents' self-sufficiency and economic independence, and assure the fiscal integrity of all program participants.
HOPE VI is a program of the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development. It is intended to revitalize the worst public housing projects in the United States into mixed-income developments. Its philosophy is largely based on New Urbanism and the concept of defensible space.
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In the United States, federal assistance, also known as federal aid, federal benefits, or federal funds, is defined as any federal program, project, service, or activity provided by the federal government that directly assists domestic governments, organizations, or individuals in the areas of education, health, public safety, public welfare, and public works, among others.
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The Housing Act of 1937, formally the "United States Housing Act of 1937" and sometimes called the Wagner–Steagall Act, provided for subsidies to be paid from the United States federal government to local public housing agencies (LHAs) to improve living conditions for low-income families.
In the United States, subsidized housing is administered by federal, state and local agencies to provide subsidized rental assistance for low-income households. Public housing is priced much below the market rate, allowing people to live in more convenient locations rather than move away from the city in search of lower rents. In most federally-funded rental assistance programs, the tenants' monthly rent is set at 30% of their household income. Now increasingly provided in a variety of settings and formats, originally public housing in the U.S. consisted primarily of one or more concentrated blocks of low-rise and/or high-rise apartment buildings. These complexes are operated by state and local housing authorities which are authorized and funded by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). In 2020, there were 1 million public housing units. In 2022, about 5.2 million American households that received some form of federal rental assistance.
Carl R. Greene was the executive director of the Philadelphia Housing Authority (PHA), the fourth largest public housing authority in the nation. On his departure, PHA provided approximately 14,000 units of affordable housing for 80,000 Philadelphia residents and managed the city’s Housing Choice Voucher program. Before heading PHA, Greene held a similar position with the Detroit Housing Commission. He also held senior positions with housing authorities in Atlanta and Washington, DC.
Housing trust funds are established sources of funding for affordable housing construction and other related purposes created by governments in the United States (U.S.). Housing Trust Funds (HTF) began as a way of funding affordable housing in the late 1970s. Since then, elected government officials from all levels of government in the U.S. have established housing trust funds to support the construction, acquisition, and preservation of affordable housing and related services to meet the housing needs of low-income households. Ideally, HTFs are funded through dedicated revenues like real estate transfer taxes or document recording fees to ensure a steady stream of funding rather than being dependent on regular budget processes. As of 2016, 400 state, local and county trust funds existed across the U.S.
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The Rental Assistance Demonstration is a federal housing program that was enacted as part of the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2012, and is administered by the U.S. Department of Housing & Urban Development (HUD). Broadly, the purpose of the Rental Assistance Demonstration is to provide a set of tools to address the unmet capital needs of deeply affordable, federally assisted rental housing properties in order to maintain both the viability of the properties and their long-term affordability. It also simplifies the administrative oversight of the properties by the federal government. Specifically, RAD authorizes the conversion of a property's federal funding from one form to another, where the initial form presents structural impediments to private capital investment and the new form is not only familiar to lenders and investors but, since its enactment in 1974, has leveraged billions in private investment for the development and rehabilitation of deeply affordable rental housing.
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