NAHRO attends meeting at HUD on the HCV Program
On May 10, NAHRO staff, along with other industry and advocacy groups, attended a meeting at HUD at which the current state of the Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) Program was discussed. HUD staff at the meeting had two main points for the attendees:
- With the passage of the FY 2017 budget, most PHAs will be receiving a similar amount or more in HAP than they received the year before (this is happening despite the 97.277 proration of HAP because of higher inflation factors);
- HUD highly recommends using their HCV forecasting tool.
Read more by clicking the link.
Similar or more HAP in absolute terms
The chart above shows how many PHAs received each of the inflation factors mentioned at the bottom of the graphic. For example, there were 15 PHAs that received an inflation factor greater than 20 percent. Most PHAs, 1,351 of them, received the minimum inflation factor of 2.6%. What this means is that if your PHA received a $100 in calendar year 2016 and have an inflation factor of 2.6 percent, then in calendar year 2017 your PHA is eligible for $102.60. The amount your PHA actually receives will be its eligible amount prorated (i.e., $102.60 x .97277 = $99.81). HUD brings this up so that PHAs are not overly conservative in issuing vouchers in the second half of this year.
HUD recommends using the HCV Forecasting Tool
HUD highly recommends using their forecasting tool. The tool allows PHAs to track funding under different proration scenarios, test different success rate scenarios, track leasing, and project voucher trends, among other things.
Recent changes to the tool and new features include the following (taken from a HUD handout):
- The populated tool is now available to PHAs directly from HUD’s website;
- There is a cash management tab tracking disbursements, PHA-held reserves, and HUD-held reserves monthly;
- There are Year 3 and 4 projection sheets with their own funding proration options;
- There is a VASH breakout projection with funding and VASH spending and referral worksheet;
- There is a waiting list calculator translating issuances planned to a number of names to pull from waiting list; and
- The tool breaks out PBV and RAD: inventory leasing and vacancies.
HUD is planning on releasing a youtube video explaining how to use the tool and new features in the tool soon. NAHRO will notify our members as soon as HUD posts this video.
A link to the forecasting tool can be found on HUD’s HCV page here.