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The Insider's February 2009 feature, “Comply with VAWA Before Seeking Resident's Eviction,” p. 1, discussed how the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) protects domestic violence victims from being evicted solely on the basis of an incident relating to domestic violence. If a resident claims protection under the law, VAWA provides that site owners and managers may ask the resident to certify that he or she is a victim of domestic violence, dating violence, or stalking. HUD has now provided a certification form for this purpose, Form HUD-91066.

On Feb. 11, 2009, HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan announced that the Department will extend the Disaster Housing Assistance Program (DHAP), which had been set to expire on Feb. 28, 2009. HUD and FEMA will provide additional assistance as needed until Aug. 31, 2009, to people displaced by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in order to give them more time to transition out of the DHAP program.

Donovan toured the Gulf Coast with Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano in early March.

A 2008 HUD report to Congress on intergenerational housing needs found that about 50 percent of very low-income, grandparent-headed, renter households paid more than half their income for housing. HUD defines an “intergenerational household” as a family receiving (or “covered by”) housing rental assistance, with a family member or other relative who is 62 years of age or older and who is raising a child.

According to an analysis of Census data by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, the proportion of renters among U.S. households has increased steadily in recent months.

In the fourth quarter of 2008, there were an estimated 632,000 more renter households in the U.S. than during the same period a year before. In the same period, the number of homeowner households grew by 344,000. Thus, the proportion of renters in the U.S. rose to 32.5 percent from 32.2 percent the year before, the highest proportion of renters since the third quarter of 2000.

A recent report by the Center on Policy and Budget Priorities (CPBP) claims that reforming public housing is less costly than increasing the number of rental assistance vouchers.

CPBP, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit think tank, found that the cost of modernization and operating subsidies is 8 percent less than the price of providing replacement vouchers to individuals.

“Green” technology, devices, and plans are typically cheaper and easier to implement when constructing a new building than when retrofitting an older building. But the incentives in the Mark-to-Market (M2M) program offered through HUD's Office of Affordable Housing Preservation (OAHP) is making green rehabs more affordable.