Section 811 Supportive Housing for Persons with Disabilities
May 6, 2009
By Ann O’Hara, Associate Director, Technical Assistance Collaborative
The Section 811 program provides communities with funding for housing and rental assistance for people with disabilities. Despite significant changes in disability policy over the past 16 years, the program has changed very little since it was first authorized. A Section 811 reform bill (H.R. 1675) was reintroduced in the House on March 23, 2009.
The Section 811 Program is administered by HUD’s Office of Housing.
History
The Section 811 Supportive Housing for Persons with Disabilities program was authorized by the National Affordable Housing Act of 1990. For more than 30 years, Section 811 – and its pre-cursor, the Section 202 Supportive Housing for Persons with Disabilities Program – has provided funding to mission-driven nonprofit housing developers seeking to build and operate supportive housing for low income households with the most severe disabilities.
Program Summary
A home of one’s own, whether rented or owned, is the cornerstone of independence for people with disabilities, including people with serious and long-term disabilities who can also benefit from in-home or community-based supports. Section 811 provides supportive housing for people with serious and long-term disabilities, including physical or developmental disabilities as well as serious mental illness. Participants must be 18 years of age or older and have very low incomes at or below 50% of median income. By law, community-based services and supports must be offered and available to tenants living in Section 811-funded housing. However, the supportive services must be voluntary and cannot be mandated as a condition of participation in the program.
Section 811 is one of the few remaining HUD program that ensures housing affordability for people with disabilities with extremely low incomes, such as people who rely on Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments. Nationally, SSI payments equal only 18% of the average area median income. Many people who receive SSI and do not benefit from the Section 811 program are unnecessarily residing in restrictive settings such as nursing homes and public institutions or continue to live at home with aging parents.
There are two separate program components authorized in the Section 811 program: the Capital Advance/Project Rental Assistance Contract (PRAC) component and a tenant-based rental assistance component. These components allow for the building and operation of housing for people with disabilities.
Capital Advance/PRAC Funding. New Section 811 Capital Advance/ (PRAC) funding is announced each year through HUD’s SuperNOFA published in the spring. Applications for capital advance/PRAC funding must include a supportive services plan ‘well designed’ to meet the needs of people with disabilities and approved by the appropriate local or state agency. Examples of supportive services offered in conjunction with Section 811 projects include case management, assistance with housing or residential skills such as landlord/tenant obligations, housekeeping assistance, assistance with skills of daily living and others. However, residents cannot be required to accept any supportive services as a condition of tenancy.
The Section 811 Capital Advance/PRAC component provides interest-free capital advances to nonprofit sponsors to help finance the development of ‘single purpose’ permanent supportive rental properties, including independent living projects and group homes. The purchase of condominiums and cooperative units is permitted but bureaucratically difficult. The Capital Advance does not have to be repaid as long as the housing remains available for very low income people with disabilities for at least 40 years. A three-year renewable PRAC is awarded with the capital advance and covers the difference between the HUD-approved cost of operating the housing (maintenance and repairs, utilities, insurance, etc.) and tenant rents which are set at 30% of income. New 811-funded group homes may not assist more than 8 people and each person must have his/her own bedroom. New independent living projects may not exceed 24 units although the HUD Secretary can waive both size limits on a case-by-case basis.
Tenant-based rental assistance. The tenant-based voucher program funded by Section 811 is officially known as the Section 8 Mainstream Housing Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities program and is administered by an estimated 145 public housing authorities (PHAs) and 40 nonprofit organizations. PHAs are required to track so-called Mainstream vouchers separately from other Housing Choice Vouchers and issue/re-issue them only to people with disabilities. Disability advocates remain concerned that some number of these Section 811-funded vouchers may be assisting households without disabilities.
Funding
In FY09, Congress appropriated $250 million for the Section 811 program, a 5% increase from FY 2008. However, rising costs and difficulty leveraging other funding means that only 930 new Capital Advance/PRAC units were awarded in 2008. In addition, almost $100 million is ‘taken off the top’ of the appropriation each year to pay for the on-going cost of the Mainstream vouchers. No new Mainstream vouchers have been made available since 2003.
What Advocates Need to Know Now
Despite significant changes in disability policy over the past 16 years, the 811 program has changed very little since it was first authorized by the National Affordable Housing Act of 1990. Section 811’s current program structure makes it virtually impossible to integrate 811-financed supportive housing units within a larger rental housing property – a housing approach that most people with disabilities prefer and one that is also strongly encouraged by most state disability policies. It is also difficult to ‘blend’ Section 811 funding with federal Low Income Housing Tax Credit financing – the nation’s major source of financing for affordable rental housing development.
In March of 2009, Representatives Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Judy Biggert (R-IL) re-introduced legislation to reform the Section 811 Supportive Housing for People with Disabilities Program. The bill, known as the Frank Melville Supportive Housing Investment Act of 2009 (H.R. 1675), is designed to spur the creation of thousands of new Section 811 permanent housing units every year. An identical bill passed unanimously in the House of Representatives on September 17, 2008. Similar legislation in the Senate did not leave committee prior to the 110th Congress adjournment.
The Section 811 Permanent Supportive Housing Program for People with Disabilities is a critically important federal program that assists the lowest income people with serious and long-term disabilities to live independently in your local community by providing integrated affordable rental housing linked with voluntary services and supports. This essential and ground-breaking legislation will help address the enormous and unrelenting housing crisis faced by millions of extremely low income people with disabilities and will spur the creation of thousands of new Section 811 units every year. By authorizing a new and innovative Section 811 PRAC Demonstration program, the bill will enable communities to create thousands of new Section 811 units each year without a substantial increase of federal Section 811 appropriations levels. Communities will be able to do this by leveraging new set-asides of supportive housing units in federal Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) properties and HOME-funded projects. The PRAC Demonstration program will provide the essential rental subsidy to reduce rents in these projects to affordable levels for over 4 million people with disabilities receiving federal Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits.
The legislation also reforms the existing Section 811 production program to better leverage other capital funding and reduce barriers to ‘mixed-finance’ Section 811 projects. These reforms will also increase the number of units created each year through the current Section 811 production program.
More than 30,000 units have been developed since the program’s inception. A separate tenant based rental assistance component assists 14,000 households with disabilities in the private rental market.
What to Say to Legislators
Advocates are encouraged to contact members of Congress with the message that people with disabilities continue to be the poorest people in the nation. It is virtually impossible for people with disabilities receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI) to obtain decent, safe, affordable, and accessible housing in the community unless they receive housing assistance. Currently a person receiving SSI needs to pay 112.1% of their monthly income in order rent a modest one-bedroom unit.
By enacting the Frank Melville Supportive Housing Investment Act of 2009, Congress can address this housing crisis by enacting a reinvigorated Section 811 program that is ready to create thousands of new integrated permanent supportive housing opportunities for people with significant and long-term disabilities every year without needing to double or triple appropriation levels.
Advocates are encouraged to contact members of Congress with the message to:
Support H.R. 1675 and identical legislation soon to be reintroduced in the Senate to reform and reinvigorate the Section 811 program
Provide at least $250 million in Section 811 appropriations for FY10
For More Information
Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities Housing Task Force • 202-783-2229 • www.c-c-d.org/tf-housing.htm
The Technical Assistance Collaborative • www.tacinc.org
