Community Choice Demonstration: HUD issued a report this week on the initial implementation of the housing mobility demonstration funded by Congress in the 2019 and 2020 Appropriations Acts. Titled “Rapid Cycle Evaluation Report: An Early Look at the Community Choice Demonstration,” the report assesses first-year results for the eight sites in the demonstration (Cleveland, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Nashville, New Orleans, New York City, Pittsburgh, and Rochester). Although the first-year numbers were relatively low, the success rate for families in the demonstration were deemed statistically significant, and more than 5x the number of families receiving mobility services were able to move to higher opportunity areas, in comparison with housing voucher families receiving no mobility services.The report also noted features that were appealing to landlords in the eight sites, including expedited inspections and lease-up procedures, a damage mitigation fund, and a designated point of contact at the PHA. For participating families, the study confirmed previous research in Seattle (CMTO) that cited one-on-one support from housing mobility counselors as the most important factor in successful moves. In contrast to the Seattle study, in this initial year participating families were primarily families that already had vouchers, as opposed to families with new (time-sensitive) vouchers, which affected the total number of moves in the first year.

New HUD data tools: Although we don’t expect to see a new fair housing rule anytime soon, HUD has continued to update its AFFH Data and Mapping Tool for jurisdictions that want to pursue fair housing planning (including states like NY, MD, CA, and CT that have passed their own AFFH laws). Another useful data tool that HUD recently unveiled is the Socio-Demographic Data Dashboards which provide easily accessible (and mapped) current data on every local jurisdiction in the country. For a summary of other recent HUD advances, see this end-of-term message from the folks at the Office of Policy Development and Research.

Social housing provisions in the HOME program final rule: Last week, HUD also released a HOME Investment Partnerships Program final rule,which includes improved definitions of the HOME-eligible “Community Housing Development Organizations” (CHDOs) to ensure greater local accountability and control, plus enhanced tenant protections for tenants in HOME properties, and revised provisions on the eligibility of Community Land Trusts, to recognize the variations that exist in this social housing model and to ensure that HOME funds support CLTs that benefit low income residents.

Another recently released HUD resource, “Advancing AFFH at the State Level,” describes California’s successful experience with its own state AFFH law and encourages other states to follow (see also our 2022 report, “How States Can Affirmatively Further Fair Housing”).

Finally, if you would like to meet the new HUD nominee, his hearing commences today at 10:00 this morning – you can tune in here.

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P.S. – please remember to register for the National Conference on School Diversity, NCSD’s 5th national conference and the largest cross-sector school integration convening in the nation. February 27-28 in DC – learn more and register here.

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