HOUSING NEWS:

NEW SECTION 8 HOUSING VOUCHERS

(Article published in HWW March 2007)

Despite subfreezing weather, lines formed around the block for several days last month after Mayor Bloomberg announced that 22,000 new Section 8 housing vouchers would be made available over the next two years to low income New Yorkers. NYCHA (New York City Housing Authority) was reopening its Section 8 waiting list, closed since 1994 to all but emergency applicants.

"I waited in line in the cold for three hours," said a young woman, one hand pushing her baby’s stroller and the other clutching her new white-and-yellow Section 8 application.

Getting the applications became easier as word got around that you could find them at not only the NYCHA Borough Applications Offices but at any of the management offices of NYCHA’s many projects in all five boroughs.

Completed applications for this year’s vouchers must be postmarked no later than May 14, 2007, and mailed to:

New York City Housing Authority

Post Office Box 445, Church Street Station

New York, NY 10008-0445

Jane Bock, staff attorney at Legal Aid’s Homeless Rights Project advises if you have applied and think you’re already on the waiting list, you would have priority so you should call NYCHA to be sure they have record of your application with your correct address, and reapply if necessary.

DHS Commissioner Robert Hess said "families and individuals in shelter will not receive a priority for these Section 8 resources." But that’s not to say they shouldn’t apply. As Jane Bock points out it would be "unlawful for the city to discriminate against shelter families." And she urges "Families who are in substandard HSP apartments should also be encouraged to apply for Section 8."