ANCOR is sharing this article by Politico Pro because as we previously shared, one of the ways the shutdown affected people with disabilities was by endangering housing assistance programs.
“All 1,175 of the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s rental assistance contracts that expired during the government shutdown have been authorized for renewal, a top official told House appropriators today.
‘I’m pleased to report that as of today all of the ones for December and January have been authorized for renewal,’ said Brian Montgomery, Federal Housing Administration commissioner and acting deputy secretary.
About half of those project-based contracts still need to get an owner signature, and ‘we actually made a decision a couple days ago to accept PDF signatures,’ he said, adding, ‘our goal is to get this all wrapped up by Friday, in case the government shuts down again.’
Montgomery explained that 23,000 HUD contracts expire and are renewed on a rolling basis — and that HUD recalled staff to work on the expired ones — but he was unable to answer why the department hadn’t better anticipated the possibility of a shutdown.
‘There were no evictions of our residents on any of our properties as a result of the shutdown,’ he said. ‘Zero.’”
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