Housing Choice
The Housing Authority of Racine County (HARC) has opened up Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher applications this week. They will take online applications through March 24 and then randomly select 1,500 applications to go onto the Racine Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher waiting list. HOPES Center has been providing access to computers and assistance to people who need some help in the application process.
The Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher is a subsidized housing program of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Once approved for the voucher, a person is able to select their own apartment as long as the landlord agrees to accept rental assistance through the Section 8 program, it falls within fair market rental prices, and the unit passes a housing quality standards inspection. Program participants pay 30% of their income towards their units.
One Rapid Rehousing participant recently had a previous Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher application come to the top of the waiting list and was very excited. He came into the office to show us his letter from the Housing Authority and said, “I think this is a golden ticket to housing stability.” He had lived in shelter and then was unsheltered (living outside) when he had contact with our street outreach team. Street outreach helped him enter into Racine’s Coordinated Entry System, and he was eventually prioritized for one of HOPES Center’s Rapid Rehousing projects. As he prepares to leave Rapid Rehousing, he hopes to use the Section 8 Voucher and stay in the same apartment.
The street outreach team also has assisted a number of people to complete Section 8 Housing Voucher applications who went directly from the streets into a Section 8 supported unit. Two of them who had been chronically homeless entered their housing just as the COVID-19 pandemic began to be felt in Wisconsin in March 2020 and are still safely housed in their apartments. We always strongly encourage people who are experiencing homelessness, who are in short-medium term housing programs, or who have low incomes and are not stably housed to apply for the Housing Choice Voucher when applications are being taken. We are always there to help make it happen if someone needs assistance.