Beginning in 2013, HUD has moved Section 811 — a housing program for low income people with disabilities — to a model called Project Rental Assistance (PRA) that makes it more likely to serve people who have experienced or are at risk of homelessness.
Historically, participants entered the Section 811 program for very low income, non-elderly people with disabilities through referrals from service organizations. People experiencing homelessness have not typically been linked into those service streams, so Section 811 did not play a major role in strategies for ending chronic homelessness.
The Notice of Funding Availability (NOFA) targeted the PRA program to extremely low income applicants and now specifically mentions people experiencing homelessness as a potential target population. Several of the states that received the first two rounds of program funding in FY2012 and FY2015 are focusing on people with disabilities who are leaving homelessness or are at high risk of becoming homeless.
The new program model for Section 811 also has a stronger link to community-based services funded by Medicaid. In order to be eligible to apply for grant funding, a state housing agency must have a memorandum of understanding with the state Medicaid agency, in which both parties agree to jointly provide affordable housing (through the Section 811 program) and the services that people want and need to sustain their housing and their health (through Medicaid).
This is in effect a scattered-site form of project-based permanent supportive housing. Owners of affordable housing properties, often financed by Low Income Housing Tax Credits, agree to rent no more than 25 percent of the property’s units to people with disabilities. This cap applies to units both for those who are eligible for the PRA program and to units set aside for other people who have disabilities through other programs. The owner receives a rent subsidy for each unit occupied by a program participant.
Abt Associates has been contracted by HUD to lead an evaluation of the Section 811 Project Rental Assistance Demonstration Program, looking at health and quality of life outcomes among participants as the program ramps up and more people get into housing.
Abt’s task was to analyze the impact of these changes on program participants. Abt’s mixed methods approach assessed:
- The extent to which state housing agencies and health agency partners developed effective, sustainable partnerships that increased housing availability for people who are poor and disabled.
- Early evidence on how participants fared on a range of issues from quality of life to health-service utilization compared with comparable individuals.
- The program’s cost effectiveness.
A final evaluation report was released in March 2020. Publications include:
- HUD and CMS Team Up to Provide Housing and Services for People with Disabilities (blog post)
- Phase II Evaluation Final Report Implementation and Short-Term Outcomes
- Process Evaluation Report
Gretchen Locke is a principal associate in the Social & Economic Policy Division of Abt Associates. She specializes in evaluation research on programs for people who have special needs, including people who have disabilities and people who are at risk of homelessness or experiencing homelessness. Her research has focused on individuals with chronic patterns of homelessness, permanent supportive housing, and the intersection of the housing and health systems. Learn more
Last updated October 2021