It provides choice to the applicants to find a home in Hamilton County that suits their particular family needs."
“I’m going to try again,” said Shamieka Hart, a 25-year-old mother of a 2-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son.
She was among 6,533 people who applied for CHA’s voucher program when the waiting list opened Jan. 26 for the first time in four years. The agency used a computer to randomly select 1,000 applications for its latest housing choice voucher waiting list. The authority has 250 vouchers available.
CHA posted the 1,000 applications selected on its website Monday. Paper lists are posted at CHA public housing management offices.
The housing agency will contact the first 100 people by letter later this week and issue vouchers the following week.
CHA expects to get through the waiting list of 1,000 and open the list again in 18 months or earlier. Those not selected need to reapply when the waiting list opens again.
Those selected have the opportunity to obtain affordable housing while paying only a third of their income, and the federal government provides rent funding to make up the difference.
“It provides choice to the applicants to find a home in Hamilton County that suits their particular family needs,” CHA Executive Director Betsy McCright said. “From the landlord’s perspective it’s a good program because landlords can be guaranteed their rental income.”
The housing authority wants more property owners participating in the program. Only 30 to 50 percent of people with vouchers got them leased in 2014 because so few landlords accepted vouchers, according to CHA officials.
Being in the Housing Choice voucher program would mean a safer, more comfortable neighborhood, Hart said.
She’s lived in the East Lake Courts public housing site, the scene of a number of shootings and assaults, for three months.
Contact staff writer Yolanda Putman at yputman@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6431.