The city of Los Angeles will soon open its Section 8 housing list for the first time in 13 years, and analysts expect applications to come pouring in, according to an article by Doug Smith for the Los Angeles Times.
The Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher waiting list will open October 16, 2017 at 6 a.m., and will close again on October 29, 2017 at 5 p.m.
But even as the city comes close to opening the list once again, some residents who applied in 2004, the last time the list was open, are still waiting in line, according to the article.
From the article:
Because every Section 8 voucher is already taken, and federal budgets haven’t kept up with poverty, the only way to move up in line is for someone who has a voucher to relinquish it.
Turnover, due mainly to rising income or death, is rare. Today, with about 57,000 vouchers in use, only about 2,400 become available each year.
Now, the 300,000 applicants who applied in 2004 are nearly all through the line, meaning the city’s housing authority will soon open the waiting list once again. But this time, analysts expect the number of applications to double to up to 600,000 during the two week registration period in October.
From the article:
After an initial screening to drop those who neither live nor work in the city, and are therefore ineligible, 20,000 will be selected by lottery to make up the new Section 8 waiting list. The other 580,000 will be out of luck, though they are still able to sign on to the list of 35,000 waiting for public housing.
But even those chosen to be placed on the list could be waiting another ten years for their turn to receive their Section 8 voucher.
