Champaign County, Illinois; Orlando, Florida; and Tacoma, Washington gain MTW status

On January 29, 2010, U.S. Housing and Urban Development Assistant Secretary Sandra B. Henriquez announced that the public housing authorities of Champaign County, Illinois; Orlando, Florida; and Tacoma, Washington have been selected for HUD's Moving To Work (MTW) Program. These agencies will be joining 30 other MTW agencies across the U.S. in designing and testing innovative, locally developed housing and self-sufficiency strategies.

New MTW Agency Site Summaries

As part of HUD's 2009 budget appropriation (Section 236, title II, division I of the Omnibus Appropriations Act, 2009, enacted March 11, 2009), Congress directed HUD to add three agencies to the MTW program. The agencies had to be high performing under HUD's Public Housing Assessment System (PHAS); be a recipient of a HUD HOPE VI grant; and operate no more 5,000 aggregate housing vouchers and public housing units.

The Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH) issued PIH Notice 2009-29 on August 19, 2009, offering eligible public housing authorities the opportunity to apply for admission to the MTW demonstration program. HUD identified 17 potential applicants and received applications from eight housing authorities.

Applications were ranked according to criteria listed in the Notice. The Department also developed a Q & A to assist potential applicants. The three agencies selected received the highest scores.