Features

Feds Want City to House Students By MATTHEW ARTZ

Friday February 04, 2005

Concluding that Berkeley’s public housing authority unfairly favors African Americans, federal regulators have suggested that the agency target other groups including UC Berkeley students. 

The findings—part of an October compliance audit of the city’s federally funded Section 8 Housing Program—confounded city officials, who questioned why the Bush Administration wanted to give housing vouchers to college students. 

“I see the main purpose of the program as helping to prevent homelessness,” said Berkeley Housing Director Steve Barton. “I don’t think it’s intended for graduate students getting financial aid.” Berkeley has given out vouchers to a small number of UC Students, mostly graduate students with families, Barton added. 

On Monday Barton sent a reply letter to the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), contesting its findings. HUD oversees the city’s Section 8 housing program, which manages over 1,700 federally subsidized housing vouchers and operates 61 rental units. 

Charles Hauptman, HUD’s office of housing regional director, said he expected the two sides to meet within the next month and ultimately hammer out an agreement to make sure Berkeley complied with federal civil rights laws.  

As far as offering vouchers to UC students, Hauptman said, the agency was more interested in diversifying the program participants than guaranteeing spaces for college students. “What we’re really looking to is marketing to specific groups that are least likely to apply,” he said. HUD excluded the recommendation about UC students in its Draft Negotiated Agreement sent to Berkeley officials after the October report. 

Last July, HUD audited the housing authority’s operations for the first time in the last six years, Barton said. 

The audit found that African Americans comprised approximately 74 percent of Section 8 tenants, compared with 24 percent for whites and three percent for Asians. 

Yet, among the more than 5,000 people on the Section 8 waiting list in 2001, HUD found that whites comprised 46 percent, African Americans 43 percent, Hispanics eight percent and Asians three percent. 

The numbers conflicted, HUD wrote in its audit, with a 2000 census report showing that 15.7 percent of the city city’s low-income population were African American, 30.5 percent were Asian, 10.1 percent were Hispanic and 41.5 percent were white. 

To boost participation by non-African Americans, HUD recommended that Berkeley reach out to Asians and Latinos and abolish its residency preference for applicants who either live, or work at least 10 hours, in Berkeley. 

Noting that the housing authority hadn’t housed anyone outside of Berkeley in the past year, HUD cautioned that Berkeley’s policy might amount to a residency requirement, illegal under HUD by-laws. 

In his reply letter, Barton contended that that resident preferences added to diversity by bringing more disabled tenants into the program and that there were few differences between the racial composition of residents and non-residents on the waiting list. 

As for the discrepancy between the racial composition of Section 8 tenants and those on the waiting list, Barton postulated that there might be a smaller percentage of whites with vouchers than on the waiting list because whites keep vouchers for fewer years because on average they are less poor or disadvantaged. He added that the African American population of Berkeley has declined significantly since many of the current Section 8 tenants received their vouchers. 

HUD’s mention of bringing more UC students into Section 8 housing intrigued ASUC Housing Director Jesse Arreguin, who said the city should take it as a cue to help provide affordable housing for students even though he thought the Section 8 option sounded impractical. 

“There’s a very long wait for the vouchers,” he said. “By the time students got one they’d probably be close to graduation.”