On July 5, HUD published a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) for fiscal year 2023 Continuum of Care (CoC) Competition and renewal or replacement of Youth Homeless Demonstration Program (YHDP) grants. More than $3.1 billion is available in total for state and local governments, nonprofits, PHAs and tribal entities. Award amounts will range from grantee to grantee with a minimum award amount of $2,500 to a maximum amount of $15 million.

HUD will prioritize funding for CoCs that have demonstrated the capacity to reallocate
funding from lower to higher performing projects. Project applications for YHDP renewal and replacement must be completed in full and in accordance with the application processes outlined in the NOFO.

The application deadline for this NOFO is September 28, 2023, no later than 8 p.m. ET. The application can be found on grants.gov to apply and the full NOFO can be found here.

For more information on the NOFO, please see our next edition of The NAHRO Monitor on July 18th.

Shortfall applications due August 7, 2023

On July 7, HUD published PIH Notice 2023-18, “Implementation of Public Housing Operating Fund Shortfall Funding from Federal Fiscal Year (FFY) 2023 Appropriations.” This notice updates PIH Notice 2022-17 with requirements relevant to the $25 million provided under the 2023 Consolidated Appropriations Act. These changes include agencies with shortfall grants from multiple years, budget submission requirements, budget approval processes, and grant restrictions based on specific MTW flexibilities. All PHAs with public housing—including MTW agencies—may apply.

On July 11, HUD published allocation information for Housing Trust Fund (HTF) grantees. The notice lists the formula allocation amounts for each eligible HTF grantee–this covers all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the United States Virgin Islands.

In total, more than $382 million has been allocated for HTF grantees. For the full list please see below:

On June 28, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) welcomed applications to the $7 billion grant competition Solar for All, which was created by the Inflation Reduction Act’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) to expand existing and implement new residential solar investments in low-income and disadvantaged communities. The program will award up to 60 grants to states, territories, Tribal governments, municipalities, and eligible nonprofits.

NAHRO’s Summer Symposium includes a session titled Green Energy Funding in the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act which will include a panelist from the EPA to discuss the NOFO. Register here.

The application deadline for submission is September 26, 2023. In addition, applicants are required to submit a Notice of Intent by the following dates:

• July 31, 2023, for all states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico
• August 14, 2023, for U.S. territories, municipalities and eligible nonprofits
• August 28, 2023, for Tribal governments and Intertribal Consortia

PHAs can apply for grant funding individually or as subrecipients in applications. PHAs can also apply through coalition applications with other organizations. The minimum amount to apply for the program is $25 million and recipients must serve a minimum of 10,000 low-income households.  

While PHAs can still participate in awarded programs in which they are not formal partners or subbidders, they must contact the state or regional sponsor applying for the award before September 26.

Seventy-five percent of the grant award must be in the form of “financial assistance” which means grants, loans, subsidies and other direct financial support to offtakers (tenant recipients). There is also a requirement that each offtaker or participant demonstrate a 20% or better reduction in their electricity bill. The other 25% can pay for technical assistance, outreach, marketing support, contractor training, tenant education, interconnection support, and program management.

The application can be found on grants.gov.  

On July 6, HUD released the “National Standards for the Physical Inspection of Real Estate and Associated Protocols, Scoring Notice” for public inspection. It will be officially published in The Federal Register on July 7, 2023. Public Housing inspections were scheduled to begin July 1, 2023. 

The notice outlines how NSPIRE inspections will be scored and responds to comments submitted in response to the Proposed Scoring Notice. It significantly revises the proposed notice in two ways.  

1. The final notice eliminates the new letter grade requirement. Now, NSPIRE scores will no longer provide a letter grade categorizing a property’s physical condition based on the inspection score it receives.  

2. Projects that have one deficiency in multiple parts of a building will only have points deducted once per “inspectable area”—units, inside common areas, and outside areas—but not multiple times per each inspectable area.  

The final notice does not revise the new methodology, which prioritizes resident health and safety by prioritizing units most heavily. Final scores will be calculated by weighting each deficiency the inspection finds. Weights are determined by the location and severity of the deficiency. Those found in units are weighted more heavily than common areas inside buildings, and deficiencies outside of buildings are assigned the lowest weights. At the same time, “life-threatening” deficiencies, as defined by HOTMA, are given the greatest weight and the lowest severity deficiencies are given the lowest. Therefore, a life-threatening deficiency found in a unit will result in the largest possible score deduction of any single deficiency.  

The NSPIRE Administrative Procedures Notice was published on July 3, 2023. For more information, please see the pre-published Final Scoring Notice, NAHRO’s July 3^rd NSPIRE coverage, and the forthcoming July 15 edition of The NAHRO Monitor.