A Good Place To Live
Having a good place to live is important. Through your Public Housing Agency (or PHA) the Housing Voucher Program will help you to rent a good place. You are free to choose any house or apartment you like, as long as it meets certain requirements. Please click here to find, "A Good Place To Live."
Legal Services
We recommend contacting Prairie State Legal Services for sound legal advice. Prairie State Legal Services is a not-for-profit corporation that offers free legal services for low income persons and those over 60 who have serious civil legal problems and need legal help to solve them.
You may reach them at their website: http://www.pslegal.org/index.htm or as follows.
Larry Smith - Managing Attorney
325 West Washington Street, Suite 100
Waukegan, IL 60085
Telephone: (847) 662-6295 or (800) 942-3940
TDD (847) 662-4441
Fax (847) 662-6986
Important Note About Portability
The receiving housing authority may deny assistance, or terminate the family, in accordance with its applicable rules (Administrative Plan). Thus, it is important for any voucher participant who wishes to port to become familiar with the rules of the receiving housing authority. This is especially true if the participant or a member of the particpant's family has a criminal background.
Action or inactions by the household causing termination...
EXPLANATION OF PORTABILITY
Lake County Housing Authority is currently Billing the Initial Housing Authorities who transfer a voucher to our jurisdiction.
WHAT IS PORTABILITY?
The ability of a family to move from one housing authority's jurisdiction to another and continue to receive assistance.
Portability allows a family holding a Voucher to move anywhere in the USA in the jurisdiction of a housing authority with tenant-based assistance. If you currently have a Voucher and desire to move outside this Authority's jurisdiction of Lake County, (excluding the cities of Waukegan and North Chicago), you must be briefed on the Housing Choice Voucher Program, receive a Voucher from this Authority and then be transferred to the new Authority's jurisdiction.
The Lake County Housing Authority may not provide portability assistance to a family if the family moved out of their assisted unit in violation of the lease.
If you are not living in this Authority's jurisdiction when you receive your Voucher you may not qualify for portability until you have lived in a unit in this Authority's jurisdiction for at least 12 months.
TERMS:
Initial PHA: The Lake County Housing Authority is the Initial PHA because it is the agency who issued the Voucher.
Receiving PHA: The housing authority serving the area you are moving to.
Jurisdiction: The geographic area within the boundaries where a housing authority is authorized to function.
Absorbs: Refers to the Receiving Housing Authority incorporating into its program a family who has moved from another Housing Authority's jurisdiction.
INCOME LIMIT RESTRICTIONS FOR NEW ADMISSIONS:
If the family moving to another jurisdiction is not a current participant of the Authority’s voucher program, the family must be income eligible in the area where the family initially leases a unit with the assistance under the Program. The Income Limit for the receiving Authority is used for these families.
If the family is a current participant in this Authority's program, income eligibility is not redetermined when the family moves to the Receiving Authority under portability procedures.
WHO DOES WHAT?
Family
Your family has a responsibility to:
Notify this Agency (your assigned Housing Quality Specialist) where you want to move.
Contact the Receiving Authority and comply with that Authority's procedure for incoming portable families.
Submit a Request for Tenancy Approval in the Receiving Authority's jurisdiction by the established deadline.
INITIAL PHA:
Advise the family how to contact and request assistance from the Receiving PHA.
Advise the family that they must promptly contact the Receiving PHA and comply with that Authority's procedures for incoming portable families.
Promptly notify the Receiving PHA to expect the family.
If the family is not a current participant in the Section 8 rental assistance program, determine whether the family is income eligible in the area where the family wants to lease a unit.
SEND the required information to the Receiving PHA (cannot be carried by the family).
Carry out other obligations as stated in the HUD regulations regarding payments.
Receiving PHA:
Receiving PHA must decide whether to bill this agency for the family's housing assistance payment to the owner or absorb the family into its own program.
Will perform all administrative functions governing the family's program participation including issuing a Voucher to the family. The Receiving PHA's policies, Subsidy Standards and Payment Standards apply.
Lake County Housing Authority is currently Billing Initial Housing Authorities who transfer a voucher to our jurisdiction.