Like many large municipalities, Albemarle County seeks to assist some households with the cost of rent through a voucher program. With limited funds available, there is a waiting list that only opens periodically and the next window is opening soon for some specific places to live.
“Waiting lists for Albemarle County’s Tenant-Based, Treesdale 2-Bedroom, Treesdale 3-Bedroom, Crozet Meadows, The Crossings at Fourth & Preston, and Scottsville Schools voucher programs will open at 10 a,m. on Monday, May 6, 2024, until Monday, May 13, 2024, at 4 p.m.,” reads a press release that was sent out this morning.
For more information on how to apply and for eligibility requirements, visit Albemarle’s website.
Under the program, participating households pay 30 percent of their adjusted income to rent and Albemarle County’s Office of Housing pays the rest using funds that come through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Households are selected based on a series of criteria, but there’s an element of chance to get added to the list.
“Due to the high demand for vouchers, the Albemarle County Department of Human Service’s Office of Housing uses a lottery-based waiting list system,” the release continues. “Once the application period closes, complete applications are sorted at random, and a fixed number of applicants will be placed into the spots that are available.”
The Office of Housing used to be within the Department of Social Services but has since been moved elsewhere under Human Services in the county’s organizational chart. Still, a DSS report to the Board of Supervisors last week claimed that 443 families a month receive financial support through housing vouchers totaling $3.7 million.
Not all of the vouchers available to the county are used. Supervisor Mike Pruitt said at that meeting that one reason the county has low utilization rates for housing vouchers is a lack of inventory.
“There are richer communities than us that have utilization rates in excess of 95 percent and that is something we should be striving to,” Pruitt said.
Pruitt said Charlottesville has a supplemental voucher program that he would like the county to emulate.
“And half of them live in our county,” Pruitt said. “Those are Albemarle residents, Albemarle voting citizens, who are being paid to live here by Charlottesville and I might suggest it might be prudent to have a little matching on that and in some way mirror that program or figure out how to regionalize it.”
The city allocates $900,000 a year to the supplemental voucher program which is administered by the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. In the most recent period, the program served 61 households and disbursed $55,586 between March 16, 2024 and April 15, 2024.
Before you go: The time to write and research of this article is covered by paid subscribers to Charlottesville Community Engagement. In fact, this particular installment is from the April 22, 2024 edition of the newsletter. To ensure this research can be sustained, please consider becoming a paid subscriber or contributing monthly through Patreon.
