Agenda - 03-06-2014 - 6a - Laserfiche WebLink

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22 1 kinds of cases. She mentioned a variety of programs that keep people from sliding into 2 abject poverty, mainly Food & Nutrition and Medicaid. 3 4 Nancy Coston said that a lot of their work is crisis oriented. She acknowledged the 5 additional $100,000 the Board approved this year for Emergency Assistance, with most 6 of that going towards rents and utilities at number two. Some counties don't provide 7 much or any of this funding. 8 9 Nancy Coston said she thought the Skills Development Center had been very effective. 10 The Work First program for Subsidized Employment was very helpful for folks 11 transitioning after losing jobs, although those funds are no longer available. DSS has 12 been in the process clearing the child care subsidy wait list. She said the fact that there 13 are 12,000 Medicaid families and 6,200 Food & Nutrition households in Orange County 14 demonstrates there is a lot of need. 15 16 Nancy Coston described how the Adolescent Parenting program works. She noted that 17 one of the huge risk factors for not becoming financially self-sufficient is having a 18 second child before completing high school (or having one child and NOT finishing high 19 school). 20 21 Housing Director Tara Fikes referred to the information in Attachment 4b at page 123 22 about 2014 Housing & Urban Development (HUD) Department income levels related to 23 housing affordability. She said that a large number of residents are paying more than 24 50% of their income for rent (which should not be more than 30%). Utility costs are a big 25 part of housing costs. 26 27 Tara Fikes then referred to the information on pages 124-125 pertaining to what hourly 28 pay would be needed to provide a housing wage. In North Carolina, in order to afford a 29 two bedroom apartment at an average monthly rent of$737, a person would have to 30 earn $14.17 per hour. With the higher average housing cost in Orange County, that 31 figure would be $16.13 per hour. 32 33 She explained several HUD programs that focus on assistance with rental housing: the 34 Section 8 voucher program administered by the County: and the low-rent conventional 35 public housing program administered by the Town of Chapel Hill. Those two programs 36 involve nearly 1,000 units of housing. There are also have about 14 apartment 37 complexes throughout Orange County that were built using various forms of federal 38 funding — most are in Chapel Hill and Carrboro and 5 of those are designated for the 39 senior population. 40 41 Tara Fikes said that is not enough - there is an acute need for rental housing in our 42 community. Most apartment construction in the last few years has been at the luxury 43 level that the average worker is not able to afford. 44 45 Commissioners and staff discussed the child care subsidy waiting list. Nancy Coston 46 said they started the wait list about 20 and did not take anyone off it for a year and a 47 half. She said they finally received some federal dollars after the State decided what 48 their budget would be so they could take some people off the list by September. Then 49 the federal shutdown happened, and not only could we not take people off the list, they 50 were threatening not to pay the folks already on. Now DSS is working to clear the wait 51 list. When they have a stale waiting list, people's circumstances change as time passes 52 and the clearing of the list can be misleading. She said that if you don't clear the wait 53 list at least once a year (by sending letters out to applicants), it can become an almost 54 unworkable situation. 55