HOUSING CHOICE VOUCHER PROGRAM
The Housing Choice Voucher rental housing
assistance program is the Arlington Housing
Authority’s (AHA) largest program, assisting over
3,700 households with monthly rent assistance
payments. In FY 2014, 6,254 applicants were
interviewed, resulting in 523 new admissions.
Housing Authorities earn an administrative fee
based in part on the number of participants
served. During the past 11 years, the federal
government has prorated administrative
fee payments to Housing Authorities. The
administration of Housing Voucher services
is manpower intensive. In the existing federal
political and economic climate, the AHA
determined it is unlikely the federal government
will discontinue making prorated administrative
fee payments in the future. As a result, it is
necessary and appropriate to identify a solution
to enable the
AHA to fulfill its
programmatic
responsibilities in
a more efficient
less costly manner.
The AHA identified
solutions which
involved emerging
technology. Objectives were established to 1)
increase the processing speed and efficiency of
HUD required transactions and related processes
while maintaining effective quality assurance,
2) appropriately equip staff to increase their
individual caseloads by 35%, and 3) migrate to a
paperless operation.
After considerable research, the AHA identified
and invested in technology solutions to
accomplish these objectives. The AHA has
implemented solutions in several phases.
Document Imaging was implemented first,
followed by interactive software that enables
its client audiences to securely access their
information in the AHA’s database, to add
and edit data and complete H U