What is Affordable Housing?
In a broader sense, affordable housing is for households with a limited income. Those units' rent or fees are controlled so families within a specific income range can afford to live decently.
Most affordable housing support low-moderate-income households earning less than 80% of area medium income (AMI). HUD sets the lower income limits at 80% and very low-income limits at 50% of the median income.
Workforce housing, on the other hand, is also considered a category under affordable housing. Workforce housing aims to promote local construction and give the average household more diverse housing choices. This type of housing is developed for a household income at a slightly higher tier, mostly between 60% to 120% of AMI. Take Montgomery County, for instance; their workforce housing program sets the limit at or below 120% of the area's medium income.
What is Public Housing?
Public housing was developed to provide rental housing for eligible-income households. According to HUD, there are approximately 970,000 household living in public housing units that 3,300 local housing agencies manage. They come in all housing types for various-size families.
What's the difference between Public Housing and Subsidized Housing
Based on the landlord
If a person lives in Public Housing, the housing authority that owns the building is the landlord. If the person lives in Subsidized Housing, the private owner is the landloard, who receive subsidies in exchange for renting to low-moderate-income residents, the owners could be individuals or corporations.
Subsidized Housing can be obtained through the government-issued voucher program, or the subsidy stays in the property. Most affordable multifamily housing developed nowadays chooses to get subsidy stays in the property.
Section 8
Section 8 housing voucher, or "Section 8," is a tenant-based public housing program. People with these vouchers can also apply for housing outside their states.
People who join this program will pay a cap-limited rent which is a portion (about 30%) of their adjusted income. That means tenants in public housing pay about 30% of their income for rent if the utility is included; the tenants are charged less than 30% if the utility is not included.
HUD’s formula on a Housing Assistance Payment. PHA stands for local public housing authority.
What does Community Solar have to do with Affordable Housing?
Solar panels were typically installed on the rooftop of each house. This traditional installation is difficult to apply to renters' situations because most renters live in a multifamily setting, and it is difficult to have separate onsite renewable energy systems.
Because those off-site renewable energy sources are non-dispatchable renewable energy, such as community solar, when we apply it to affordable housing, we use the electricity billing mechanism called "Net Metering." It is a system in which solar panels or other renewable energy generators are connected to the public utility power grid. The surplus power is transferred onto the grid, allowing customers to offset the cost of power drawn from their local utility.
Credits are Incidental Benefit
Since those extra energies are credits, they only apply to the unit, not the resident. Therefore the residents' energy consumption does not determine how much credit they will benefit from each month. In other words, using such a mechanism will not impact HUD's assisted housing formula and will not be considered to affect renters' utility allowance.
What's Next?
Burning fossil fuels has always been a more economical choice for many communities. Over the past 150 years, fossil fuel has been the major electricity production source. But burning fossil fuel produces large amounts of greenhouse gases, worsening global warming and producing harmful particles that impact human health and well-being.
Some communities still hesitate to use renewable energy because of the notion that renewable energy costs more. Fortunately, in recent years, "renewable energy has become the cheaper form of power today," confirmed by a recent report from the United Nations and the International renewable energy agency.
So Far, community solar might be the most straightforward way to alter the delivery method to meet each property's local constraints and make this source more available for everyone. Perhaps in the future, not only solar panels, other forms of renewable energy, such as wind, geothermal, hydropower, or even bioenergy, will have the potential to join this "communal distribution" to the local utility.
If you like this topic, you might also interested in “Homelessness and Housing Affordability.”
Notes and references:
Adjusted income means the income of the family less any deductions. People who get the standard voucher can apply anywhere within their state.
PHAs are required to adopt a minimum rent which may be set anywhere from $0 to $50. The PHA's minimum rent is a minimum TTP and becomes a part of the TTP formula, as shown in examples 1-3 above. (Details please refer to page. 4 the "Housing Choice Voucher Program Guidebook")
For other housing assistance programs administered by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, please refer to Rental Assistance link.
For workforce programs in Maryland, please see "Creating Workforce/ Affordable Housing" by the Department of Planning.
Workforce program in Montgomery County by the Department of Housing and Community Affairs (DHCA)
Renewable energy has become a cheaper form of power, confirmed by the United Nations and the International Renewable Energy Agency.
To get more detail on how the community solar work on your property, check out "Community Solar and Affordable Housing" by GBCI.