Featured News - Current News - Archived News - News Categories

NYS Homes and Community Renewal announces expansion of COVID-19 rent relief program through Feb. 1

Submitted

Fri, Dec 18th 2020 09:00 am

Applications for COVID-19 rent relief program available online at HCR.NY.GOV/RRP

Previous applicants do not have to reapply to receive consideration

New York State Homes and Community Renewal Commissioner RuthAnne Visnauskas announced the COVID-19 rent relief program will be reopened for application with expanded eligibility criteria in an effort to serve New Yorkers who may have not had the opportunity to initially apply and those who may have been previously ineligible. HCR will accept applications from households starting at 9 a.m. Friday, Dec. 18, and running through Monday, Feb. 1, 2021.

“HCR is acutely aware that this pandemic has put more pressure on New Yorkers who were already housing insecure, and these improvements to the Legislature’s original program will expand access to rent relief while building on Gov. Cuomo’s eviction protections,” Visnauskas said. “We worked around the clock for months to ensure rent-burdened households received the assistance for which they qualified. But more can be done. Gov. Cuomo has taken repeated action to protect residents from eviction and foreclosure, and as a long-time housing advocate, he understands that our efforts must be unending. Tenants need our support in order to offset the long-term implications of this public health and economic crisis.”

The program’s eligibility has been changed to no longer require households to have been considered “rent-burdened” prior to the pandemic in order to qualify. Rent burden is defined as paying more than 30% of monthly gross income toward rent.

Residents who previously applied for COVID-19 rent relief will not have to reapply to be reconsidered. HCR will reevaluate all applications that were denied according to the new criteria and issue revised determination letters to applicants.

To qualify for this one-time subsidy, low-income renters impacted by the pandemic must meet all of the following criteria:

√ Must be a renter and have a primary residence in New York state;

√ Applicants must have lost income during the period of April 1 to July 31, 2020;

√ Before March 7, 2020, household income must have been at or below 80% of the area median income, adjusted for household size; and

√ Households must be “rent-burdened” during the months they are applying for assistance between April 1 to July 31, 2020.

For the purposes of assessing applicant income, cash benefits and unemployment benefits are both included in the calculation.

The subsidy for eligible applicants will be calculated as: the difference between the household’s rent burden on March 1 and the household’s rent burden during the months of April, May, June and July. For applicants who were not considered rent-burdened on March 1, the subsidy will be calculated to bring them to the 30% rent burden threshold.

Applications are available on the COVID-19 rent relief program portal on HCR’s website here: https://hcr.ny.gov/rrp.

The program’s online application is available in both English and Spanish. Over the next week, HCR will provide translated applications in six foreign languages – Spanish, Chinese, Russian, Haitian-Creole, Korean and Bengali. The agency will also work with local not-for-profit organizations to ensure New Yorkers receive the assistance they need to apply.

Throughout the application period, residents who need help or have questions about their application can contact HCR’s COVID-19 rent relief program call center for assistance at 1-833-499-0318 or [email protected]. Call center representatives are available 8:30 a.m. until 5 p.m. weekdays.

HCR will also allow to applicants who are unable or uncomfortable applying online to do so over the phone rather than by mail. More information on this assistance and expanded language support on the hotline and will be available on HCR’s website in the coming days.

Since July, HCR has reviewed and processed more than 90,000 applications to the COVID-19 rent relief program to determine eligibility according to requirements of the legislation.

In October, HCR issued a report to the State Legislature on the program, which included breakdowns of payment information by county, by average payment amount, and disbursements made by race/ethnicity. The report is available online at: https://hcr.ny.gov/RRP#rrp-report.

Hometown News

View All News