Alcohol, Drug, and Criminal History Restrictions in Public Housing

Abstract

AbstractHousing assistance programs are a crucial resource for poor households. Access for families who include a member with a history of or drug use or a criminal record, however, varies considerably across public housing authorities (PHAs), because alcohol, drug, and criminal history restrictions in the housing assistance programs determine access to this scarce benefit. Very little is known about the specific rules facing poor families who apply for or use public housing. This article analyzes the alcohol, drug, and criminal history provisions governing access to or eviction from public housing using data from 40 PHAs across the country. The data show that nearly all PHAs institute more stringent bans than required by federal law and that individual PHAs exercise a great deal of discretion in setting ban lengths and defining individual problematic behavior. As a result, similar households may encounter radically different rules when attempting to access or retain housing assistance, even within a single PHA. The decision to define those with alcohol, drug, or criminal histories as categorically undeserving of housing assistance undermines other important public policy goals to treat similar populations equitably and to support ex-offenders and their families.IntroductionThe federal government funds three primary housing assistance programs: the public housing (PH) program, the Housing Choice Voucher Program (HCVP), and Section 8 project-based rental assistance, which together serve approximately 4 million low-income families.1 The primary goal of these programs is to provide a subset of low-income households with stable, affordable housing (Committee on Ways and Means, 2004). All three programs reduce the cost of housing for participants and are governed by federal guidelines setting income eligibility and subsidy levels.2All applicants to and residents of housing assistance programs are subject to federal alcohol, drug, and criminal activity restrictions, intended to increase the safety of assisted housing and to award a scarce benefit to deserving applicants (HUD, 1996; McCarty et ah, 2012). These restrictions require that applicants be screened for use that interferes with the community (hereafter, alcohol abuse), other drug use, and past criminal activity. Applicants may be denied housing assistance if they, or anyone in their household, are found to have engaged in certain activities. In addition, households already receiving assistance may be evicted for behaviors related to abuse, drug use, and criminal activity. Public housing authorities (PHAs)-governmental entities that operate at the state or local level-administer the PH program and HCVP and are responsible for enforcing these federal abuse, drug use, and criminal history restrictions within their programs.In an effort to empower PHAs to respond to local crime conditions, federal guidelines require the PHAs to implement certain abuse, drug use, and criminal activity restrictions, but they also give PHAs the discretion to create more severe restrictions. As such, the screening criteria for alcohol, drug, and criminal history vary tremendously across PHAs (LAC, 2004; Lundgren, Curtis, and Oettinger, 2010; McCarty et ah, 2012). Further, to enable PHAs to consider applicants individually, PHA staff have broad discretionary power in determining the circumstances under which restrictions should apply and to whom. Many PHAs, for example, implement policies that individuals may be banned from assisted housing for certain offenses, leaving the final decision up to an individual PHA worker.This set of circumstances raises three important issues that are of concern to policymakers. First, inter-PHA variation in the application of alcohol, drug, and criminal history restrictions means that similar households in different locations may encounter radically different rules when attempting to access or retain housing assistance. …