Just as Dane County Housing Authority opened their Section 8 waiting list (now closed since October 12, 2007) for the first time in 5 years, now the CDA is doing the same thing. Here’s their announcement.
Community Development Authority for the City of Madison will accept entries to its Housing Choice Voucher Program, (Section8) Application Lottery beginning Monday, October 29, 2007. Lottery entry forms and instructions will be available at any Madison Public Library and many social service agencies. Entries may also be submitted via the Internet at: http://www.cityofmadison.com
/housing . You must be 18 or older to enter. You must be a U.S. Citizen or an eligible immigrant. Only one lottery entry per household. Lottery entries will be accepted until Friday, November 30, 2007. Selected entries will receive a regular application form for the Section 8 program. Entries not selected in the drawing will also be notified by mail. Regular applications will be entered to the waiting list and will be ranked by return date. Applications from elderly or disabled households and households with minor children will be ranked ahead of non-disabled, non-elderly adults. Households living or working in the City of Madison will receive priority over non-residents.
Here’s a little more info that you might find helpful about this list opening:
- Starting MONDAY 10/29, people can sign up for a LOTTERY by sending in a postcard or filling out a form online.
- CDA prefers people do this online.
- If people sign up online, when they are finished the form will allow you to print a “receipt” from the browser in case people want a receipt.
- People will have to provide name, SSN and address.
- It is a lottery, meaning that everyone who signs up will be entered in to a random drawing to occur in the beginning of December.
- The people whose names are drawn in the lottery will then receive the full written application form.
- People will be placed on the list in order of when their actual completed applications are received. (However, some people may actually receive a voucher faster than others based on priority/preference. This is no different than if the list were continually open. Some people will get to the front of the line faster than others.)
- As long as you sign up online or postmark your card by 11/30, you will have an equal chance of receiving a full application, so there is no need to camp out or rush to the office or anything like that.
- IF you are drawn in the lottery and receive an application, though, it *is* important to get that application in very quickly at that time, in December.
- The current waiting list is down to about 150 and will not be purged this time around.
- NEXT TIME (in about 2 years) the entire list will be dumped and it will be another lottery system, starting from scratch.
- Anyone who is not sure whether they are already on the list should find out before signing up again.
So, there you have it. We now have a lottery for low-income housing in the City of Madison.
To add to the confusion, the elevator woes in the Municipal Building (“Post Office Building”) at 215 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. have made it so that many of our meetings need to move and some of our services are unaccessible. One of the services that has been effected is the CDA services. Here’s the information they sent out:
Hello,
I am writing to notify you that CDA Housing Reception is now located in Room 130 at the Madison Municipal Building. We have been experiencing intermittent elevator failures here, so in the interest of safety, and to accomodate our customers, we ask that you please bring your business to Room 130 on the main level at 215 Martin Luther King Jr., Blvd, (same building, different floor and room #) rather than to 3rd floor as you and your customers have done in the past. Please pass this information on to any of your customers who utilize our services.
Thank you.
Sally JoSally Jo Spaeni
Eligibility Coordinator
City of Madison Housing Operations
