The Report on Housing: Crisis and Opportunity
A Traumatic Brain Injury and Disability Perspective
Recommendations Summary
A publication of the Ohio Legal Rights Service (OLRS)
March 2002
Contents
- Build Disability Coalitions: Disability groups should form coalitions with other disability groups
to meet with local housing officials and inform them about disability
housing needs.
- Assess Needs Completely: Assessment of unmet housing needs of people with disabilities should
include those who (1) are rent burdened, (2) live in institutions, (3)
are homeless, (4) are eligible for housing assistance but not eligible
for SSI and (5) live at home with family members.
- Document Housing Needs: Coalitions should attend Consolidated Plan and Public Housing
Authority (PHA) Plan hearings, participate in housing needs
assessment and advocate funding for disability housing, including
expanded accessibility modification funding.
- Provide Mainstream Vouchers: Coalitions should urge every PHA to provide Mainstream vouchers.
PHAs should collaborate with nonprofit agencies to administer them.
- Assure Housing Assistance: PHAs should direct housing assistance to persons with extremely low-incomes and to persons with disabilities who receive SSI.
- Assure Accessible Housing: PHAs should make their programs accessible to persons with
disabilities, including non-elderly disabled persons. PHAs should
routinely grant higher rental subsidies to persons who need
accessible housing.
- Address Disability Homelessness: Coalitions should advocate with local providers for the long-term
needs of homeless persons with disabilities.
- Confront Housing Discrimination: Coalitions should collaborate with local fair housing groups to
enforce anti-discrimination laws in public and private housing.
- Share Housing Information: Coalitions and housing agencies should provide easily-understood
information about housing programs.
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- Build a Statewide Coalition: Statewide disability organizations should form a coalition to meet
with the Ohio Department of Development (ODOD) and should
advocate for (1) more housing assistance for persons with disabilities,
(2) more funding for accessibility modifications, (3) housing
assistance for homeless persons with disabilities, (4) enforcement of
anti-discrimination laws, and (5) more affordable housing stock.
- Collaborate with COHHIO: The coalition should work with the Coalition on Homelessness and
Housing in Ohio (COHHIO) and other housing advocates to increase affordable
housing.
- Expand Support Services: The coalition should advocate more support services so that persons
with disabilities who need both support services and housing
assistance are not denied both when both are not available
simultaneously.
- Enforce Fair Housing Laws: Fair housing officials should work with disability groups to promptly
address housing discrimination, should identify areas where
accessible housing is scarce and should work with local fair housing
advocates to increase accessible housing.
- Share Best Practices: Best fair housing practices should be shared across geographic
regions to improve enforcement of laws that prohibit discrimination
on the basis of disability.
- Increase Accessibility Funding: ODOD should increase funding for accessibility modifications and
should improve public visibility of this resource. ODOD should
pursue federal HOME (Home Investment Partnerships) Program funds
to support local accessibility modifications and home maintenance
assistance programs.
- Expand Housing Tax Credits: ODOD should expand tax credits for disability housing and should
ensure that the housing developed is easily accessible to all persons
with disabilities.
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- Fund Mainstream Vouchers: Housing and Urban Development (HUD) should fund more
Mainstream vouchers and improve monitoring the impact of
designated "elderly only" housing.
- Improve Supportive Housing: HUD should modernize and streamline the Supportive Housing for
People with Disabilities (Section 811) program and substantially
increase its availability.
- Fund Support Services: HUD and other agencies should increase funding for support
services, necessary for some individuals with disabilities to use
generic housing assistance.
- Make Programs Accessible: HUD should improve access for persons with disabilities to all its
housing programs, including homeownership initiatives and
programs funded under Consolidated Plans. HUD should improve
monitoring to assure involvement of people with disabilities in PHA
Plans and Consolidated Plans on the state and local level.
- Expand Homelessness Programs: HUD should improve and expand McKinney-Vento Homeless
Assistance programs to address the long-term needs of persons with
disabilities who are homeless. HUD should assure that state and
local agencies include local disability advocates in their McKinney
planning processes.
- Set Realistic Fair Market Rents: HUD should improve its process for determining Fair Market Rents to
accurately reflect market rates for comparable, accessible units, so that
more rental housing will remain available to persons with low incomes.
PHAs should routinely, and without exception, provide these increased
rates for voucher recipients who need accessible apartments.
- Enforce Fair Housing Laws: HUD and the Department of Justice should vigorously enforce the accessibility
requirements of the Fair Housing Amendments Act, Americans with
Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 as
amended to improve the availability of housing for persons with
disabilities and to address housing discrimination they so often face.
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- Designate a Home Agency: Ohio should designate a lead agency charged with responsibility
to coordinate and fund a statewide system of services for persons
with traumatic brain injury.
- Fund Case Management: Ohio should establish and fund a system to provide service
coordination or case management services for persons with
traumatic brain injury.
- Fund Support Services: Ohio should develop and fund a system of community based
support services for persons with traumatic brain injury.
- Disseminate Information: Information and training resources on traumatic brain injury
should be made available to the variety of agencies used by
persons with traumatic brain injury.
- Educate Legislators &Administrators: Disability coalitions should educate state legislators and state and
local agencies about the needs (including housing needs) of
persons with traumatic brain injury and their families and about
the lack of services available in Ohio to meet those needs.
- Form TBI Collaboratives: Persons with traumatic brain injury and their advocates should
form collaboratives in their communities to identify local problems
faced by persons with traumatic brain injury and their families and
to facilitate solutions.
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This Executive Summary and the Report on Housing
were made possible through a grant from the
Ohio Rehabilitation Services Commission through the
Brain Injury Advisory Committee.
The Brain Injury Advisory Committee was created under Ohio
law to advise the Ohio Rehabilitation Services Commission and
brain injury program regarding the unmet needs of survivors of
brain injury. The mission of the Committee is to reduce the
incidence of traumatic brain injury; to influence public policy on
behalf of persons with traumatic brain injury; and to promote a
system of services and supports which facilitates healthy,
personally productive, and satisfying life-styles within their
communities for persons with traumatic brain injury.
This publication was produced by the Ohio Legal Rights Service, 50 West Broad Street, Suite 1400, Columbus, Ohio 43215-5923. Telephone 614-466-7264/800-282-9181 TTY 614-728-2553/800-858-3542 Web site: http://olrs.ohio.gov
Ohio Legal Rights Service and this publication are funded in part by grants under the following federal laws:
- Developmental Disabilities Assistance (DD) Act, administered by the Administration for Children and Families;
- Protection and Advocacy for Mentally Ill Individuals Act (PAIMI), administered by the Center for Mental Health Services of the U.S. Department of Human Services; and the
- Rehabilitation Act of 1973 as amended, administered by the Office of Education Services and the Rehabilitation Services Administration of the U.S. Department of Education.
Ohio Legal Rights Service does not discriminate in provision of service or employment because of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, military service, disability, or age.
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