Recovery.gov - Track the Money

The eligible activities allowed under HPRP are clear and intentionally focused on housing—either direct financial assistance to help pay for housing, or services designed to help participants obtain, maintain and remain in housing. Funds are also available to track assistance through HMIS for local program or policy use and reporting to HUD. Grantees and sub-grantees may use HPRP funds to administer the following categories of eligible activities: (1) financial assistance; (2) housing relocation and stabilization services; (3) data collection and evaluation; and (4) administrative costs.

The HPRP Notice (FR-5307-N-01), which outlines the eligible activities, also includes a section that clearly states activities that are ineligible, including services that are eligible under other Recovery Act programs, mortgage costs, and credit card bills. In an effort to further avoid mismanagement of grant funds, the Notice stipulates that HPRP funds must not be used to make payments directly to program participants, but only to third parties, such as landlords or utility companies. The Notice can be found at http://hudhre.info/documents/HPRP_Notice_3-19-09.pdf.

Project/Activity: Financial assistance
Description: Financial assistance is limited to the following activities: short-term rental assistance (3 months), medium-term rental assistance (4 to 18 months), security deposits, utility deposits, utility payments, moving cost assistance, and motel and hotel vouchers.
Funding: $820,875,000.00

Project/Activity: Housing relocation and stabilization services
Description: Housing relocation and stabilization services are limited to the following activities: case management, outreach and engagement, housing search and placement, legal services, and credit repair.
Funding: $447,750,000.00

Project/Activity: Data collection and evaluation by grantees.
Description: Reasonable and appropriate costs associated with operating a Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) or comparable client-level database for the purposes of collecting and reporting data required under HPRP are eligible.
Funding: $149,250,000.00

Project/Activity: Grantee Administrative costs
Description: Administrative costs are limited to the following activities: pre-award administrative costs (as specified in the HPRP Notice), accounting for the use of grant funds, preparing reports for submission to HUD, obtaining program audits, similar costs related to administering the grant after the award, grantee or sub-grantee staff salaries associated with these administrative costs, and related training for staff who will administer the program.
Funding: $74,625,000.00

Project/Activity: HUD will provide training, technical assistance, monitoring, enforcement, research and evaluation activities.
Description: HUD will hire staff, build systems and work with grantees to ensure effective and efficient implementation
Funding: $7,500,000.00

(1) Data Collection and Reporting
a. Substantial Amendments: Grantees must submit to HUD substantial amendments to their Consolidated Plans. HUD staff will review the plan to ensure it meets HPRP requirements and will obligate all funds to grantees by 9/1/2009.
b. Financial Reports: HUD has two financial reports that will be generated and analyzed on a weekly basis. These include a Summary Financial Report that indicates the amount of funds for each program, and a Funding Notification Report, which shows the amount of funding by program for every jurisdiction, including local governments and some states.
c. Quarterly Recipient Reports: The cornerstone of HUD’s monitoring and evaluation system is the project and contract data collected from grantees. The Recovery Act specifically requires data collection fields for grantees and contractors. HUD has also issued HPRP-specific data elements that grantees must report on, including: contact information; authorizing information; project information; persons and households served; housing outcomes of persons who exited the program; and HPRP expenditures by eligible activity.
d. Sample Survey of Outcomes: HUD has allocated a portion of the program funds for research, including sampling a subset of grantees to measure outcomes. The Office of Policy Development and Research (PD&R) will lead the “Homeless Families Intervention” and “Homeless Prevention” studies. For the Homeless Families Intervention Study, HUD will use a random assignment of homeless families in up to 12 sites into one of four to five housing/services interventions. For the Homeless Prevention Study, HUD will use administrative, homeless management information system and survey data to track over-time outcomes for a sample of very poor families determined to be at risk of homelessness.

(2) Ongoing Grantee Management: HUD categorizes grantees by risk, then monitors and allocates interventions accordingly. High Risk grantees are those with a history of unsatisfactory performance, financial instability, inadequate management system, mismanaged previous awards, or otherwise demonstrated irresponsibility. To ensure timely expenditure of funds and budget/cost compliance, the Department utilizes IDIS or LOCCS to assess grantees’ spending. To ensure quality expenditure of funds, HUD will perform on-site monitoring for high-risk grantees, which allows HUD to assess and document grantee compliance with program requirements based upon file reviews, using both automated and manual data and reports submitted to HUD; interviews with grantee staff to determine the accuracy of the information; and interviews with clients to assess level of satisfaction with services. Following a grantee monitoring HUD may use the following interventions: issue a warning letter; direct the grantee to cease incurring costs; or require that some or all of the grant amounts be remitted to HUD. Sub-grantees are also subject to the same compliance rules. Grantees that are high-risk will receive technical assistance and support from field offices who will design an approach that meets the specific needs of each grantee, which could include direct assistance with implementing oversight, documentation, and financial management procedures. The process described above will be applied to all grantees, including those that are not high risk.

(3) Long-term Evaluation: PD&R is considering restructuring its existing Homeless Families Study to include a rapid re- housing intervention. PD&R is also proposing to track a sample of very poor families to determine which families: (a) access homeless services; (b) which ones become homeless; (c) which ones receive prevention services/assistance; (d) which ones enter the homeless shelter/housing system; and (e) which ones follow particular patterns of homelessness.

With respect to reporting, OMB has issued detailed guidance on the requirements for recipients of the Recovery Act funds. Specifically, each prime and first tier recipient is required to report specified information to HUD 10 days after the end of each calendar quarter. This includes but is not limited to a detailed list of all projects and activities for which Recovery Act funds were obligated or expended, an evaluation of the completion status of the project or activity, and an estimate of the number of jobs created or retained. In addition to the overarching requirements of the Recovery Act, HUD has also identified a number of program-specific measures that will be collected through this reporting process.

HUD expects that the transparency requirements of the Recovery Act, specifically the requirement to publish both spending and recipient performance reports, will create accountability amongst its managers and grantees. That said, HUD will establish additional internal management controls to create a greater level of accountability for performance. The HUD Recovery Act program management team will work with the leads of the program and cross-cutting teams to prepare a bi-weekly program snapshot report for the steering committee to review with the Deputy Secretary and Secretary. Drawing from the program and risk management plans, the reports will include summary-level quantitative financial and programmatic performance measures and targets, key milestones, and issues or risks. Interim spending and performance targets will be set to ensure that annual objectives from the program plans are met. Performance data will be summarized by grantee risk category, as defined in the agency’s risk management plan. Performance measure targets and milestones that are missed, or that are in jeopardy of being missed, will be accompanied by an explanation of the reasons why, including any issues affecting progress and the specific plan for their resolution or mitigation. The report will also identify specific grantees with performance issues, and summarize the actions being taken to address them. In addition to the bi-weekly reporting, each program team will meet with the Secretary, Deputy Secretary and Steering Committee on a monthly basis to review a more detailed set of Recovery Act performance measures. On a quarterly basis, these monthly meetings will include updated grant recipient data described above.

This program does not invest in Federal Infrastructure.