Blogs

Multiple strains on Section 8 housing are creating major worry for those who depend on affordable housing in Orange County. 

The recent floods are perhaps receiving the most news coverage.

However, General Service Corporation, which according to the Chapel Hill News, owns nine apartment complexes in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, recently announced that it will no longer accept rent vouchers. This means that as leases run out in the coming months, low income citizens will be thrown into housing crisis. With so little affordable housing available already, GSC's announcment means that the properties available to low-income renters will be even more sparse and hard to come by.

Additionally, a letter from Tara Fikes, Orange County Housing Director, that went out to HUD recipients this past week cited the federal sequestration as a strain on local budgets.  "Here in Orange County, this will mean a reduction of more than $250,000 in how much our Section 8 program will have available to pay in rental assistance," the letter stated.

We've had several discussions lately about what some of us would like to see from county government in terms of communications and information technology. Perhaps the county naming a new Chief Information Officer will be an opportunity for a new focus in the county on open data, open standards, and information access. What do you think? The first item on my wishlist (half jokingly) would be to have him work with Public Affairs to find a better solution than using Microsoft Office to format emailed press releases. Why? Because Microsoft's use of proprietary stylesheets makes the formatting of documents break when text is copied into other programs, unless I go through and manually edit the code.

I know the folks in county government are hard working people with a lot on their plate, so I hope any suggestion is given (and received, too) as well-meaning constructive feedback. From an Orange County press release: