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National Disability Institute Webinar Transcript – Understanding the Family Self-Sufficiency Program

May 14, 2014 – 3:00pm

>> Keith Combs: Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Keith Combs, manager of financial empowerment and I will be moderating today's webinar. Thank you for joining us today. For the Real Economic Impact network webinar on Understanding the Family Self-Sufficiency P rogram. Today's webinar is sponsored by Acorda Therapeutics, Bank of America, and Walmart. Nakia Matthews, MDIs technology and media manager, will provide us with some housekeeping tips for today's webinar. >> Nakia Matthews: Good afternoon, everyone. The audio for today's webinar is being broadcast through your computer. Please make sure your speakers are turned on and your headphones on -- our plug-in. You can control the audio broadcast panel via the audio broadcast panel that you see here below. If you accidentally close this panel, where the sound stops, you can reopen the audio broadcast panel by going to the top menu i tem, communicate, and then join audio broadcast. If you do not have sound capabilities on your computer or you prefer to listen by phone, you can dial the number you see here and enter the meeting code. You do not need to enter an attendee ID. I will also post this number into the chat box for those who might join a little bit late. Realtime captioning is provided during this webinar. The captions can be found in the media viewer panel which appears in the lower right corner of the webinar platform. If you'd like to make the media viewer panel larger, you can do so by minimizing some of the other panels like chat, Q&A or panelist. Conversely, if you do not need captions, you can minimize the media viewer panel. There will be a question and answer portion at the end of the webinar. If you have any questions, please use the chat box or the Q&A box to send any questions you may have during the course of the webinar to either Keith Combs or to myself, Nakia Matthews. And we will direct those questions accordingly during the Q&A portion. If you're listening by phone and not locked into the web portion, you may also ask questions by e-mailing them directly to Keith at [email protected]. This webinar is being recorded and webinars will be placed on our website at www.realeconomicimpact.org. If you experience any technical difficulties during the webinar, please use the chat box to send me, Nakia Matthews, a message. You may also e-mail me at [email protected]. >> Keith? >> Keith Combs: Thank you, Nakia. We would like to thank our sponsors today including Walmart, Bank of America, Acorda Therapeutics, the Burton Blatt Institute, and the I RS, without their sponsorship and support, we would not be able to provide the webinar such as we do today. If you're not familiar with National Disability Institute, we are a national research and development organization with the mission to promote income preservation and asset development for persons with disabilities and to build a better economic future for Americans with disabilities. The Real Economic Impact network is an alliance of organizations and individuals dedicated to advancing the economic empowerment of people with disabilities, the network consists of more than 900 partners and more than 100 cities in the United States. The network includes nonprofits, community, tax coalitions, asset development organizations, financial education initiatives, corporations, and private sector businesses, federal, state, local governments and agencies and individuals and families with disabilities. All of the partners in the Real Economic Impact's network join forces to embrace, promote and pursue access to and inclusion of people with disabilities in the economic mainstream. In today's webinar, we're going to receive an introduction and overview of the Family Self-Sufficiency program. We are going to have a discussion of eligibility and how individuals and families can apply for the FSS program. We're going to receive an explanation of the benefits of the Family Self- Sufficiency program and we're also going to hear some examples of how the FSS has directly benefited individuals with disabilities. And there will be approximately 10 to 15 minutes at the end of the webinar for questions and answers for our panelists. Some of the outcomes that we are hoping that you are going to receive from the webinar today are learning the benefits of the FSS, learning the eligibility requirements of the SSS, as well as resources available to those individuals and families that are accepted into the program as well as the positive impacts that the FSS can have for individuals with disabilities and learn some real-life examples of successes of graduates from the Family Self- Sufficiency program. We have two wonderful presenters with us today. The first is going to be Darrin Dorsett. He is with the department of Housing and Urban Development. Darrin is a program analyst and works in the housing voucher management and operations division. Prior to joining HUD, Darrin worked with the national Association of Counties providing technical assistance to elected county officials on the use of HUD funds. Prior to working with the national Association of Counties, Darrin worked with the national consulting firm providing technical assistance to local, state and federal agencies on a range of affordable housing and community development programs. Karen has a Masters in urban and regional planning. And we also have Sharon Hirota with us today, who is going to be giving us some real-life examples of successes that she has seen from individuals in the FSS program. Sharyn is currently employed as the existing housing division manager for the County of Hawaii office of housing and community development. As the division manager, Sharon has oversight responsibility for the housing choice voucher or Section 8 program, the tenant- based rental assistance program, the residential emergency home repair program, as well as an elderly and family housing project. Sharon joined the oh HCD -- OHCD in 2002. She had positions of increasing responsibility to include human resources and risk management. Sharon also attended the University of Hawaii majoring in business administration. With that, I would like to turn it over to Darrin, who's going to talk to us about the FSS program overall. >> Darrin Dorsett: Good afternoon. Can you hear me? >> Keith Combs: Yes, we can. >> Darrin Dorsett: Okay. Great. Thank you, Keith, Nakia, and staff at the National Disability Institute for inviting us to participate in today's panel. I bring you greetings from HUD, the housing voucher management and operation division our director and members of our FSS team, Briyona Bender and Maurice Rodriguez will not be present to participate in the program panel today. I briefly wanted to provide an overview of HUD's Family Self-Sufficiency program. I'm going to call it FSS program. As I go through some of the slides. Again, to provide a basic overview of the program, the overall objective of the program is to reduce dependency on welfare assistance and to promote independence and self-sufficiency. We like to think that it is a pretty successful program, yet it's an underutilized program. We'll talk about that in a little while. Generally speaking, about HUD's family self sufficiency program up until this year, under FY2014 funding under the director from Congress, there was an FSS program that targeted public housing residents in a separate FSS programs that targeted housing choice voucher or Section 8 participants. Generally speaking the rules were the same but again, there was a different population targeted. One, public housing residents and the other, Section 8 vouchers holders. A couple of components of FSS programs, obviously we want to help individuals and families achieve self-sufficiency. One way to do that and one component of the program is to provide supportive services. Supportive services, I'm sure you're familiar with those, job training, counseling, child care, transportation, education and other supportive services while participants in the program are receiving housing assistance, so that they can actually obtain education employment and other skills necessary to achieve self-sufficiency. Another component -- a big driving force behind a program other than the participants and agencies that administer the program are public housing authorities action plans. The action plan describes the policies and procedures for operating the housing authority's FSS program. As part of the plan, they must describes outreach efforts to reach eligible families. Within this action plan, they also have to provide a certification of coordination. That's certification is provided that services and activities provided under the program have been coordinated with public and private providers including the Java job program, the job training partnership act, the Department of Labor funded job training programs, other employers, childcare, transportation, and education and other training type programs. This is really important as public housing authorities describe what are the outreach efforts. Are they making sufficient strides to reach businesses in the community? Are they doing everything necessary that they can do to help promote the Family Self-Sufficiency program? Again, the whole point of the program is to obviously increase self sufficiency. We want to make sure that agencies are doing everything they can to provide services to those participants to help achieve their goals. Next slide is on FSS administration or administering FSS program. The FSS program is administered by public housing agencies with the help of program coordinating committees or PCC's. These PCC's are made up of several representatives of the local community. We are talking about local government, employers, job training agencies, welfare agencies, nonprofit service providers as well as local businesses. Within these PCC's, there must be a housing authority representative and a voucher program participant or public housing residents per the rules in 24 CFR 984.202. The main function of this committee is to assist the public housing agencies in obtaining public and private commitments for the operation of the asset -- of the FSS program. We'd like to encourage PCC's to actively participate in development of the PHA's action plan and actually implementing the program. We constantly encourage PHA's to look at membership of their PCC's and look at ways to help promote new services to clients. Oftentimes PCC's have been established and there's no new membership or blood into the PCC's. So something that we encourage P HA's or housing agencies to do is to go back out into the community, emphasize what they are doing in the FSS program, and step up and outreach efforts in order to serve clients better. Critical components to the FSS program -- I'm going to talk about three things. First, a contract. This is a contract of participation. This contract is between Housing Authority and participants. This specifies what the rights and responsibilities are of both parties. It is a contract. It sets for the general terms and conditions of participation in the program. This is a critical part of what the FSS program is about. Because again it lets everybody know up front, this is exactly what's expected of you. It's a five-year contract of participation, which is possibly extended for two years given some unusual circumstances. A second critical part of the FSS program is an individual training and service plan or ITSP. Created for each participant of the program. This plan is basically developed by the head of household in each adult member of the FSS family who decides to participate in the program. This ITSP sets for all the services that will be provided to the family and also articulates the activities to be completed by each family member. As well as the completion dates for services, as I mentioned, this is a contract of participation, not a contract -- not something you just throw away or lack of participation. We're constantly asking participants to do their part in the PHA to do their part as well. I'm going to quickly talk about interest-bearing escrow account. Another critical part -- component of the FSS program. This is one of the selling points of the program. Again, when I mentioned that this was an underutilized program, something that can help promote the program is interest-bearing escrow account. The whole idea here is to have an incentive program or some type of incentive for families to participate in the program, whether or not you are a housing choice voucher holder or whether or not you are a public housing resident. Ultimately as you achieve your goals, in your ITSP, hopefully you will be saving money or you will be saving money. And you'll be closer to economic independence. I'll talk a little bit how the escrow account works. Basically HUD deposits money into an escrow account every time a tenant's share of rent is increased due to a raise in your household income or wages. A quick example -- say a family becomes enrolled in an FSS program and their rent share is $30. They don't have any monthly escrow as of yet. Year one. Year two, the individual gets a part-time job and their rent share increases to $200. Again, the jumping rent from their rent share from $30 to $200 is a $170 difference. That $170 will be deposited to the -- into the family's FSS escrow account. Again over a period of time, you can imagine the type of savings as individuals go through the FSS program, continue to receive services, and other benefits and improve their job situation and improve employment opportunities. Families will be able to save quite a bit of money. And I'm sure Sharon will talk about that a little bit later as she goes through some examples in Hawaii. Again, within the FSS escrow account, families and possibly -- can possibly receive interim disbursement during the contract term to complete some of their goals. Some families have taken out escrow to pay tuition for college. Some have been able to disburse or receive some of the money so that they can buy a car. That car will help them get to work or drive a little further to get to a better job. Again, that's one component of the FSS escrow account. Again, in order to claim that escrow at contract completion at the end of five years, the head of household must be employed and no family member should be receiving or can be receiving welfare assistance. Again, you don't participate in the program for a number of years, stay on welfare, and receive a huge payout at the end of the contract term. In order for that contract to be successfully completed, the individual or the head of household has to be employed and not receiving welfare assistance. Jumping over to the next slide, I'll talk about who's eligible to participate in FSS. As I mentioned earlier, prior to this year, it was a separate program for public housing residents, as well as individuals that participate in the housing choice voucher or Section 8 p rogram. Both are eligible to participate in the program. However, it is voluntary for families to participate as individuals get on Section 8 or public housing, they are not required to participate in the program. But again, the targeted population that FSS tends to serve are unemployed or underemployed public housing residents and housing choice voucher program p articipants. Again, there's a little bit of misinformation or confusion about who can serve in the program. Again, individuals or participants with the household head who has a disability, they are able to participate. They are eligible to participate. One component of it -- of being enrolled in the program is finding employment. And for individuals with disabilities, that does not mean a full-time -- not necessarily does not mean a full-time job. Again, the ITSP or the individual training and service plan, if an individual has a an, if an individual has a disability, some of the goals within that plan can be adjusted so that person with disabilities can accomplish their goals. A person with disabilities may not be able to work for 80 hours a w eek. Sorry, 80 hours biweekly. Again, goals within the plan our adjusted to each family. There's no cookie-cutter ITSP. We always encourage public housing authorities to work with individual families so that the goals that are within the ITSP can make sure that their -- that they are family specific. We also encourage PHA's to review the plan on a regular basis and to modify it if necessary. We also ask for PHA's to work closer with families so that they can better assess what their strengths are, what their individual needs are, what the household needs are and what are some of the barriers as well as setting goals and developing a workable plan with actual supportive services that providers and PCC can provide. Again, the whole purpose of the program is for families to achieve self-sufficiency. It's not about pushing a couple of pieces of paper, getting families in and out. We still want to make an impact on families lives. I'm going to jump over to how is FSS funded? In the FSS program, if you will, the services are not funded by the program. Public housing authorities are required to leverage their public funds and private resources in order to provide supportive services. I know some housing authorities, they say, how can I do this? Again, as I talked about, this program being an underutilized program that we found that in several best practices that there are companies, service providers that are out there, private companies out there that are willing to partner with agencies with -- public housing agencies if they knew what the program was about. And if they knew that there was an impact in communities. So there are several examples of public-private partnerships that have worked extremely well. Again, those are the type of partnership that we encourage. Again, we do ask public housing authorities to help leverage resources. In funding for FSS or Family Self-Sufficiency Program coordinators is provided from HUD through annual notice of funding availabilities. It's open right now to provide salary and fringe benefits for FSS program coordinators. A brief history on FSS. Again, started in fiscal year 1993. Public housing authorities were required to develop an FSS program for families if they received new funding for their Section 8 certificates for vouchers or the public housing rental units. Mandatory minimum FSS program requirements for the Section 8 certificates or voucher and public housing programs were based on the number of new units funded. Again, this mandatory minimum applied to several hundred PHA's. And again they are required to implement an FSS program. And really, briefly some changes to the FSS program over the years, when their new allocations of rental certificates or new public housing units after October 21, 1998, no longer an increase for mandatory FSS program slots or s ize. A PHA's mandatory minimum FSS program size is reduced by one slot for each graduate. For example, if Honolulu had a mandatory program of 25 slots or 25 participants and a graduated 25, again, it was reduced by 25. Another change was that confirmed continued authorities wear PJs administer voluntary FSS programs -- where PHAs administer voluntary programs. If I could again provide a quick snapshot -- >> Keith Combs: Thank you very much, Darrin. We're going to turn it over to Sharon. >> Sharon Hirota: Good morning. Can everyone hear me? >> Keith Combs: Yes. Thank you. >> Sharon Hirota: Thank you. Good morning. My name is Sharon Hirota. I'm the existing housing manager for the County of Hawaii. One of the programs that I administer or oversee is the FSS program. Thank you, Darrin, for providing that background. This morning I wanted to talk about our agency. And talk about the successes that we've had in regards to the FSS program. So we started our program in March of 20 -- 2004. And over the last 10 years have been successfully connecting families to local resources in their journey to become less reliant on government assistance. At the start, we had some local marketing efforts. We did and continue to do monthly informational meetings. These are meetings that we open up to all participants of our Section 8 program to introduce them or to talk about both the FSS and the Section 8 homeownership option programs. We include information in our family briefing packet. We also include information regarding -- in our annual recertification package that gets mailed out to our participants. We do a lot of community outreach. We participate in a lot of the job fairs or community resource fairs that are held throughout our islands. We also hosted this past year, a VITA tax side to encourage not only our current FSS participants, but anyone in our Section 8 programs to learn about the benefits of EBITDA and free tax services -- the benefits of a fight and free tax services. -- the benefits of VITA. There have been 330 individuals or families that have shown interest in the program. 182 have signed on to FSS program contacts. And as of today, we have 39 quote-unquote graduates who have met the requirements of the FSS program and have gone on -- are no longer participating in the program. Some of the program challenges that we face -- I'm sure a lot of the FSS programs out there also face are getting the family to understand what's in it for me? For many people, they become dependent on government assistance. So when you talk about working towards incentivizing them, there's always a hesitancy or question in their mind, what do they get out of it? Goes on to letting go of government assistance. The other challenge is understanding the escrow savings account as Darrin explained. For many people, trying to understand the concept of if I get an increase in earned income, how would it impact my current benefits that receiving? But also and I really going to receive this escrow account you're talking about? Financial literacy concepts, we really work on getting people to work on a budgeting, savings, looking at their debt and figuring out the methods of solutions to paying down their debt. Many of our clients are not banked. And so finding and guiding them through their banking options that are available in our community. Some of our successes, we've had 14 individuals who have attained a post high school education degree. So they've gone on to college and have received their bachelors degree if not higher. We have 52 individuals who have increased their employability skills and have moved from being underemployed or unemployed to gaining full-time employment status. And where we talk about full-time employment status, we define full-time as an individual who has -- who is working at least 32 hours per week. Continued examples of our successes, this chart shows between 2008 and 2014, the number of families that were on contract -- active contracts increased into their annual income in total. And then the average increase per family. So we are -- except for 2009, we saw a slight drop but we are seeing our families continuing to see an increase in their annual income on an annual basis. So we're happy about that. As I've mentioned, we've had 39 program graduates to date. And although our required graduates was 25, we decided to continue to promote this program to our program participants because we see the benefits. And although we've met our 25 family quote so to speak given to us, we continue to administer this program. So far we've had 39 program graduates. 22 of them are no longer receiving rental assistance. So they can now afford the total rents on their own. 14 have become homeowners. We've disbursed about -- a little under $300,000 in escrow savings to these graduates at an average of 7683. And one individual was able to save up to $27,145 in their escrow savings. And they used it to pay down the remaining debt that they had. And used the balance to assist them with the purchase of their single-family unit. Our 14 successful homeowners that have come through the FSS program, 10 of the homeowners work through the Habitat for Humanity's program. We have a local self-help housing program or individuals where mortgage qualified word table -- able to obtain a loan directly from the local federal credit union or local bank. One individual -- one successful homeowner is no longer receiving morning -- mortgage assistance. So is paying the mortgage 100% on their own. We have three who are receiving mortgage assistance through our Section 8 homeownership program. So before I continue, I wanted to talk about two of our successful FSS program participants and Section 8 homeownership participants. Two of them that are receiving mortgage assistance, both of them are on Social Security benefits. Fixed income. But through help through connections to the different community resources available through their hard work in building their credit, through gifts that they received from their families, they were able to put down a deposit and then become homeowners. So one built a single-family home. So she went through the construction process and then eventually purchased a home out right. Through the Section 8 homeownership program. The other one had the opportunity -- he had been living in this rental unit for about 10 years. The landlord approached him and indicated that he was putting the unit up for sale. And he was very used to -- he's disabled. He was very comfortable in the u nit. So he approached us in finding out how we could help him work with the landlord in purchasing this home. And we were successful in doing so. So it was a collaboration of various resources, but now he's a homeowner. So we will continue to operate the FSS program for the County of Hawaii. And we will continue to assist as many families as we possibly can as they work towards becoming self-sufficient and less reliant on rental assistance and/or any type of government assistance. So thank you. Thank you for allowing me to share about our program. >> Keith Combs: Thank you very much, Sharon. Thank you, Darrin, for all the great information. We do have quite a few questions that have come in. We've got -- looks like about 25 minutes left for questions. So please continue to send those questions in. I did receive a question. This could be directed to either Darrin or Sharon. Is there any follow-up done with the family's that graduate from the program? Any additional resources that they are provided? Anything you can tell us about that part? >> Sharon Hirota: Okay. So I can talk about that. In regards to our graduates, we do have a follow-up system to make sure that -- to check on how they're doing, to make sure they continue to be on track, because for a lot of our programs, we open it up to all of our program participants. So we're having a financial literacy class. We're offering a budget class, offering a post purchase -- Post home purchase class. We open it up to our community. So although it's geared for or coordinated through our FSS p rogram, we see the benefit for the community. So we open the doors to anyone. So it's kind of answers some questions. So the graduates could come back for refresher courses as a community member, not necessarily associated with specifically to our us -- FSS program. >> Keith Combs: Wonderful. Thank you very much. Darrin, did you have anything to add on that? >> Okay. Thank you. Sharon, can you tell us about how you selected agencies or other organizations that you work with your community to provide the financial literacy or any of the other resources that are available through the program? Is that something that your agency provides directly or do you work with other nonprofits in your local community to be able to provide those services? >> Sharon Hirota: Okay. So we don't provide the direct services. We work with different community nonprofits that are experts in delivering various services for our participants or for the community as a whole. So we work with local counseling services that are out there, different agencies that provide financial literacy. What my FSS coordinator does is that he does the follow through with the Section 8 participants. We do a budgeting class and they have homework or they have to do follow through. Then he will sift down individually with the FSS participants to address any concerns or specific questions they may have in regards to the training they received. So we do more of the follow through to make sure that you understand, do you know what you need to get done? Is there anything we can help you with? We do a lot of the coordination, the connections between what the needs of the client is and what the resources are out there in the community. We're also very fortunate in our offices that we sit in a building that is also includes -- the local employment office, the local unemployment office, the local Department of Human Services that manages our food stamps and financial benefits, and another agency that coordinates all of the childcare connections and within our employment office, they host a gamut of different nonprofits that sit within their office. So we are very fortunate where we can just literally walk next door or -- with our clients to the resource centers or nonprofits without them having to get in their car and drive to another entity to get the services done. Also, a love of the workshops that are held, we do a lot of the hosting. So we have a large conference rooms that we will host and provide free services. And then the nonprofits will come in and provide their services. So that's how we do it here in our local community. >> Keith Combs: Thank you very much, Sharon. I think some questions came in directly to Nakia. >> Nakia Matthews: We had a couple questions that were similar. I think this question would be better towards Darrin. A lot of people wanted to know the definition of family. I think a lot of people were asking this question because they wanted to know if a single individual could participate and if that person would be the head of household. >> Darrin Dorsett: Okay. That's a good question. FSS family or participating family -- I'm going to read it straight from the regulations. A family that resides in public housing or receives assistance under the rental certificate or rental voucher program -- elects to participate in the FSS program and who is designated head of household has signed a contract of participation. So individuals -- single persons, yes, they can participate in the program. One of the requirements again is that you have to be either a Section 8 voucher holder or a resident in public housing. >> Nakia Matthews: Another repeat question that we had come in was “could you explain the term welfare or government assistance? Does this include programs like TANF, Medicaid, SSI, SSDI, SNAP, could you explain specifically which programs those are?” >> Darrin Dorsett: Sharon, do you want to explain exactly how income is determined? In your FSS program? >> Sharon Hirota: Sure. Okay. So under -- let me get the question here. When we talk about the term welfare, in my eyes -- in our definitional welfare, it includes the SNAP and the TANF benefits. Where we talk about government assistance, it could be any type of government assistance including Medicaid, SSI, SSDI or any type of assistance coming to the household. So I hope that helps with the definition. >> Nakia Matthews: Darrin? >> Darrin Dorsett: Yes? >> Nakia Matthews: I was asking if Darian had anything to add. >> Darrin Dorsett: No. Again, Sharon covered it right there. But again, we're still looking at TANF assistance, et cetera. >> Nakia Matthews: Okay. Thank you, guys. The next question that we had was, is there a website that lists PHA activity of FSS for each state? The number of people who have an FSS contract who have graduated, et cetera? >> Are you there? >> Okay. Darrin, I think you need to answer this one. >> Darrin Dorsett: There's not -- yes and no. Generally speaking, you can contact a housing agency and generally, they're able to provide the number of participants that are in their program. So there's a system called public information housing system. So PHA's are required to enter information about residents or participants in the FSS program that are enrolled in their program. That information is not a perfect system. However, that's where PHA's or agencies enter the number of participants that are in the FSS program. Currently, in our FY2014 notice of funding availability, we provided a list of public housing agencies as well as the number of persons that the system has accounted that are in their program. However, this system not being a perfect system, we also ask PHA's to provide an updated count of persons that may not be in the PIHC system for various reasons. So again, that information is out there. If you're interested in finding out how many persons have been enrolled in particular PHA's, FSS program has of the current date or during a target period, you can look at the FY14FSS or Family Self-Sufficiency notebook. It's only specific to a particular target period. This year's notebook. >> Nakia Matthews: We are can you find it? Is it on the web? >> Darrin Dorsett: Yes. It's on HUD's website. Actually, if you Google HUD and Family Self-Sufficiency, again, that's a very good resource to provide a lot of good information about the FSS program. >> Nakia Matthews: Thank you. Is there an age limit for FSS participation? >> Darrin Dorsett: No. I don't believe so. There's no age limit. But again, one of the requirements is employment. So again, I'm not sure if a 102-year-old gentleman -- I'm not sure that the program is perfect for him considering that there is a work component here. A work requirement. >> Nakia Matthews: Thank you, Darrin. Keith, do you have any more questions? >> Keith Combs: Yes. We do have a few more that have come in. One second -- someone asked that they may have missed this information. But for individuals with disabilities receiving SSI or SSDI, will the program work with them on recording income to SSA as well? Is that something that you could answer for us? >> Darrin Dorsett: Sharon, did you talk about that when you mentioned -- how income is calculated? >> Sharon Hirota: Yes. So in regards to that question, in regards to reporting income to SSA as well, we will not report the income to SSA, but the employer they are working with will report that income directly to the Social Security Administration. When we work -- we do have a few individuals who are disabled receiving SSI or SSDI that are participants in the FSS program. So we connect them with a local resource that can help them understand what the impact is to their benefits if any. As -- going from just receiving benefits to benefits and receiving some type of employment income. So we refer them to the experts. And again, we have a contract that the County of Hawaii was awarded that does -- is a triage that works with persons with disabilities to coordinate all of their benefits, to ensure that they understand what the impact is. So we do not directly report the changes. But we will guide them or connect them to the resources or the expert that would tell them what to do. >> Keith Combs: Thank you very much, Sharon. We also had a question of -- about obtaining direct contact and local areas. Is there a website or how would one go about -- this was directly regarding San Bernardino County, California. How do you go about locating direct contacts in certain locations? >> Darrin Dorsett: Can you hear me? >> Keith Combs: Yes. >> Darrin Dorsett: Good. If you go to HUD's website, there is a listing of public housing agencies by state. And individuals that are i nterested, if you're interested in finding out whether or not an agency has an emphasis -- FSS program, you can contact the Public Housing Authority directly. Again, a component of it is individuals have to be enrolled in either the HCV or Section 8 program or public housing. Again, you have to be enrolled in those programs. That's part of the eligibility into FSS. >> Keith Combs: Thank you very much, Darrin. We have a few more questions. Can you discuss the escrow account a little bit -- in a little bit more detail? When does the escrow account become established? Is it when a contract is signed between the individual and the agency? When money starts going into the escrow account? And what are the reasons that one could withdraw money from that escrow account? Are there rules and regulations on how that money can be used? >> Darrin Dorsett: Good. Sure. There's certainly rules on interim disbursements on the escrow a ccount. Again, the general idea here is to have an interim disbursements that is related to an individual or family achieving goals in the program. So somebody may not be able to withdraw funds to take a family vacation or they won't be able to do that to take a family vacation. However, if it's something related to furthering their goals, it could be again, college education, it could be taking some vocational classes, again, Microsoft class, those are pretty expensive. You may be able to withdraw some funds to achieve some of those purposes or those goals. At the end of the contract, and if all the goals -- if all of the goals have been met, you're able to withdraw to those monies. There's no restrictions on what those monies can be used for. At the end of the contract period. Some families have gone on to purchase homes. Some families have again gone back to school. To further their education. But again I think when families or individuals have participated in the program for such a long period of time, generally speaking, they continue to use those resources to help them become more self-sufficient. They may use some of those funds to pay down debt for any other credit -- to pay down debt or help resolve any credit issues. But again at the end of the contract period, that money is yours for the family. As long as those goals have been met. >> Keith Combs: Thank you, Darrin. Sharon, did you have anything to add to that? >> Sharon Hirota: No. I don't. >> Keith Combs: Thank you. Another question we received is, some PHA's have suffered budget cuts because of cuts in HUD f unding. How has this affected FSS programs? And the provision of services that are provided? >> Darrin Dorsett: I guess I'll take a stab at that. Sharon, you might be able to at a local context to it. On a national level, we've seen over the last couple of years or something that Congress has been pushing for, they want to see results of the program. And one way in order to hold HUD's and PHA's more accountable may have been by combining programs. So we don't have separate programs in public housing, separate programs for HCV corporate housing voucher participants, as a part of that. We've seen -- there used to be two programs, two different funding streams. Those funding streams have been combined. Technically I guess there has not been a budget cut for the Family Self- Sufficiency program coordinator funding. But again, Congress wants to see results of the program. And if I'm not mistaken, I think I've seen a couple individuals -- the new America foundation that have really helped HUD and other PHA's come to the table and say, what are some improvements and since -- what are some things that PHA's need to do better in order for FSS not to take those budget cuts that Congress is already thinking about? But I'm sure -- again, that Congress is looking at everything across the table to say, how can we afford any duplication of programs or services amongst all agencies, not just HUD. I think the emphasis -- the FSS program -- I wouldn't say it's going to continue to be attacked, but again we don't want the program vulnerable to further cuts by Congress. Again, that's why we always encourage the PHA's to do the very best they can in making outreach efforts to individuals as well as running a really good program. That goes back to HUD too and provides good guidance on program participants and what programs -- successful programs really look like. >> Keith Combs: Thank you, Darrin. Sharon, did you have anything to add to that? >> Sharon Hirota: Briefly in regards to budget cuts, I manage the entire program, so inclusive of housing choice voucher Section 8 program, which includes the FSS, we've taken the approach -- we are fortunate that his position has been funded, but we've looked at it, that this is a positive way to move people off the programs and to become successful, whether it be homeowners or renters on their own or to connect with resources in the community. And so even with the budget s trains, we've taken the approach that we will continue to offer this opportunity to individuals who are interested. We have not added more people to our program. We are considering that now in this current calendar year. To allow more people to participate in FSS. But we've really focused our efforts on those who have -- Ticket image -- take -- taken initiatives and are on the right path to become successful in this program whether through employment, through gaining -- increasing employability skills or getting further in their education. Because we understand that if we can help them, than they are actually the best marketing tool out there to say the program is successful. Go check out the FSS program coordinator. This is how I've been able to do i t. And that's what we use our graduates for. From marketing to say, if I can do it, you can do it. That's the approach we're taking. >> Keith Combs: Thank you very much for that great information. We've got a couple more minutes. I've got a couple questions regarding around eligibility. One specifically. Is there a minimum level of income required to enter the program? And along with that, another eligibility question is if someone's not a US citizen and does not have a Social Security number, are they eligible to apply to be in the FSS? >> Sharon Hirota: Darrin, do you want to take the lead on that one? >> Darrin Dorsett: If I can, I'll take the first one. If you want to go to the second one regarding eligibility and Social Security. >> Sharon Hirota: Okay. >> Darrin Dorsett: There's no income requirement. There's not a requirement to say you have to make $5000 a year. Again, you do have to be enrolled in the Section 8 program or public housing program. And in order for that to happen, there are some income eligibility requirements. There's no -- you don't have to make a certain amount of money in order to participate in Family Self-Sufficiency. If you are an eligible voucher holder or a public housing residents, you can participate in the program. Sharon, if you could clarify that -- if I missed anything there? >> Sharon Hirota: The key word is eligible for participating in the Section 8 program. Once an individual or quote-unquote family is determined to be eligible to participate, and they've met some housing authorities -- they say you must be an eligible participant in good standing for 12 months in the Section 8 program before your eligible for the FSS program. Others don't have that criteria. I think the key word is eligible. In regards to the question about a non-US citizen who does not have a Social Security card, they would need to check with their local agency who is administering the FSS program in terms of the definition of eligibility. In our County, we would say the non-US citizen individual may not be eligible to the head of household but maybe an eligible member who can participate as part of the family in the FSS program. It gets tricky when you start talking about -- talk about eligibility specific to a makeup of a family. That would need to go one-on-one with your housing authority. >> Keith Combs: Thank you very much for those responses. Thank you for the great questions we've received today. We are running out of time for the webinar. If there are any questions that you were not able to get in, feel free to e-mail those questions to me directly. At [email protected]. I will be more than happy to get responses to those questions. Again, we'd like to thank all of our speakers today. Sharon -- Sharon Hirota, Darrin Dorsett, as well as Nakia Matthews for our technical support. We welcome you to join us for our next webinar, which is coming up on Wednesday, June 11, 2014 at 3:00. This will be a discussion on joining the economic mainstream. And again, we'd like to say a special thank you to our sponsors today. Walmart, Bank of America, Acorda Therapeutics, Burton Blatt Institute, and the IRS. Some ways to keep in contact with National Disability Institute is through Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, and tumbler. Again, I want to extend a thank you to Sharon and Darrin for your time today. The information was wonderful. And for all of the participants that joined us for this great discussion on the Family Self-Sufficiency program. Thank you and have a great day.

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