Department of Housing and Urban Development December 2005 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This rule implements a new law, enacted as part of HUD's Fiscal Year (FY) 2006 appropriations, that restricts individuals enrolled in an institution of higher education and who meet certain other requirements from receiving assistance under section 8 of the U.S. Housing Act of 1937. The new law directed HUD to issue a final rule within 30 days of enactment of the new law. This rule fulfills the statutory requirement.

This Notice identifies unutilized, underutilized, excess, and surplus Federal property reviewed by HUD for suitability for possible use to assist the homeless.

The proposed information collection requirement described below has been submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act. The Department is soliciting public comments on the subject proposal. This information is required for approval of all FHA Title I lender and Title II mortgagees; issuers of Ginnie Mae mortgage-backed securities. Additional information is then required of all FHA approved Title I lenders and Title II mortgagees to: (1) Maintain their approval (annual Recertification); (2) add/delete branches; (3) pay additional fees to FHA for annual Recertification, new branches, and business conversions; (4) report business changes of lender or mortgagee including structure, addresses, and principal owners and officers; (5) report non-compliance detected by lender and mortgagee quality control plans; and (6) voluntarily terminate FHA approval.

This final rule establishes the requirement for applicants for HUD grants or certain other financial assistance to submit their applications to HUD electronically. This final rule follows publication of a proposed rule on November 23, 2004. HUD received four comments in response to the proposed rule's invitation for public comment. After careful consideration of the comments, this rule makes final without substantive changes the proposed rule published on November 23, 2004.

The interim rule implements certain statutory changes by revising HUD's regulations for the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program. Specifically, this interim rule prohibits state and local governments from using CDBG funds for ``job pirating'' activities that are likely to result in significant job loss. The rule also applies to section 108 loan guarantees, and the use of Brownfields Economic Development Initiative and Economic Development Initiative funds with section 108 loan guarantees and CDBG funding. This rule follows publication of an October 24, 2000, proposed rule and takes into consideration the public comments received on the proposed rule. The interim rule also provides the public with an additional opportunity to comment on the regulatory job pirating provisions.

In compliance with section 202(c) of the National Housing Act, this notice advises of the cause and description of administrative actions taken by HUD's Mortgagee Review Board against HUD-approved mortgagees.

This notice proposes changes in the metropolitan area definitions used to calculate HUD median family income estimates and income limits. In this notice, HUD is proposing to issue FY2006 income limits that are based on current Office of Management and Budget (OMB) metropolitan statistical area (MSA) definitions based on 2000 Census data rather than to continue to use old OMB metropolitan area definitions based on 1990 Census data. OMB revises metropolitan area definitions after each Decennial Census. It issued its 2000-Census based definitions in 2003, which contained substantial changes to several metropolitan area definitions. These changes were made to better reflect metropolitan area commuting and economic patterns. The OMB metropolitan area definitions are used on a widespread basis throughout the federal government for both data collection and program administrative purposes. HUD proposed implementing these definitions in its 2004 publication of proposed FY2005 Section 8 Fair Market Rents. It planned to issue FY2005 income limits using the same area definitions. In response to public comments, it reverted to use of old OMB definitions in its final FY2005 Fair Market Rent (FMR) publication. HUD noted in this publication that it intended to continue exploring how to best implement the new definitions, and subsequently received a number of comments supporting use of the new definitions. To meet the needs of agencies required to use current OMB metropolitan area definitions, it published a separate set of FY2005 income estimates based on the new definitions. HUD's final FY2006 FMR publication of October 3, 2005, uses the new OMB definitions in defining metropolitan areas, but modified these definitions to permit subareas based on old metropolitan area definitions in instances when FMRs based on the old definitions differed significantly from the new metropolitan area-wide FMRs. The new approach leaves open the question of whether a hold- harmless provision of some type should be applied in instances where the new metropolitan area definitions produce decreases in estimates of median family income and/or income limits. The statute governing how income limits are to be defined is relatively detailed, but the Secretary of HUD does have limited discretion over its application. Given the number of changes associated with OMB's new metropolitan area definitions, the Department wishes to solicit public comments on this matter prior to implementation. In order to provide directly comparable estimates on the impacts of the changes in metropolitan area definitions on income limits, revised FY2005 income limits were calculated using the new area definitions. The actual FY2006 estimates using the new definitions are likely to be at least somewhat higher than the comparable FY2005 estimates. To provide detailed information on the impacts of the new metropolitan area definitions, HUD prepared a table that compares FY2005 actual income limits with the equivalent FY2005 income limits calculated using the new metropolitan area definitions. Two versions of revised FY2005 income limits are providedone without any hold-harmless policy and one with a hold-harmless policy based on the published FY2005 income limits for the primary old-definition component of the new metropolitan area. This table identifies all of the component parts of the new metropolitan areas and shows which parts previously had different income limits. The table may be obtained at www.huduser.org/datasets/ il.html. In addition to inviting comments on the hold-harmless policy, HUD is also interested in comments on FMR area definitions for areas where two or more metropolitan areas were merged under the new definitions. In preparing its proposed FY2006 FMRs, HUD opted to disaggregate such areas when their FMRs differed by more than 5 percent so as to better reflect local market conditions. In reviewing the impacts of FMR area changes on income limits, it was found that most areas had minimal changes in income limits. There were two notable exceptions. Under the new area definitions, the former Bergen-Passaic and Monmouth-Ocean metropolitan areas were added to New York City and the former Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach-Boca Raton metropolitan areas were added to Miami. In both instances, the old metropolitan areas had very similar 2000 Census-based FMRs to those of the metropolitan areas to which they were being added, but they had significantly higher median family income and income limit amounts. HUD therefore wishes to invite comments as to whether any of these areas should be treated as distinct subparts of their new OMB metropolitan areas, as was done for subparts with measurably different FMRs. Establishing separate income limit areas would mean that separate FMR areas would also be established. In these specific instances, however, the changes in FMR area configurations would have no impact on FY2006 FMRs and would be likely to have very little impact on FY2007 FMRs. HUD believes that the primary area hold-harmless appears to provide the best compromise between program objectives and program administrative considerations. Given that there are methodological changes involved, however, HUD wishes to obtain public comments before calculating and publishing FY2006 income limits.

The proposed information collection requirement described below has been submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act. The Department is soliciting public comments on the subject proposal. This information collection is used as a ``turnaround'' document by mortgage lenders to request extension of time and for HUD to provide a response. For audit purposes, regulations require mortgagee's to maintain claim files for three years after a claim is paid. Information in the claim file includes copies of the HUD approval with related claim documents to verify that HUD has authorized extensions of time on specific cases.

This notice announces HUD's intention to sell certain unsubsidized multifamily and healthcare mortgage loans, without Federal Housing Administration (FHA) insurance, in a competitive, sealed bid sale (MHLS 2005-3). This notice also describes generally the bidding process for the sale and certain persons who are ineligible to bid.

The proposed information collection requirement described below has been submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act. The Department is soliciting public comments on the subject proposal. This information collection covers application, qualification, and certification processes for participants in HUD-FHA's 203(K) Rehabilitation Mortgage Insurance Program.

The proposed information collection requirement described below has been submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act. The Department is soliciting public comments on the subject proposal. Owner entities submit requisitions periodically (generally monthly) to HUD during construction to obtain Section 202/811 capital advance/ loan funds. This collection identifies the owner, project, type of disbursement, items covered, name of the depository, and account number.

As part of the ongoing implementation of Electronic Government (E-Government), a key component of the President's Management Agenda, HUD is continuing with its transition to a total electronic grant application system. This system requires applicants to submit applications for Federal grants electronically through Grants.gov, the governmentwide portal for electronic grant applications. To protect the applicant and the applicant's information, and to assure Federal agencies that they are interacting with officials authorized to submit applications on behalf of applicant entities, an applicant must register with Grants.gov to submit an application for funding. To facilitate the Fiscal Year (FY) 2006 Federal grant application process, this notice encourages prospective applicants for HUD funding to register early for the FY2006 funding cycle. Registering now, in advance of agencies posting their FY2006 grant opportunities, may eliminate many of the registration issues that HUD applicants faced in FY2005 of not meeting registration requirements in time to meet grant application deadlines. Early registration provides HUD, Grants.gov, and the applicant sufficient time to address any questions regarding the registration process, as well as allow applicants to focus on completing application requirements, since registration will be completed. HUD anticipates that it will post its funding opportunities in early 2006. Prospective applicants for FY2006 HUD grants are encouraged to register at https://www.grants.gov with the publication of this Notice. Although applicants can register at any time before an application is submitted to HUD, the registration process can take approximately 10 days or more. The process relies upon an exchange of data across three different databases and an organization's E-Business Point of Contact (E-Business POC) to complete the authorization process. With busy schedules, an organization seeking to submit a grant application would not want a scenario where a key individual serving as the E-Business POC is not available to complete the process in time to meet an application deadline. Early registration helps applicants avoid possible delays with the timely submission of applications or finding out right before the submission deadline that all the steps in the registration process are not complete. This notice describes the steps that HUD applicants must take to register successfully at https://www.grants.gov.

The proposed information collection requirement described below will be submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act. The Department is soliciting public comments on the subject proposal.

This notice announces revised Annual Adjustment Factors (AAFs) for adjustment of Section 8 contract rents for specified programs. These factors apply to housing assistance payment contract anniversaries for calendar months commencing after the date of publication of this notice. The AAFs are based on residential rent and utilities time-series cost indices from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index (CPI) surveys.