Department of Housing and Urban Development June 14, 2006 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

On January 20, 2006, HUD published its Fiscal Year FY2006, Notice of Funding Availability Policy Requirements and General Section (General Section) to the SuperNOFA for HUD's Discretionary Programs. On March 8, 2006, HUD published its FY2006, SuperNOFA, for HUD's Discretionary Grant Programs. This notice announces that HUD has extended the submission deadline date for the Community Development- Technical Assistance Program, Fair Housing Initiatives Program, Housing Choice Voucher-Family Self-Sufficiency Program, and Rural Housing and Economic Development Program NOFAs that were part of the FY2006 SuperNOFA. Specifically, this notice extends the submission deadline dates for only those applicants located in areas designated by the President as disaster areas, as the result of severe storms and flooding that began on May 12, 2006 and adversely affected areas of the State of Maine, Commonwealth of Massachusetts and State of New Hampshire. The areas included in the President's Emergency Declaration and covered by this Notice are the Maine county of York; the Massachusetts counties of Essex, Middlesex and Suffolk; and the New Hampshire counties of Belknap, Carroll, Hillsborough, Merrimack, Rockingham and Strafford. For those applicants located in one of these counties, the revised deadline date is June 27, 2006 at 11:59:59 p.m. eastern time. All electronic applications are available at https:// www.Grants.gov and must be received and validated by Grants.gov by the deadline date and time. As provided by the General Section, applicants wishing to submit a hard copy application must obtain a waiver from HUD. If the waiver is granted, applications must be received by HUD in accordance with the waiver approval notice by the deadline date and time. Applications received from areas other than those listed in the emergency declarations will not be considered. Applications received in accord with the submission requirements and not impacted by the declaration are under review and are not affected by this Notice.

The Manufactured Housing Consensus Committee (MHCC) has submitted to HUD recommended regulatory text that would revise HUD's current Subpart I regulations that implement statutory requirements concerning how manufacturers and others address reports of problems with manufactured homes, including notifications to consumers and correction of safety defects and of homes that fail to meet the Federal construction and safety standards. The National Manufactured Housing Construction and Safety Standards Act of 1974 expressly limits HUD to either accepting such an MHCC recommendation in its entirety for publication as a proposed rule, or rejecting the recommendation, providing the MHCC a written explanation of the reasons for rejection, and publishing in the Federal Register the rejected proposal, the reasons for rejection, and any recommended modifications. The Secretary commends the careful work of the MHCC on this initiative and would accept almost all of the MHCC's recommendation. HUD has met with the MHCC numerous times on these regulations, and the Department and the MHCC have worked together to draft a clear and comprehensive revision of these regulations. However, because HUD believes that certain language included in the MHCC recommendation is contrary to the statute, HUD cannot accept the proposal. Nevertheless, in accordance with a different statutory procedure that is available, and in an effort to resolve the remaining differences between what HUD could accept and what was included in the MHCC recommendation, HUD has also submitted to the MHCC for its review a HUD proposal for revision of subpart I that is based on the MHCC recommendation, with a few modifications as discussed in this notice. As required by the statute, the full text of the MHCC's recommendation is set forth in this notice for informational purposes, along with HUD's reasons for not accepting all of the recommendations and an explanation of the modifications HUD has suggested to the MHCC. A set of principles that the MHCC drafted to guide its development of its recommendation is also set out in this notice. In accordance with statutory procedure, after HUD has received the MHCC's comments on HUD's proposal to revise Subpart I and HUD has considered those comments, HUD expects to publish separately a proposed rule revising Subpart I for public comment.

This notice describes additional waivers and alternative requirements applicable to the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) disaster recovery grant provided to the State of Louisiana for the purpose of assisting in the recovery in the most impacted and distressed areas related to the consequences of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. On February 13, 2006, HUD published an allocation and application notice applicable to this grant and four others under the same appropriation. As described in the Supplementary Information section of this notice, HUD is authorized by statute to waive statutory and regulatory requirements and specify alternative requirements for this purpose, upon the request of the state grantee. This notice for the State of Louisiana also notes statutory provisions affecting program design and implementation.

This notice describes additional waivers and alternative requirements applicable to the CDBG disaster recovery grant provided to the State of Alabama for the purpose of assisting in the recovery in the most impacted and distressed areas related to the consequences of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. HUD previously published an allocation and application notice on February 13, 2006, applicable to this grant and four others under the same appropriation. As described in the Supplementary Information section of this notice, HUD is authorized by statute to waive statutory and regulatory requirements and specify alternative requirements for this purpose, upon the request of the state grantee. This notice for the State of Alabama also notes statutory provisions affecting program design and implementation.