Burlington County’s Housing Hub and housing assistance programs were praised by two of the top officials with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development during a visit to the county last week.
Dr. Kimberly McClain, HUD’s Assistant Secretary for Congressional and Intergovernmental Relations, and Alicka Ampry-Samuel, HUD’s regional administrator for New Jersey and New York, toured the Housing Hub at the Burlington County Human Services Building on Friday with Commissioner Director Felicia Hopson, State Assemblyman Herb Conaway, Westampton Mayor Sandy Henley, County Director of Human Services Shirla Simpson and County Division of Housing and Community Development Director Jennifer Hiros.
After the tour, the two federal housing administrators participated in a roundtable meeting with the County officials to learn more about the Housing Hub and other housing assistance programs in the county.
“No resident should be forced to live unsheltered or without permanent safe, sufficient housing and our Board has made combating housing insecurity and homelessness a priority,” said Hopson, who is the liaison to the Department of Human Services. “With HUD’s support, we’ve also boosted our County’s first-time homebuyer and emergency home repair programs to make purchasing a home here more obtainable and to assist our low- and moderate-income families with unexpected home repairs. Both programs have been huge successes and we’re continuing to look for new ways to make sure working families and young adults are able to afford homes in all our county’s communities.”
Launched in 2019, the Housing Hub provides a single point of entry for residents experiencing housing hardships or homelessness to go for supportive services and advocacy without having to navigate several different offices. Among the services the Housing Hub has helped facilitate are: emergency sheltering in hotels/motels, housing placement, mortgage assistance, rental assistance, security deposit assistance, transitional housing, substance use disorder assistance and utility assistance.
In 2023, the Housing Hub assisted more than 2,800 unduplicated clients receive nearly 10,300 total services.
The Burlington County First-Time Homebuyers Program provides aid to income-eligible homebuyers to assist with downpayments, closing costs and interest reduction. Last year, the Commissioners approved changes to the program to make the program more responsive to market conditions and the needs of low- and moderate-income families.
Under the approved changes, $15,000 is now available for downpayment assistance (up from $5,000) and a maximum of $10,000 is available for closing costs and interest reduction (up from $4,000). The Commissioners also approved changing program rules to permit the County to forgive loans awarded through the program if the recipient resides in the purchased home for 10 years.
A total of 56 homebuyers have received help from the program since 2023, including 31 since the program changes were announced last summer.