HUD Grants Available for Rural Communities

In a speech to the U.S. Housing Assistance Council’s National Rural Housing Conference, HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan acknowledged that more work is needed to provide affordable housing in rural and tribal areas. To that end, he announced a new grant program aimed at promoting affordable housing development in those areas. A total of $25 million has been allocated for HUD’s new Rural Innovation Fund, which aims to “stimulate new approaches to old problems” by making money available for innovative rural affordable housing and related projects. Grants of up to $2 million will be awarded to eligible applicants that present creative and executable solutions to rural and tribal housing and economic needs.”Eligible applicants” includes rural non-profit organizations, state housing finance and/or community development agencies, and federally recognized Indian tribes. Grant money can be used for land acquisition, building demolition and/or construction, financial assistance, homeownership counseling, or developing of construction plans.Three different grant programs were created under the Rural Innovation Fund:Single Purpose Grants
Comprehensive Grants, and
Economic Development and Entrepreneurship for Federally Recognized TribesMoney has been allocated as follows: $7.5 million for Single Purpose (individual grants not to exceed $300,000), $2 million for Comprehensive, and $5 million for Federally Recognized Tribes (individual grants not to exceed $800,000).Single Purpose Grants of up to $300,000 are awarded to address a specific need within a project area. The need should be related to housing or economic needs of an area’s residents. The proposed solution must target the need identified by, for example, building additional low-income housing stock, or offering grants or loans to small businesses.Comprehensive Grants are designed to support projects that seek to tackle a wide scope of issues within a project area, and use a combination of public and private funding to do it. Awards can be up to, but not more than $2 million. Qualifying proposals must show an understanding of the comprehensive needs of a target area, including: unemployment levels and hindrances to obtaining gainful employment; availability and quality of existing housing; and, demographics of target-area residents. Existing assets and resources must be identified as well.Economic Development and Entrepreneurship Grants are exclusively for federally recognized tribal communities. Grants of up to $800,000 are available.For the purpose of these grants, HUD defines “rural” as:a place located outside a metropolitan area with a population of 20,000 or less,
a “non-urban place” with a population of less than 2,500, or
a parish or county with an urban population of no more than 20,000HUD also has a handful of exceptions to these definitions, which are detailed in HUDs Notice of Funding Availability that was released late last year.