Strengthening the Role of Fathers in Public Housing Families

SUMMARY: The Department published an Advance Notice of Proposed

Rulemaking (ANPRM) on the subject of ``Strengthening the Role of

Fathers in Public Housing Families'' on July 30, 1996 (61 FR 39812),

with a 45-day comment period. The ANPRM invited public comments on

measures, practices, and authorizations to local public housing

agencies in support of efforts to encourage absentee parents,

especially but not necessarily limited to absentee fathers, to play a

more responsible social and economic role in the lives of families in

PHA-owned or assisted developments. Upon review of comments received in

response to that ANPRM, the Department has determined that it is

unnecessary to go forward with a regulatory change at this point, but

that the purposes described in the ANPRM and in this Notice would be

best served by proceeding with the development of less formal guidance

material, described below.

DATES: The ANPRM on the subject of ``Strengthening the Role of Fathers

in Public Housing Families,'' published on July 30, 1996 at 61 FR 39812

is withdrawn as of October 23, 1997.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Richard A. Trebelhorn, Technical

Assistance and Planning Division, HUD, Room 4236, 451 Seventh Street

SW, Washington, DC 20410-5000, telephone (202) 708-3642 (this is not a

toll-free number). A telecommunications device for hearing- and speech-

impaired persons (TTY) is available at 1-800-877-8339 (Federal

Information Relay Services). (This is a toll-free number.)

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

I. Background

The Department published an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking

(ANPRM) on the subject of ``Strengthening the Role of Fathers in Public

Housing Families'' on July 30, 1996 (61 FR 39812), with a 45-day

comment period. HUD received comments from 32 entities, most of which

were State or local housing agencies, and the substance of those

comments is summarized below. In addition to comments received in

response to the ANPRM, HUD convened a roundtable discussion on this

subject in early September 1996, in which knowledgeable housing

professionals and academics shared their thinking on measures that

would encourage more responsible roles for fathers, and that would

facilitate reuniting public housing families.

The comments on the ANPRM and comments and observations from the

roundtable generally suggest that a formal rulemaking might be

unnecessary, and in the absence of a compelling need for regulatory

action, the Department has determined not to proceed with publication

of a Proposed Rule at this time. Therefore, consistent with the

majority of the comments on the ANPRM and the draft proposed rule, and

with the recommendations of the roundtable, HUD will sponsor

development of a ``best practices'' guidebook or source book for use in

local fatherhood initiatives. HUD, or a contractor under HUD

supervision, will visit a substantial number of sites--probably 12 to

15 locations beginning with and in addition to the known programs in

Baltimore and Hartford--to gather information on best practices,

procedures, attributes, and similar program elements or components of

local programs compatible with the Department's goal of strengthening

the role of fathers in public housing families.

Based on information gathered in the course of the site visits,

information developed from the roundtable and comments on the ANPRM,

and any other information that becomes available, HUD will develop a

guidebook or source book of materials for PHA managers planning a

fatherhood initiative. The materials in this guide or source book will

emphasize ``how- to'' information on program modules or components that

can be replicated, as opposed to narrative descriptions or case

studies; case studies are expected to be used for illustrative

purposes, but are not to be the principal focus of the research project

or the resulting guide or source book.

Using inputs from the roundtable and the best practices study, HUD

will use contracted resources to develop an Implementation Guide and a

training package for use by PHAs electing to develop and implement a

``fatherhood initiative.''

The Guide would be a compendium of current thinking, reflecting but

not duplicating the best practices material referenced above, that

would be useful to housing authorities in initiating a local program to

encourage or facilitate fathers' playing a more positive and

responsible role in public housing families and communities. The

training and implementation component is expected to include a short

video to introduce HUD's interest in strengthening the role of fathers

in public housing families, suitable for use with tenant groups and HUD

field office staff as well as PHA personnel. It will also include

detailed lesson plans and training materials for program managers at

the PHA and project-site levels.

II. HUD Responses to Public Comments on the ANPRM

In drafting the Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, HUD assumed

an initial goal of reuniting families and bringing absent fathers back

into their children's homes. Responses to the ANPRM and explicit

comments in HUD's roundtable suggest that the ANPRM blurred necessary

distinctions among several important goals. These include, at least,

(1) facilitating the return of absentee fathers to their families; (2)

encouraging men who are living intermittently or clandestinely with

their public housing families to come forward and assert a responsible

social and financial role; (3) assuring that estranged parents accept

financial responsibility for their children in public housing; and (4)

making it possible for absentee fathers to connect or re-connect with

their children in public housing communities.

By subsuming these (and probably other) reasonable goals under a

general statement of support for ``re-uniting families,'' the ANPRM

assumed an active PHA role in areas and issues that generally are

beyond the authority and the capacity of local housing agencies. HUD

recognizes that the program outlined in the ANPRM required considerable

refinement. The Department recognizes that many of the activities that

would go into a local program for strengthening the role of fathers and

encouraging fathers to play responsible roles in their children's

growth and development fall more appropriately within the capacity and

responsibility of social service agencies outside the housing

authority.

Therefore, any further initiative in this area--including the

proposed best practices guide and implementation package--will

necessarily place less emphasis on a presumed role for a housing

authority. This Notice identifies

[[Page 55325]]

PHA actions or activities already authorized in statute and/or

regulation that can be employed to further the goals described in the

ANPRM. The proposed best practices guidebook will address additional

measures that can be undertaken by a PHA and/or another service agency

or contractor, and the implications of such measures for PHA

management, including financial management.

The ANPRM invited comments on several specific items, and most

respondents commented on most of those elements. Those comments are

summarized, under the subject area heading of the ANPRM that is

addressed by the comment, as follows:

1. To the extent that it may be necessary to encourage responsible

behavior by an absent parent, HAs would be encouraged, but not

necessarily required, to:

a. Provide a priority for transfer among HA properties;

Summary: The vast majority of respondents pointed out that PHAs

already have the latitude to permit, authorize, or require transfers

among their properties, and that such policies are spelled out in

tenant selection and assignment plans; no further regulation should be

necessary.

Response: HUD accepts these comments, and acknowledges that

transfer policies are best left to local decision-making. HUD will

continue to examine the desirability or practicality of including in a

transfer policy explicit recognition of requested transfers that would

result in a family's better access to day care, or more convenient

access to employment or job training, especially in cases involving a

returning parent.

b. Offer a priority for a Section 8 certificate or voucher

(consistent with the principles of the Family Unification program);

Summary: Most respondents were opposed to Federal preferences in

any guise, including this one. Several comments suggested that a

preference, especially a new preference, was unfair to applicants

already on waiting lists, some for several years. Other comments made

the point that offering public housing residents a priority for Section

8 placement creates vacancies in public housing.

Response: HUD accepts these criticisms, and does not plan to

emphasize use of tenant selection preferences to further the goals

described in the ANPRM.

c. Exempt from rent determinations the incremental income of the

returning parent for a period of up to three years without adverse

effect on the HA's eligibility for operating subsidy under the PFS.

Summary: Income disregards, rent forgiveness, and rent credits

elicited more comment than almost any other part of the ANPRM. Only two

respondents--both state housing agencies--opposed incentives of this

kind, and several respondents recommended expansion of PHAs' latitude

to disregard incremental income from a new job, income from a second

job or second wage-earner (whether a new family member or not), or any

earned income.

Response: Under section 402 of the 1996 Continuing Resolution, PHAs

are permitted to adopt optional earned income deductions in determining

adjusted income (but are not eligible for commensurate increases in

eligibility for operating subsidy); this provision was extended in

section 201 of the Department's 1997 Appropriations Act and is in

effect at least through September 30, 1997 pending additional

legislation.

In addition, the Department's recently-published Optional Earned

Income Exclusions Final Rule, published May 5, 1997 (62 FR 24334),

permits PHAs to adopt an exclusion for earned income; PFS Operating

Subsidy will not increase to cover rental income reductions resulting

from such exclusions, but will allow a PHA that achieves net increases

in rents from earned income to maintain eligibility for subsidy up to

an amount equal to the PFS operating subsidy shortfall (see also the

Interim Rule on Performance Funding System--Incentives, published in

the Federal Register on September 30, 1996 61 FR 51178).

2. To obtain any benefits or incentives offered by an HA program, a

returning parent would be required to enter into a formal agreement or

contract, binding him or her to comply with the requirements of the HA

lease and to make and honor commitments to family members and to the HA

community. HUD requested public comments on the nature of such an

agreement, and on the range of obligations that could reasonably be

demanded of a returning parent. Should HUD create a model form of

agreement for this purpose? Are there certain minimum requirements that

HUD could itemize, and permit HAs to make additions to reflect local

interests? Or should HAs be given maximum latitude to develop their own

standards and agreements?

Summary: Responses to this item were nearly as varied as comments

on income disregards, ranging from specific recommendations for

contract language, to suggestions that all the requirements for

positive parental behavior are already written into marriage vows and

lawful marriage ought to be a major goal of fatherhood initiatives.

Response: HUD's first conclusion is that the ANPRM was too narrowly

focused to have introduced this subject as a contract between the PHA

and a returning parent/father. As was correctly pointed out in the

comments, the PHA already has a lease with the subject family, and if a

returning father joins that household, he becomes subject to that

lease. If there is another agreement, securing additional rights or

privileges beyond those of the leasehold, that agreement would be

between the program participant--the returning parent, presumably--and

the service agency managing the fatherhood program. That service agency

may or may not be a PHA; experiences related at HUD's roundtable

suggested that in many cases, if not most often, the service agency

would not be a PHA, but a wholly separate community services entity

whose clientele could include PHA families but would not be limited to

PHA families. The substance and the enforcement of any such additional

agreement, and the range of benefits secured by the agreement--

employment, employment counseling, job training, behavior counseling--

would be entirely between the signatories; neither HUD nor the PHA need

necessarily be involved in that agreement.

HUD anticipates that the ``best practices'' study will develop a

variety of agreements and components of agreements from which service

providers, including any PHAs that elect to manage their own fatherhood

initiative, can develop agreements suited to their specific situations.

A second major observation is that, particularly in the context of

returning parents and re-uniting families, agreements between the

absentee parent and the service agency are necessarily secondary to an

agreement between the public housing leaseholder and the absentee

parent. If the parent or grandparent is living in public housing with

the children, then as a practical matter, that person will exert far

more influence and control than the PHA or the service agency over the

terms under which the absentee parent establishes or re-establishes a

relationship with the children.

This observation also responds to several comments to the effect

that restoring an absent parent to a household is not necessarily a

good idea; sometimes the best resolution is for the absentee to remain

absent. HUD's goal in fostering local fatherhood

[[Page 55326]]

initiatives is to facilitate plans that will enable absentee parents,

especially fathers, to establish or re-establish positive social and/or

economic links with their children, but HUD also recognizes that any

such links must be mutually agreeable to the absentee and the custodial

parent.

Summary: There were specific comments to the effect that HUD and/or

the PHAs should encourage, or even require, lawful marriages as part of

this effort.

Response: The policies and authorizations incident to this

initiative are intended to facilitate the establishment or re

establishment of positive social and economic links between absentee

parents and their children in public housing communities; any explicit

prescription concerning linkages or relationships among adult residents

is beyond the scope of HUD rulemaking.

3. HUD's position is that participants must be subject to

admissions screening, to assure the rest of the community that the new

or re-joining family member would not constitute any special threat to

the peace and quiet of the neighborhood.

Summary: Respondents were nearly unanimous in favor of rigorous

screening of all applicants, including persons joining or re-joining

resident families.

Response: HUD will instruct developers of subsequent guidance

material to make explicit that housing authorities have the right to

review and to reject persons proposing to join (or re-join) resident

families, irrespective of the applicant's relationship to the resident

family or of any prior leasehold interest enjoyed by that person: if

someone has left the household, return is not necessarily automatic.

Summary: Several comments suggested that there was an apparent

conflict between the ``one-strike'' provisions of section 9 of the

Housing Opportunity Program Extension Act of 1996 (Pub. L. 104-120,

approved March 28, 1996) (the ``Extension Act'') and out-reach efforts

to engage absentee parents in public housing communities.

Response: HUD has reviewed those comments and the cited statute,

and is of the opinion that there is no conflict between this initiative

and the Extension Act. Section 16(e)(2) of the Extension Act sets forth

several exceptions to the Extension Act's rule that Public Housing

authorities must deny assistance to persons who have a pattern of use

of a controlled substance or a pattern of abuse of alcohol that

interferes with the health, safety, or right to peaceful enjoyment of

the premises by others. The Extension Act states that in determining

whether to deny occupancy or assistance, a housing authority may

consider whether an individual:

(A) Has successfully completed a supervised drug or alcohol

rehabilitation program and is no longer engaging in the use of a

controlled substance or abuse of alcohol (as applicable); or

(B) Has otherwise been rehabilitated successfully and is no

longer engaging in the use of a controlled substance or abuse of

alcohol (as applicable); or

(C) Is participating in a supervised drug or alcohol

rehabilitation program (as applicable) and is no longer engaging in

the illegal use of a controlled substance or abuse of alcohol (as

applicable).

For purposes of screening tenants who would join or re-join public

housing resident households, the PHA should take into consideration an

applicant's participation in a Fatherhood Initiative. Where that

services or counseling program includes a substance abuse counseling

component, the housing authority may, but is not required to, accept

that as compliance with the rehabilitation provisions of the one-strike

limitations in section 16(e)(2), and permit an exemption from the

prohibitions of sections 6(r) and 16(e)(1) of the United States Housing

Act of 1937 (1937 Act).

In addition to screening for admission or re-admission to residency

in a public housing community, the issue of screening for acceptance

into an employment, job training, or other social service program was

subsumed in the ANPRM's reference to ``screening.'' In response to

comments on the ANPRM and information shared at the roundtable, the

Department recognizes that criteria for participation in a services

program are not necessarily the same as tenant selection criteria. HUD

anticipates that the best practices study will include a variety of

selection factors and screening techniques from which service

providers, including any PHAs that elect to manage their own fatherhood

initiative, can develop procedures suited to their specific situations.

4. Returning parents, or a parent newly accepting a responsible

role in a family, would be required to participate in a parenting and/

or counseling program. To the extent that some returning parents may

have been involved in domestic violence or abuse, such counseling or

training must have been completed before admission or re-admission to

the HA housing. Parenting training or counseling would be allowable

budget costs for the HA.

Summary: Respondents were generally in favor of parent training and

counseling, and not necessarily limited to new or returning parents,

but several PHAs objected to the suggestion that such services could be

operated or financed by the housing authority.

Response: HUD's response is to remind all concerned that certain

PHA-provided tenant services and management of external services are

already allowable costs under PFS procedures, at least to the extent

that such services are part of an approved Family Self Sufficiency plan

under section 23 of the 1937 Act.

Where participation in a parenting class, anti-abuse counseling, or

any other sort of behavior counseling is a component of a non-PHA

service agency's program, the PHA has the latitude to accept or reject

an applicant for admission (or re-admission) to public housing,

irrespective of the applicant's participation in the training or

counseling program, in accordance with the PHA's tenant selection and

screening policies or procedures.

5. The Hartford Family Reunification model includes an explicit

requirement that returning parents be and remain free of substance

abuse, including provisions for pre-admission testing and subsequent

random testing for substance abuse. Testing is at the expense of the

housing authority. HUD is interested in public comments on such drug

abstinence and drug testing requirements and policies.

Summary: As stated in the ANPRM, the discussion of drug abstinence

and drug testing unfortunately blurs the distinction between public

housing residency versus participation in employment, training, and

services programs. Responding housing authorities were nearly unanimous

in opposition to substance abuse testing requirements for returning

fathers (although a few comments were positive toward universal

substance abuse testing). Negative comments cited issues of

discrimination against a particular segment of PHAs' clientele, the

inappropriateness of PHAs' involvement in medical processes, PHAs' lack

of capacity to manage or operate a substance abuse testing or

identification program, and the costs of such an undertaking.

Response: Where a service provider operates a fatherhood initiative

that includes a substance abuse testing component, existing regulations

authorize PHAs to take into account the results of testing for

controlled substances in screening potential residents, including

parents seeking to

[[Page 55327]]

re-establish residency with their families.

PHAs can also condition continued rent abatement or income

disregard benefits on a resident's successful participation in an

employment, training, or services program, including success in

abstinence from controlled substances where that abstinence is a

condition of the program.

Dated: October 17, 1997.

Kevin Emanuel Marchman,

Acting Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing.

[FR Doc. 97-28080 Filed 10-22-97; 8:45 am]

BILLING CODE 4210-33-P