May 1, 2023
Office of Public and Indian Housing
Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity Office of General Counsel
Department of Housing and Urban Development 451 7th Street, SW, Room 10276
Washington, DC 20410-0500
RE: Housing Choice Voucher Program: Rescreening of Porting Participants
Dear colleagues,
We are writing to express our continuing concern regarding elective rescreening of Housing Choice Voucher families that choose to port their voucher across Public Housing Authority (PHA) jurisdictional lines. This illegal and duplicative process creates significant barriers to the portability rights of recipients and restricts their movement to areas of higher opportunity. This practice violates the Housing Choice Voucher statute and is inconsistent with HUD’s obligation to Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing. We hope HUD will reconsider its position as set forth in the final portability rule in 2015 and issue clarifying guidance or revise its regulations to comply with the law.1
