March 18, 2020 | Volume 13, Issue 2

A message from Suzanne Anarde, RCAC Chief Executive Officer

Dear friends and colleagues,
Like you, we continue to monitor the ever changing COVID-19 situation with concern. First and foremost, we are focused on the safety and health of our staff, their families and the communities we serve. We are monitoring Centers for Disease Control (CDC) updates, public health department warnings, school closures, staff health, at-risk or vulnerable staff and their families and tracking the number of corona virus cases in areas where we work. Read more

RCAC housing director update

The first Mutual Self-Help Housing conference in more than five years was held in Albuquerque February 4 – 6 and it was a tremendous success; with more than 400 attendees, significant participation from our USDA partners as well as tremendous guest speakers. I was overwhelmed by the positive energy generated by this group. Read more

Planning for homeownership month

June is Homeownership Month and now is the time to start planning for success! Every year we search for interesting ways to celebrate, garner exposure for our programs and get community members, media and state representatives to attend. Read further for celebration ideas

Dear Sher

I’m working on an application and with all of the changes lately, I’m not sure if I need a landlord verification? If an applicant has a reliable score over 640, does the rent need to be verified at all? The handbook seems silent on this, but other language suggests it’s not necessary. Is whatever the applicant puts on the RD 410 application acceptable? And how does this work for addressing payment shock? Read more

PN 532: Instruction 1944-I updates and changes to chapters 3 and 4

Long awaited changes to 1944-I were published on Dec. 12, 2019! USDA RD has made some significant updates and changes to 1944-I, Section 523 Self-Help Technical Assistance Grants and Handbook 1-3550 Chapters 3 and 4 through PN 532. Review those changes here

Nancy’s SHARES tidbits

Some of you took advantage of the updated method to print your SHARES report on TWO pages versus SIX. Whether you have or have not, you’ll want to use this newer, updated version for printing out your reports. Thanks to Jason Stillwell of Little Dixie, you’ll save paper and ink and see some extra features on your reports. Read more

News you can use!

National self-help conference session materials available

Did you want copies of a presentation you attended at the National Self-Help Housing Conference hosted in Albuquerque, February 2020? Were there two sessions you wanted to attend but could not because they were at the same time? Do you want to see what happened in the one you couldn’t attend? Presentations have been uploaded to the Self-Help Housing Spotlight website and are available at https://www.selfhelphousingspotlight.org/self-help-conference/. As more presentation documents become available, the site and link will be updated to include them.