MONITORING
Thank you to the properties who have allowed our third-party vendor, Safe Building, to continue physical inspection safely throughout the past year. We are back on schedule and have about 220 audits to conduct in 2021; 30% of which are already scheduled.
While we are firmly committed to ensuring the health and well-being of all Iowans who live in the LIHTC/HOME and NHTF projects we monitor across the State, we made the decision to not indefinitely postpone our monitoring responsibilities despite the IRS guidance allowing us to do so. Please know that Safe Building continues to follow the most stringent safety measures to limit contact with tenants and site staff to ensure both their health and that of our inspector, Ron Frazee.
When notified of an impending inspection, all units must be given 24-hour notice and may also be advised that they may request not to have their unit inspected if they have legitimate health concerns. You should, however, advise of the extra safety precautions put in place by our vendor.
CERTIFICATION PORTAL (CP) UPDATE
We are working diligently to troubleshoot the issues with software, thank you for your patience. With that in mind:
- Please enter your data in the CP portal. You will not be able to to upload it until we let you know, but you can get your data into the system if you haven't already done so.
- Submit your Certification of Continuing Compliance documentation to IA if you haven't already done so.
- Once the portal allows you to submit, we will not have the auto-post feature enabled so that we can manually check all data to ensure that everyone is working smoothly.
As previously stated, the normal March 1 and April 1 deadline for new projects has been extended indefinitely until we get CP working properly.
IOWA RENT AND UTILITY ASSISTANCE PROGRAM
The new Federal rental assistance program was launched March 29 and application began flowing instantly. Please be patient as there were many changes between the program we launched las year (EFP) and this new program based upon Department of Treasury guidance and requirements.
One of our management company partners reported to us that they notified their delinquent tenants of the availability of the program and set up appointments with those households to go to their units to help them complete the application and then completed their part of the process at the same time. A copy of the tenant's lease must be uploaded along with income documentation as household income must be below 80% AMI to qualify. More information can be found
here.
