The National Housing Law Project (NHLP) has published a report, Survey of State Tenant Protection Policies for the Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP). The survey examines WAP tenant protection policies in 25 states. It also highlights state WAP policies likely to provide the strongest protections for tenants, as well as concerns about certain policies.
Congress created the Weatherization Assistance Program in 1976 “to increase the energy efficiency of dwellings owned or occupied by low-income persons, reduce their total residential energy expenditures, and improve their health and safety.” WAP is overseen by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and administered by states and sub-grantees at the local level. WAP has provided substantial benefits to low-income tenants through improvements to their rental homes – such as better insulation and more efficient appliances – that can reduce tenants’ energy bills and improve their living conditions.
The authors point out that when WAP is used in multifamily rental properties, improvements can also result in financial benefits to property owners that may erode the benefits to the low-income tenants, the program’s intended beneficiaries. A landlord might, for example, try to increase rents on improved units or evict tenants in those units so they can rent the units to new tenants at higher prices. WAP improvements and accompanying repairs can also increase an owner’s equity in a property, increasing the likelihood an owner might sell to someone who could then raise rents or evict tenants to bring in higher paying renters.
In order to safeguard WAP’s benefits to low-income tenants, the statute authorizing WAP imposes some basic requirements on states, and DOE regulations and program notices provide some additional guidance. The WAP statute and regulations, however, give states broad discretion over the measures they use to meet the statutory requirement of ensuring that WAP benefits “accrue primarily to the low-income tenants residing in such units.” As a result, state-level WAP rules implementing these tenant-protection requirements vary widely.
Survey of State Tenant Protection Policies for the Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP) is available at: https://bit.ly/2XgTIiv