About Alan Fox Consulting

I offer consulting services related to running the Section 8 program, including utility allowances and SEMAP deconcentration analysis, both SEMAP requirements.

SECTION 8 UTILITY ALLOWANCES

The amount that is paid to landlords or tenants to cover the average cost of utilities. I offer an integrated Excel-based spreadsheet package that automatically produces the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) mandated utility allowance forms (HUD-52667) using current utility company charges. It can easily and accurately be updated by non-technical PHA staff or, if you prefer, I can do it for a modest annual fee. Under SEMAP rules, utility allowances must be updated annually.

Click here for a closer look at the process.

 

SEMAP DECONCENTRATION

HUD judges a PHA's performance by the extent to which it is able to spread its Section 8 voucher families to all areas in its jurisdiction, not just the lowest-rent, often racially and economically disadvantaged neighborhoods. I offer help in the following areas:

  1. Determining where the "better" neighborhoods are, based on Census delineations (tracts and block groups.) These are defined as below-average poverty and minority concentration, compared to the PHA's entire jurisdiction (the city, county, or metropolitan area within which it operates.)
  2. Standardizing and geocoding the addresses of your Voucher families, thereby determining how many are located in these neighborhoods.
  3. Calculating and documenting your progress toward deconcentration, based on two SEMAP indicators:
    • Expanding Housing Opportunity (Indicator #7) and
    • Deconcentration Bonus Indicator
  4. Providing maps that can be used by Voucher families to locate where services are—schools, shopping, churches—in the non-poor neighborhoods.

Click here for a closer look at the process

 

OTHER ANALYTICAL SERVICES

I am proficient in Microsoft Excel (spreadsheet), Access (data management & reporting), ArcMap/ArcView (GIS—computerized mapping), address standardization and geocoding, Census data and geographic boundaries, many surveys including the Residential Energy Conservation Survey (Department of Energy), and American Housing Survey (AHS, Census Bureau/HUD).

 

 

My Background

I recently retired after a career in Federal Government policy research and program management, with extensive experience in data analysis and management, survey design and analysis, technical assistance, and contract management. As a senior-level economist at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), I had a lead role in determining Fair Market Rents, an essential part of running HUD’s multi-billion dollar Section 8 housing assistance program. I supervised many surveys to verify the accuracy of Fair Market Rents; designed simple but scientifically valid surveys to be conducted by non-specialists; studied various aspects of survey biases; and created many data management systems.

Since retiring from HUD, I have revised Section 8 utility allowances for many PHAs, large and small; created data sets and analyzed housing and demographic patterns in several large metropolitan areas; analyzed rent patterns and survey design and execution in Chicago; analyzed PHA administrative fees; provided guidance on public housing and Section 8 quality control methodology; and revised a survey guide for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

 

 

References

Utility allowances for:

  • Tempe, AZ
  • Yuba, Santa Clara, San Joaquin, and Nevada Counties, CA
  • Stamford, CT
  • Denver, CO
  • Delaware—all non-metropolitan areas
  • Washington DC-MD-VA metropolitan area (9 PHAs in all)
  • Orange & Volusia Counties, and Tampa, FL
  • Miami, FL
  • Chicago, IL. Includes several other technical jobs
  • Bloomington, IN
  • Cowley County, KS
  • Baltimore, MD
  • St Louis, MO
  • Houston, TX. Includes SEMAP and other technical jobs
  • Accomack-Northampton Counties, VA
  • James City County, VA
  • Virginia Beach, VA
  • Island County & Seattle, WA

Subcontractor for:

  • Quadel Consulting Corporation, Washington, DC.
    SEMAP deconcentration, GIS, utility allowances, and other technical assistance for their contracts in Baltimore, Houston, Chicago, Memphis, and Kankakee, IL.
  • Joseph Riley Associates, Harrisonburg, VA: Analysis of HUD utility model—comparison between recent HUD utility estimation model and PIH-Fox model, and Census/AHS utility data, using utility allowances for 31 different areas. For HUD's Office of Policy Development & Research.
  • Econometrica, Inc, Bethesda, MD.
    Various projects for the Office of Public and Indian Housing, Department of Housing and Urban Development.
  • Urban Institute, Washington, DC.
    Analysis of rent survey in Chicago.
  • Survey Research Institute, Temple University, Washington, DC.
    Survey guide for the Environmental Protection Agency.
 

 

Contact AFC

Alan Fox Consulting
747 South Harvey Avenue
Oak Park, Illinois 60304

(301) 275-4674
alan@afoxconsulting.com
DUNS Number 626901768

[Former address: 8806 Brierly Road, Chevy Chase, MD 20815]