On August 5, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) created the “Your Home, Your Internet” pilot program designed to raise awareness of, and streamline enrollment in, the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) among households receiving federal housing assistance. The FCC also took significant steps to ease ACP eligibility verification for HUD’s project-based Section 8, Section 202, and Section 811 residents. These actions are in direct response to LeadingAge comments urging the Commission to improve internet access for HUD-assisted older adults.

New Pilot Program for HUD-Assisted Residents: “Your Home, Your Internet”

A new pilot program, adopted by the FCC on August 5, is designed to raise awareness of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) among households receiving federal housing assistance by testing the best methods for helping HUD-assisted residents learn about and enroll in the program. The ACP provides a monthly discount of up to $30 on internet service cost to qualifying households, including households receiving rental assistance, and a one-time $100 discount toward a connected device.

Since the program’s enactment by Congress, household enrollment in the program has proved challenging for affordable senior housing communities in need of property-wide internet connectivity options benefiting residents in part with low tech access and literacy. Because of the program’s design, Service Coordinators or community volunteers assist by enrolling households one by one, often helping households overcome barriers relating to eligibility verification and internet service provider participation in the program.

The FCC’s new “Your Home, Your Internet” pilot program features enhancements designed to assist with the ACP application and enrollment process for HUD-assisted households. State and local housing authorities, Tribal Designated Housing Entities, and other state, regional, or local government entities, as well as community partners, are eligible to apply for the pilot. The FCC has set aside up to $10 million to support pilot-related activities, and pilot participants are encouraged to propose application assistance tools which the Commission will evaluate. More guidance on the pilot program is forthcoming; information about the FCC’s Report and Order is available here. 

Enhanced ACP Application Process for HUD-Assisted Residents

The Commission also takes significant steps to make ACP access more efficient, specifically for residents of HUD’s project-based Section 8, Section 202, and Section 811 programs.

In the FCC’s August 5^th Report and Order, the Commission directs the federal and federally-contracted entities involved with the ACP to expand and finalize a revised data sharing agreement with HUD that would allow more federal housing assistance recipients to be automatically approved for the ACP through the National Verification.

While the National Verifier is designed to ease the qualification process by leveraging connections with state and federal database connections, currently, the National Verifier only approves households participating in HUD’s Public Housing and Housing Choice Voucher programs (other qualifying households, including residents assisted by HUD’s Multifamily Housing programs), are not able to be verified through the automated database connection and need to provide additional documentation for manual review.

The FCC’s Report and Order explores data-matching connections with HUD’s TRACS database to allow more federal housing assistance recipients to qualify automatically. A standardized documentation form will also be created and provided to expedite the manual review process where still necessary.

In its outreach materials, the FCC will use more targeted language to indicate eligibility for residents of HUD’s Multifamily Housing programs, where previously the materials often referenced “Public Housing” only or more general housing assistance terms.

Get Involved with LeadingAge’s Internet Connectivity Work

LeadingAge will continue to work with affordable housing members, the FCC, and HUD to improve property-wide adoption of the ACP and to increase program enrollment among HUD-assisted households.

To get involved with LeadingAge’s ongoing work on internet connectivity, join our monthly workgroup by emailing Juliana (jbilowich@leadingage.org).