BROWN COUNTY, WI (WTAQ) – One Brown County department has already exceeded the amount it budgeted for fraud collections this year.
Robyn Hallet is the county’s Housing Authority administrator and notes the fraud comes from participants in the Housing Choice Voucher Program.
“We’ve already, as of May, met our goal for the entire year of the amount of money that we budgeted to be able to recoup.”
She says that figure is north of $90,000.
Hallet notes the county started more actively pursuing claims in 2007.
“The total recovered was $859,000. We’ve had a total of 571 cases.”
Hallet explains reasons these cases have been pursued in small claims court, or through the DA’s office in more serious instances.
“One of the most common ones is unreported household members. We have a regulation that families cannot have additional people staying with them for more than 14 consecutive days or more than 30 days in a year’s time. Also, moving without notifying us in advance, failing to comply with income or household change requirements, failure to provide us with required documentation.”
The Housing Choice Voucher program is a federal effort that assists low-income families, the elderly, and disabled persons in finding decent housing. It is managed by local public housing authorities.
Participants are allowed to choose what private rental unit they would like to live in, with income determining how much of the rent is covered by the government.
Once a small-claims judgement is entered, former program paricipants are barred nationwide from re-entering the program until that judgement is satisfied.
