Portage Metropolitan Housing Authority

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Portage Metropolitan Housing Authority provides housing assistance to low-income persons and families through Federal housing programs.  This aid helps families and individuals live in decent, safe and affordable housing while they strive for greater economic self-sufficiency.

In addition to housing assistance, PMHA collaborates with non-profit and government agencies to offer opportunities for an improved quality of life, regardless of age, race, color, disability or religion.  These opportunities include supportive services, specialized housing for persons with disabilities, homeless male veterans, senior citizens and families with children.

PMHA is now working with two housing listing services that offer free services to landlords and to households seeking housing through Section 8 and other tenant-based housing programs.  The advantage of these lists is that landlords can easily update their listings as needed, without calling PMHA and depending on an available clerk updating and re-printing the lists.  As a result, this makes information available quickly, and saves money and paper from printing out a large supply of lists that can become outdated as soon as they are printed!  The lists are also available 24 hours a day, not limited to PMHA office hours.

We hope as many landlords as possible will find these resources helpful in promoting their vacant units and achieving full occupancy as well.  The sites are:

Ohio Rental Housing Locator

GoSection8

PMHA has closed its Section 8 waiting list and is not accepting applications at this time.  The number of households on the waiting list now is beyond PMHA's ability to serve during the next 12 months.  There is no scheduled date to re-open the wait list at this time.  When PMHA is prepared to re-open the waiting list for Section 8 vouchers, an announcement will be made at its website and in local newspapers.

PMHA continues to accept applications for Public Housing, the houses and apartments owned and operated by the housing authority.

On July 22, 1968, Joseph R. Kainrad, Robert Summerlin, Richard Kertscher, John Tontimonia, and Wilson Clark met as the first appointed members for the newly-created Ravenna Metropolitan Housing Authority.  Although the agency, founded with the purpose of addressing housing needs in the Ravenna and Windham areas, wouldn't receive HUD funding for several years, the founding of a housing authority provided the basis needed to develop and acquire 305 units of Public Housing, and over the years grow a Section 8 Certificate program into a Housing Voucher Program serving 1,700 households, with both Public Housing and Section 8 aiding families in all parts of the county.

PMHA had been awarded a National Award of Merit by the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials  (NAHRO) for its Homeownership Lobby Lab, created last year through the Resident Opportunities and Self Sufficiency grant program.  It is now eligible for consideration for a National Award of Excellence determined by a panel of national judges.

The Lobby Lab, described in greater detail here, assists people by providing access to information specific to issues of homeownership, credit, employment and other self sufficiency-related topics. 

The national awards are announced at the end of July 2008 at the NAHRO Summer Conference.