Hundreds of Santa Barbara County families will face a stark choice if a proposed Trump Administration rule change happens: break up the household or somehow find a new place to live.
More than 1,300 people including nearly 600 children across the county are at risk of housing loss if a nationwide ban on undocumented immigrants in federally subsidized housing takes effect, officials say, adding they expect homelessness would rise locally and across the state.
“There’s going to be some very heartbreaking decisions coming out of this if this rule is finalized,” said Clarissa Montenegro Uhl, property and development manager at the Housing Authority of the City of Santa Barbara.
At issue are households known as “mixed status” — meaning one or more occupants are citizens or otherwise legally allowed to be in the United States while other occupants are undocumented.
Among the most vulnerable are children with two undocumented parents. The county had 88 such families at last count.
Precedent jeopardized
For decades, mixed-status households across the country have received federal housing assistance. Undocumented family members haven’t been included when officials calculate how much of a subsidy each household receives. Instead, assistance is prorated and awarded only to members who demonstrate eligibility.
The upshot is mixed-status families stay together. But in February, officials at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) revived a proposal floated during the first Trump term and said they will begin requiring proof of U.S. citizenship or eligible status from every person in HUD-funded housing.
“Under President Trump’s leadership, the days of illegal aliens, ineligibles, and fraudsters gaming the system and riding the coattails of American taxpayers are over,” HUD Secretary Scott Turner said. “We have zero tolerance for pushing aside hardworking U.S. citizens while enabling others to exploit decades-old loopholes.”
The new proposal comes amid a nationwide flurry of immigration raids and deportations. A year ago, HUD agreed to begin sharing information about undocumented residents in federally-subsidized housing with the Department of Homeland Security.
‘We should be validated’
In Santa Barbara County, the rule change would impact households that use Section 8 vouchers or project-based vouchers or assistance to help pay rent to private landlords or an array of publicly operated affordable housing properties.
“This would affect us a lot,” said one Westside resident, a Santa Barbara woman whose undocumented partner is their household’s primary breadwinner. He works demolition and roofing jobs while she’s employed part time at home caring for her father, who suffers from dementia.
A Santa Barbara native who’s lived here her entire life, the 36-year-old woman, who asked not to be identified, said the trio might reluctantly move to Mexico if the new rule takes effect.
“I just pray every single day, and I always wish that things can change soon,” she said. ”We are still paying taxes. We pay our rent, our bills. We should be validated.”
Santa Barbara opposition
In the city of Santa Barbara, 148 families would be impacted at last count. This includes 61 renting directly from the city Housing Authority, where officials are responding with plans for multilingual outreach, staff training and coordination with community partners.
On Tuesday, the Santa Barbara City Council will consider sending a letter from Mayor Randy Rowse to HUD opposing the rule change. The federal agency is accepting public comment on the proposal through April 21.
In a similar letter earlier this month, Rob Fredericks, executive director of the city Housing Authority, told federal officials the new rule risks destabilizing tens of thousands of eligible
Americans, including thousands of California families, during an ongoing housing crisis.
“In high-cost rental markets such as ours, the loss of housing assistance almost certainly results in displacement into homelessness. There are few, if any, affordable alternatives available to extremely low-income families without federal subsidy,” Fredericks wrote, arguing HUD should withdraw the proposal or at least apply it only to future applicants, not current participants.
“Evicting households does not create new housing. It does not increase appropriations. It does not meaningfully reduce waitlists. It increases instability in communities already struggling with housing scarcity.”
County-wide unease
Across the county and in the cities of Goleta, Lompoc, and Santa Maria, more than 146 families would be impacted at last count. This includes 75 participating in Section 8 and another 71 receiving project-based vouchers or assistance, according to the Housing Authority of the County of Santa Barbara.
“We expect we will have to implement the rule,” said Sanford Riggs, director of operations at the county Housing Authority. “We don’t know what the final rule will look like, but the prevailing thought among housing professionals is that this is not going to change radically, even with the public comments.”
Riggs on Friday had just returned from a conference in Washington, D.C., where Secretary Turner spoke to the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials (NAHRO).
“The administration is very committed to these changes,” Riggs said.
Some area families have become reluctant to seek housing assistance attached to federal dollars, Riggs said. “When we’re leasing our vacant units, we are having some mixed families that are nervous about leasing in federally subsidized units. Some people are backing out. Some families are very nervous.”
State and national implications
Nationwide, 79,600 individuals in more than 20,000 mixed-status households would be affected, according to the California Association of Housing Authorities (CAHA), citing a HUD analysis.
Of those individuals, approximately 52,600 are U.S. citizens, and nearly 37,000 are children.
“These are not theoretical impacts —these are children attending public schools, seniors living on fixed incomes, and extremely low-income working families,” CAHA President Jim Kruse said in a March 5 public comment letter to HUD.
“California would bear a disproportionate share of this impact,” he wrote. “Current data indicate that approximately 7,190 mixed-status households in California receive HUD-assisted housing, representing roughly 36 percent of all such households nationwide.”
Under the current proposal, housing officials across the country will have 30 days to notify impacted households. Once notified, families will have 90 days to submit eligibility documents. For those that no longer qualify, termination proceedings will begin and evictions will take place within 18 months.
