HANDICAPPED; HOUSING (GENERAL);

HANDICAPPED; HOUSING - ELDERLY;

You asked (1) if the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) allowed non-elderly disabled people to live in state- and federally assisted senior housing and (2) if state law allows for segregating non-elderly and elderly in a public senior housing project.

SUMMARY

By law, unrelated to ADA, non-elderly disabled people may be housed in state- and federally assisted senior housing. In 1963, the state legislature amended the statutory definition of “elderly” (as it pertains to eligibility to stay in state-assisted, low-income senior housing) to include those certified as totally disabled by the Social Security Administration.

The federal Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the 1988 Fair Housing Amendments Act (FHHA) prohibit housing discrimination because of a disability, including mental illness, in federally funded (i. e. , Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)) projects, according to a 1992 U. S. General Accounting Office (GAO) report entitled, “Public Housing: Housing Persons with Mental Disabilities with the Elderly. ”

Although federal law allows public housing authorities to designate a project or portion of a project as elderly only, state law is silent on the issue.

STATE-ASSISTED SENIOR HOUSING PROJECTS

In 1963, the legislature amended the definition of elderly (qualifying low-income individuals to live in state-assisted senior housing) to include anyone under age 65 who was certified as totally disabled by the Social Security Agency (CGS § 8-113a). (A 1991 amendment added those certified as totally disabled by other federal agencies. )

According to Ivan Pour, president of the Connecticut chapter of the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials, in the late 1960’s, state-assisted senior housing projects had about 5% of their units dedicated to people with disabilities, most of whom tended to be physically disabled. But as more mentally disabled individuals entered the public housing stream due to deinstitutionalization and a lack of supportive housing, the number of non-elderly disabled people has increased significantly, Pour said.

FEDERALLY-ASSISTED SENIOR HOUSING PROJECTS

The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (section 504) and FHAA prohibit owners of federally assisted housing from discriminating based on disability. The former prohibits discrimination against people with disabilities in any program or activity receiving federal assistance. FHAA expanded the coverage of the Fair Housing Act to prohibit discrimination because of a disability or familial status (presence of children under 18 and pregnant women), according to HUD’s website. Attachments 1 and 2 are copies of the information from the HUD website.

ELDERLY ONLY AND THE FEDERAL MODEL

Since 1992, federal law has allowed public housing authorities to designate a project or portion of a project as elderly only or disabled only (42 USC § 1437e; 24 CFR § 945). State law is silent on the issue. Pour said that public housing officials prefer something similar to the federal model that would allow for an elderly preference designation in state-assisted senior housing. He added that an expansion of supportive housing as well as following the federal model (that also allows for disabled only designation) could alleviate some of the tension that exists between non-elderly disabled and elderly tenants in mixed projects.

OLR report 1998-R-0124, attachment 3, summarizes the findings of a 1998 legislative working group comprised of members of the Select Committees on Aging and Housing who addressed the issue of integrating non-elderly disabled and elderly in senior housing. OLR report 2002-R-0153, attachment 4, is a survey of state-assisted senior housing projects that found an average of 14% of the units in the projects that replied to our survey were occupied by non-elderly disabled.

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