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New NC funding will help expand affordable housing for those with specific needs

Hope Court Apartments, which offers permanent supportive housing in Greensboro, is financed through the state Supportive Housing Development Program. The North Carolina Housing Finance Agency has approved new funding to expand the program. Photo courtesy of NC Housing Finance Agency.

The North Carolina State Housing Finance Agency has approved $4.3 million in funding for properties geared toward those with special housing needs, including military veterans, children aging out of foster care, and people with disabilities.

The funding will be administered through the state's Supportive Housing Development Program, which finances emergency, transitional, and permanent housing for special needs residents who fall below 50 percent of the area median income.

Scott Farmer is the executive director for the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency. Farmer says the relatively small-scale program is doing its best to fulfill a great need for affordable housing throughout the state.

"And as you see with a couple of properties in this cycle that are from the Greensboro/Winston-Salem/High Point area, they're important to those communities and they make a huge impact, even though they may be small in size and small in number, it's still units that otherwise wouldn't be available without this important state resource," says Farmer. 

Sixteen new apartment units will be made available in Greensboro, while in High Point six new houses will be provided for veterans experiencing homelessness.

Neal Charnoff joined 88.5 WFDD as Morning Edition host in 2014. Raised in the Catskill region of upstate New York, he graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in 1983. Armed with a liberal arts degree, Neal was fully equipped to be a waiter. So he prolonged his arrested development bouncing around New York and L.A. until discovering that people enjoyed listening to his voice on the radio. After a few years doing overnight shifts at a local rock station, Neal spent most of his career at Vermont Public Radio. He began as host of a nightly jazz program, where he was proud to interview many of his idols, including Dave Brubeck and Sonny Rollins. Neal graduated to the news department, where he was the local host for NPR's All Things Considered for 14 years. In addition to news interviews and features, he originated and produced the Weekly Conversation On The Arts, as well as VPR Backstage, which profiled theater productions around the state. He contributed several stories to NPR, including coverage of a devastating ice storm. Neal now sees the value of that liberal arts degree, and approaches life with the knowledge that all subjects and all art forms are connected to each other. Neal and his wife Judy are enjoying exploring North Carolina and points south. They would both be happy to never experience a Vermont winter again.

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