President Bush has signed legislation intended to end the widespread practice of college athletes living in federally subsidized housing designed for the poor while on scholarships and housing stipends that make their incomes too high to qualify for subsidized housing.

The practice in many university cities was for students to apply for and be accepted for federal Section 8 housing because their scholarships and stipends were not taken into account when their income eligibility levels were determined.

Because of this, many needy families were kept out of the already limited Section 8 pool of housing.

Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) was a force behind the legislation. His action followed a story in the Des Moines Register revealing that athletes at the University of Iowa were on scholarships and stipends yet were enjoying subsidized housing. In many cases, the athletes had housing while those who needed it remained on waiting lists.

Harkin said in a press release that “thousands of low-income, elderly and disabled Iowans depend on Section 8 housing to meet their basic needs. It is an abuse of this important program if people who do not really need help are displacing the many that truly do need it.”

The reform started two years ago and was centered on the highest-paid public employee in Iowa, University of Iowa football coach Kirk Ferentz, who earned nearly $2 million in 2003 and lived in a house valued at $946,000, and his son, Brian. Brian was receiving a full athletic scholarship and monthly stipends of $406 for housing and $298 for food and board but lived rent-free as a resident in the Pheasant Ridge apartments, a modest complex with 248 units that is part of the Section 8 program.

Pheasant Ridge was half full during the last school year with University of Iowa students, including Ferentz, and at least 34 other Iowa athletes, the Des Moines Register reported in June 2004.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) “rewrote its eligibility regulations for the Section 8 program in 1995 to make it easier for struggling adults to go back to school for training that would enable them to get off welfare,” as Rood wrote in June 2004. As a result, student financial aid, including full or partial scholarships, government Pell Grants, work-study wages, and athletes' housing and meal stipends, were all excluded from Section 8 income eligibility rules.

HUD spokesperson Lee Jones said, however, that “characterizing it as a loophole is not appropriate.” He explained that the point of Section 8 is to put a roof over the heads of people who need it and ultimately help them off housing assistance. Jones added that HUD encourages residents to pursue a high school or college education if they don't already have one when they enter the housing system. Section 8 “allows as many people to afford housing as possible, whether they are a butcher, a baker, a cabinet maker or a student,” according to Jones. “It doesn't matter what you do … it's about income eligibility.”

The executive director of the Iowa Coalition for Housing and the Homeless, Jim Cain, strongly disagrees. Speaking about Brian Ferentz, he said that “Section 8 housing wasn't intended for him,” especially since demand always exceeds the supply of vouchers.

National Low Income Housing Coalition Deputy Director Linda Couch pointed out that when a student rents a Section 8 unit and graduates, he or she can pass on the apartment to undergraduates, preventing other Section 8 voucher recipients from getting housing. “So when Johnny Football Player gets into HUD housing,” he can pass it on to his friends, Couch said.

In a place like Iowa City, where at least 2,200 people are on waiting lists to get into low-income housing and where there is only one homeless shelter, the need for Section 8 housing is quite apparent.

The use of Section 8 by students, however, isn't confined to Iowa. Other university cities facing this issue include Lincoln, Neb., Ann Arbor, Mich., Norman, Okla., Parkersburg, W.Va., Laramie, Wyo., Portland, Ore., Tuscaloosa, Ala., Platteville, Wis., State College, Pa. and Blacksburg, Va.

Senator Harkin tried but failed to have legislation passed in 2004 that would have required that student scholarships that exceed tuition qualify as income. He finally helped to get the measure through last November. The legislation amends federal housing rules to require that “rules similar to those for federal financial aid also be applied to the guidelines for Section 8 housing assistance.” This would mean that students under 24 years old would have their parents' income taken into consideration when their eligibility is determined, unless the student in question is married, has dependent children or is a veteran.

Shortly before the bill was passed, University of Iowa President David Skorton asked two of his senior administrators to work with housing officials to close the housing loopholes in an effort to take responsibility for the students' behavior.

Couch, of the low-income housing group, saw the move as long overdue, saying that it is the shared duty of students, athletic directors, and administrators to be part of the solution. “Universities are responsible for providing students housing,” she said.

Her organization took matters a step further and sent a letter to National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) President Myles Brand last December to request that NCAA amend its rules “to prohibit student athletes receiving scholarships with housing stipends from residing in federally subsidized housing” and to help move scholarship student athletes out of federally subsidized housing.

“We sent the letter out of pure frustration that managers weren't complying with the spirit or letter of the law,” Couch said. So far, there has been no response from NCAA, she added.