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State OTDA outlines housing options and competitive state funding to Tompkins legislators
Summary
NYS OTDA officials told the Tompkins County Legislature about local homelessness counts (about 180 people on a recent night), the differences between emergency, transitional, affordable and permanent supportive housing, and described competitive state funding programs (HHAP capped at $128M, ESHI $25k per unit) and application timelines.
State officials from the New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance (OTDA) briefed the Tompkins County Legislature on April 15 about housing strategies to address homelessness and the state funding streams that support construction and operations.
Sarah Watson, who identified herself as an OTDA Bureau of Housing official, said local point-in-time data indicate roughly 180 people in Tompkins County experienced homelessness on a single night this January, with nearly 100 in hotels and motels. She described three broad intervention types: emergency shelter (short-term, often hotel placements), transitional housing (up to 24 months), and permanent housing — split into affordable and permanent supportive housing.
Watson and Linda Camoin described state programs that fund construction and operations. The Homeless Housing and Assistance Program (HHAP) is a capped capital fund (OTDA cited a recent $128,000,000 appropriation) used competitively for acquiring or converting property; the Empire State Supportive Housing Initiative (ESHI) provides operational funding and includes a rental subsidy component (OTDA noted $25,000 per unit per year as a current ESHI figure). OTDA officials said HHAP funding is highly competitive and that last year the available appropriation was exhausted within three months.
County legislators asked technical and operational questions: eligibility specifics for supportive vs. affordable units; how coordinated entry and wait lists operate; whether state-owned vacant facilities can be repurposed for housing; and how investors and municipalities typically participate. OTDA staff recommended early engagement with the local Continuum of Care (CoC), pre-application studies, and applying to service-and-operations grants even before capital is secured.
OTDA staff also reviewed examples of funded projects — from small six-unit supportive homes to large hotel-conversion projects — and described caps per project and regional award splits for tax-credit-funded affordable housing. They emphasized the importance of early planning and interagency collaboration to make competitive applications.
