We've changed the focus of one of the workshops coming up at the Vermont Statewide Housing Conference:

"Challenging Changes for Housing" will still cover the Challenges for Change legislation, but will no longer focus on Washington County.

We'll discuss the legislation and what housing providers can expect in the future. The Deputy Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Human Services will provide an agency overview and then focus will shift to the Department of Corrections and its plans for transitional housing.

A community-based housing provider will respond to the agency's plans.

The Associated Press reports that, as of last month, approximately 680,000 of homeowners who entered the federal government's mortgage relief program, have been disqualified. That's 51% of all participants, up from 48% the previous month.

Those figures, released by the U.S. Treasury Department yesterday, might reflect the complex nature of fixing the nation's housing crisis.

Read the AP story online.

Formerly foreclosed upon, newly renovated homes might sit vacant as a result of stricter credit standards following the foreclosure crisis. That's the concern reflected in a survey conducted by NeighborWorks at a recent meeting in Philadelphia.

Two dozen non-profit organizations representing $740 million in Neighborhood Stabilization Program funds were polled.

“The concern is real and it is across the board,” said Thomas Deyo, Deputy Director of National Initiatives and Applied Research at NeighborWorks America.

(From left: Smart Growth Vermont Board Chair Robin Poole-Scheu; Vermont Housing Finance Agency Commissioner Gus Seelig; Smart Growth Vermont Executive Director Noelle MacKay; and Smart Growth Vermont's founder, John Ewing)

Vermont Housing & Conservation Board (VHCB) Executive Director and VHFA Commissioner Gus Seelig was presented with Smart Growth Vermont’s 2010 Arthur Gibb Award for Individual Leadership.