First relocation guidance change since 1997

Newly posted at HUDCLIPS 'What's New', we've got the first revision since 1997 to Community Planning and Development Handbook 1378.0, which spells out HUD's procedures for acquiring real property and for removing existing tenants from the said property in at least ostensible compliance with the Fifth Amendment. The handbook addresses both regular Uniform Relocation Act (URA) removals, and also the specially regulated HOPE VI relocation process. Most kinds of privately developed subsidized housing are potentially affected.

This new guidance is at a level of detail below the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), of which relevant provisions include 49 CFR Part 24. These CFR rules appear among transportation regulations because several agencies developed them cooperatively, and you can see how the Federal Highway Administration would get picked to head the drafting of rules on eminent domain. The new Handbook 1378.0 revisions say they incorporate the extensive changes to Part 24 published by the FHWA Jan. 4, 2005, together with corrections to same that appeared in the Federal Register May 2, 2005.

Handbook 1378.0 is easy enough to find online at the moment, but after it's superseded on the "What's New" list, you'll have to dig into the excessively complicated HUDCLIPS browse/search page. Within the "Handbooks and Notices" section, click the "Handbooks" circle on the "Community Planning and Development" row, then click "Search" on the right. In the resulting search screen, enter "1378.0" in the blank for "Document number." And don't forget the ".0" or the search result won't come up at all. Blippedy-blank creaky sclerotic databases over there. What HUD needs is to rent Google's whole staff for a month.