Create a plan and timeline that outlines OFO’s proposal to move the LBPR tracker to a different platform.

Develop a timeliness standard in the LBPR tracker to establish expectations for how often field office staff must reach out to PHAs on the LBPR tracker to discuss measures that will resolve cases in a timely manner.

Define and communicate policies and procedures to ensure that its products, system components, systems, and services comply with its cybersecurity and SCRM requirements. This recommendation includes:

• Identification and prioritization of externally provided systems (new and legacy), components, and services.
• How HUD maintains awareness of its upstream suppliers.
• The integration of acquisition processes tools, and techniques to use the acquisition process to protect the supply chain.
• Contract tools or procurement methods to confirm that contractors are meeting their obligations (derived from OIG FISMA metric 14).

Status

On January 17, 2025, the Office of Lead Hazard Control and Healthy Homes (OLHCHH) informed HUD OIG that the Office of the Federal Register published a notice, Modifying HUD’s Elevated Blood Lead Level Threshold for Children Under Age 6 Who Are Living in Certain HUD-Assisted Target Housing Covered by the Lead Safe Housing Rule. The notice announced that HUD is lowering its EBLL threshold from 5 to 3.5 µg/dL for a child under the age of 6, consistent with the CDC’s current blood lead reference value of 3.5 µg/dL, effective January 17, 2025. Next, OLHCHH will assist the Office of Community Planning and Development, the Office of Multifamily Housing Programs, and the Office of Public and Indian Housing to draft, circulate, and publish EBLL notices. The estimated completion date is June 30, 2025.

Analysis

To fully address this recommendation, OLHCHH must provide evidence that it has updated its regulations, policies, and procedures so that they are consistent with CDC’s lowered blood lead reference value of 3.5 ug/dL.

Implementation of this recommendation will help ensure children living in public housing with elevated blood lead levels receive effective environmental interventions.

Identify short- and long-term plans for the RPA program that align its capabilities, staffing needs, funding projections, and mission needs.

Implement procedures to capture and monitor centralized logs to maintain appropriate visibility into bot activities and provide for auditability of bot actions.

Implement procedures to periodically review RPA system access and remove access for users that are not authorized or no longer have a need to use the system.

Implement procedures to ensure that attended bots use the security rights and credentials of the attending user.

Implement a quality control review to ensure that successive below-60 REAC inspection score flags are entered into APPS.

Update APPS to automatically flag a property that receives successive below-60 REAC inspection scores.

We recommend that the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Single Family Housing update its COVID-19 Resources for Homeowners webpage to clearly communicate that homeowners who had not previously requested forbearance by September 30, 2021, are eligible to request forbearance from their servicer through the end of the COVID-19 National Emergency.

We recommend that the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Single Family Housing update its COVID-19 Resources for Homeowners webpage to include information on the various COVID-19 loss mitigation options servicers may offer homeowners with FHA-insured forward mortgages who are exiting COVID-19 forbearance.

We recommend that the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Single Family Housing update its COVID-19 Resources for Homeowners webpage to include details about the protections and loss mitigation options available for homeowners with FHA-insured reverse mortgages. This information could include (1) instructions for requesting an extension, (2) a statement notifying homeowners that they should not be charged late fees or penalties, (3) a chart showing the extension periods and related deadlines, and (4) information on the various loss mitigation options available for homeowners with FHA-insured reverse mortgages who are exiting a COVID-19 HECM extension.

We recommend that the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Single Family Housing update its COVID-19 Resources for Homeowners webpage to include relevant information on the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Homeowner Assistance Fund.

We recommend that the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Single Family Housing work with the Office of Public Affairs, Office of Housing Counseling, and other offices within HUD to develop a detailed communication strategy for how and when it plans to use websites, letters, and other methods to proactively notify homeowners about relief programs, protections, and loss mitigation options during disasters and national emergencies. The strategy could include processes to ensure that (1) key information is provided or made available in a timely manner and kept up-to-date, (2) information is communicated clearly and consistently across mediums, and is linked together when possible, and (3) letters are mailed to struggling homeowners when needed. It could also articulate the methods HUD will use to reach homeowners without internet access.

Research, evaluate, and implement technical or alternative solutions to deploy essential computer software updates using appropriate secure methods to ensure that computer security updates occur in a timely manner to minimize risk to HUD’s systems and operations

Research, evaluate, and implement technical solutions to provide additional improvements to VPN and related remote working capabilities of HUD system users.

Perform routine VPN stress tests as part of its contingency planning and testing processes to regularly identify and remediate network performance issues and ensure that network capabilities are sufficient for teleworking.

Research, evaluate, and implement technical solutions to resolve the user account management issues and the underlying issue in the technical environment.

Assess its help desk system against other technical solutions and ensure that the help desk solution used captures complete data on technical support requests. This measure includes but is not limited to ensuring that sequence gaps are properly documented or do not occur, valid transactions are accepted by the help desk system, rejected transactions are identified, and the history of each transaction is retained.

Update and synchronize the SOP and the matching procedure. The updates should include notifications that provide issuers with unmatched loans adequate time to take corrective action to comply with the requirements of the MBS Guide to put $903 million to better use by ensuring that the appropriate agency insurance or guarantee is in place.