How to challenge and update your Restore Louisiana Grant award AMI percentage.

How To Calculate your Households AMI percentage.
What steps do you take if you are in Louisiana on how to correct your AMI percentage that is listed in your grant award.
What factors change AMI percentages.

AMI percentages are calculated using total household income from all members of the household that are working and over the age of 15.

(Please check if you are required to file taxes. This link may be helpful https://www.irs.gov/publications/p501 Table 1. 2018 Filing Requirements Chart for Most Taxpayers")

Your AMI percentage uses your Federal Tax Returns Adjusted Gross Income (AGI).

Using the AGI from your tax returns calculate the combined income of all persons working that are required to file taxes living with you at the time of the disaster. If you have had changes to your household that increased directly impact your AMI for 2 or more years use the updated information for your calculation.

Example:

Person One Adjusted Gross Income: $105,000
Person Two Adjusted Gross Income: $20,000
Total household income: $125,000

You should be able to contact your states HUD office or the state agency of Community Development and request the most up to date data sheets for AMI. Below you'll find links to 2019 AMI for over 120 percent and 2017 80 percent AMI.

Using the columns select the number of persons living in your home.

"Family sizes in excess of 8 persons are calculated by adding 8% of the four-person income limit for each additional family member. That is, a 9-person limit should be 140% of the 4-person limit, the 10-person limit should be 148%."

Once you have your family income limit, match that number with your total households tax returns.

If your calculated AMI is different from your grant award AMI send an email to your assigned case worker or case manager.

SUBJECT: Account ID: 123456, Last Name AMI Percentage Correction.

Message Body:

I have calculated my AMI percentage using data provided by our state and found the AMI percentage listed in my grant award is not correct. My grant shows 150 percent and my calculation shows 79 percent. I would like to request that you forward my grant to Quality Assurance (QA) and Quality Control (QC) for AMI percentage corrections. Attached you will find the tax returns used to calculate my correct AMI percentage. I have also uploaded the attached documents to my eGrants file folder.

Thank you,
[First Name, Last Name]
[Full Address]
[Grant Account Number]

Depending if you are in Louisiana, Texas, North Carolina Puerto Rico or Florida just to mention a few that will be using this same email your contact will be different except for the IEM Project Manager which most of you have the same person to report to.

You will need to be persistent with your request. You are going to be told to wait, then you will be told that everyone is going to be calculated at the same time. This is an issue the state needs to address and it needs not to provide excuses to why your AMI percentage changes when your records and their records are identical. Many errors are manual input errors and we have seen months even years pass before they are corrected. Allow the state directors to explain why you can not have an accurate grant award with correct information.

If your Case Worker or Case Manager refuses to submit your request to have your grant award information corrected you'll need to go to the project managers level. Most of the disasters in 2016 and 2017 in the southeastern US are managed by IEM Inc. so your contact would be Ted.Lemcke@iem.com or if in the state of Louisiana it would be Ted.Lemcke@Restore-LA.Org . You will need to look up your specific program manager to be sure. Most times it will be the Homeowners Manager or Director from your states Community Development department (HUD).

Case Workers and Case Manager are not overwhelmed with work so allow one full business day for them to reply. If it takes longer than one full day skip them and go to the program manager.

The program manager will take about 3 business days or less. Once you get word back from the program manager you will either be in the system to correct the issue or you will be escalating the AMI percentage calculation to your states legal department and your project managers legal department. For Louisiana this is legal@iem.com for the project manager and dan.rees@la.gov for the state.

If legal departments after 3 days do not have the issue corrected or refuse to correct your federal grant award AMI percentage you will then need to forward all emails to your states housing manager. For Louisiana this is Spring.Garcia@LA.Gov .

It takes time to process this information and AMI percentage seems to be a manual calculation based on the number of reported areas in what should be a scripted formula.

The QA/QC process typically takes 30 days. You'll know it's being processed when you see your grant page locked. Check it daily after you start.