Homeless Housing and Assistance Surcharge.  The state and local homeless housing programs receive funding from the homeless housing and assistance surcharge collected by each county auditor when a document is recorded.  The surcharge is $62 per recorded document.  Ten dollars of the surcharge must be distributed to counties for implementing local homeless housing programs and plans and is not subject to existing surcharge distribution requirements.  
 
Both the state and the county receive a percentage of the money collected from each surcharge.  The funds collected for the $62 local homeless housing and assistance surcharge are distributed as follows:

• 2 percent to the county for collection of the fee;
• 60 percent to the county for its homeless housing program, up to 6 percent of which may be used for administering its homeless housing plan; and
• the remainder to be deposited into the Home Security Fund (HSF) and distributed as follows:
  • up to 12.5 percent of which may be used by the Department of Commerce (Commerce) to manage the state homeless housing program, including the costs of creating the statewide homeless housing strategic plan, measuring performance, providing technical assistance to local governments, and managing the homeless housing grant program; and
  • of the remaining 87.5 percent, at least 45 percent must be set aside for private rental housing payments and the remainder to Commerce to provide housing and shelter for homeless persons, including shelter and transitional housing grants, consolidated emergency and emergency shelter assistance, and overnight youth shelters, and fund the homeless housing grant program.

 
"Private rental housing" means housing owned by a private landlord and includes housing owned by a nonprofit housing entity.
 
The $62 homeless housing and assistance surcharge applies to most recorded documents.  Documents exempt from the surcharge include:

• assignments or substitutions of previously recorded deeds of trust;
• documents recording a birth, marriage, divorce, or death; and
• documents recording a federal, state, county, city, or water-sewer district, or wage lien, or satisfaction of lien.

 
Home Security Fund.  The state portion of the $62 homeless housing and assistance surcharge is deposited into the HSF, which is an appropriated account and may be used only for homeless housing programs. 
 
The Office of Financial Management (OFM) must secure an independent expenditure review of state homeless assistance and housing surcharge funds received and deposited into the HSF on a biennial basis to assess the consistency in achieving policy priorities within the private market rental housing segment for housing persons experiencing homelessness. 

Homeless Housing and Assistance Surcharge.  The requirement that at least 45 percent of the state portion of the $62 homeless housing and assistance surcharge funds be set aside for private rental housing payments is removed, and private rental housing assistance is added with the current uses for the state portion of surcharge funds.
 
Home Security Fund.  The requirement that OFM secure a biennial independent expenditure review of the state portion of the $62 homeless assistance and housing surcharge funds received and deposited into the HSF to assess the consistency in achieving policy priorities within the private market rental housing segment for housing persons experiencing homelessness is removed.