A housing authority is a quasi-governmental organization established under state statute to oversee public housing developments and programs, including federally-funded Housing and Urban Development (HUD) programs, such as Section 8 for low-income families and individuals. . . Contact your local housing authoirty (in the blue pages) to find out what options are open in your area. Most public housing programs are grossly-underfunded, so you may find long waiting lists or even closed waiting lists in many cases, which is rather unfortunate.