There is hereby established in the Department of Community Affairs a fund to be known as the “Boarding House Rental Assistance Fund.” The fund shall be under the control of the Commissioner of the Department of Community Affairs. The fund shall be maintained by the Department of the Treasury and may be invested by the Division of Investment in the Department of the Treasury in investments in which other State funds may be invested. There shall be deposited in the fund all moneys appropriated thereto by the Legislature and any other moneys made available for the purposes for which the fund is established. The fund is established for the purposes of (i) providing rental assistance to residents of boarding houses in need of assistance to meet the rental payments at the boarding houses in which they reside necessitated by the construction, acquisition or rendering of life safety improvements at or to the boarding houses with the proceeds of the life safety improvement loans made by the agency, (ii) providing a source of repayment for such life safety improvement loans, and (iii) subject to the approval of the treasurer, paying the cost to the Department of Community Affairs of discharging its obligations under sections 13 through 17 of this act. If needed to meet on a timely basis that part of the rental obligations of residents of boarding houses attributable to debt service (including fees and charges payable to the agency) on life safety improvement loans made by the agency to finance the construction, acquisition or rendering of life safety improvements at said boarding houses, the commissioner shall disburse from the fund to or on behalf of the residents of the boarding houses the amount of money which, together with amounts already disbursed and to be disbursed, will be sufficient to meet on a timely basis that part of the rental obligations of the residents of the boarding houses. If for any reason rental assistance payments made on behalf of residents are not sufficient to meet the debt service payments on the life safety improvement loans, then the commissioner shall disburse from the fund such amounts as are necessary to meet the debt service payments; or, upon the request of the agency, the commissioner shall disburse such amounts as are necessary to fully pay the life safety improvement loan and all related costs.

L.1983, c. 530, s. 14, eff. Jan. 17, 1984.