Huntsville woman spreads awareness about program helping pay off mortgages amid pandemic

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New at 5 - during this coronavirus pandemic -- america's health crisis is quickly becoming a housing crisis.

According to research by the "center on budget and policy priorities" - as of this month -- an estimated 10 million adults are in a household that is behind on its mortgage payment.

But there is a program helping alabamiams. waay31's megan reyna spoke to a woman whose mother took advantage of it - and is urging people -- especially amid this pandemic - to do the same.

In february of 2019 -- latoya whitfield chose to step up for her community... simply by creating this facebook page.

Huntsville alabama community resources.

Whitfield says:"i just had a lot of information that i didn't want to keep to myself, so that's the reason i started it."

It was her way of giving back -- by providing resources to help others.

One of those -- included informing people about a program her mother took advantage of -- hardest hit alabama.

It's a foreclosure prevention program funded by the u-s department of treasury's 'hardest hit fund' that was authorized under the emergency economic stabilization act of 2008.

Whitfield says:"i decided to reach out to them because my mom had just stopped working due to her disability and i wanted to see if i could get her some assistance."

Whitfield says within a month -- her mom was approved for the program -- and had the remainder of her mortgage paid off.

Whitfield says:"i think my mom she was in shock more than anything."

There was a period of time hardest hit alabama wasn't accepting any more applications.

However back in may -- the program re-opened due to this on-going pandemic.

Now -- whitfield is hoping people struggling due to covid -- look into their assistance.

Whitfield says:"if people would just access those programs, it would be a great thing for them to prevent them from losing a house, utilities, all those things are posted on our resource page and of course we have 2-1-1, but a lot of times people just want to her people had an experience."

Megan says:"whitfield says the process for applying is all online - for more information -- head to our website at waay tv dot com reporting in hsv mr waay 31 news" since the program began in 2010 -- it's helped more than 78-hundred alabama