The Hawaii Housing Authority (HHA) was created by the Hawaii Territorial Legislature in 1935 to provide safe and sanitary housing for Hawaii's low-income residents. Two years later, the U.S. Housing Act of 1937 made federal construction fund available for the first time for the development of public housing projects nationwide.
In the aftermath of World War II, a significant civilian housing shortage was experienced throughout the islands. Affordable housing was hard to come by for many local families. Throughout the forties and fifties, the HHA developed and constructed nearly 2,000 new dwelling units.
In 1959, Governor William F. Quinn signed the Government Reorganization Act of 1959, which administratively attached the HHA to the State Department of Social Services (known today as the Department of Human Services). The agency's duties were broadened in the coming years, with the Legislature funding the construction of new State public housing projects for low- and moderate-income families. A $100 million appropriation in the 1970s enabled the construction 10,132 new dwelling units throughout the State over the next two decades.
Act 350, Session Laws of Hawaii 1998, created another significant change in program operations; no longer the HHA, the agency was merged with the Housing Finance and Development Corporation into a single housing agency known as the Housing and Community Development Corporation of Hawaii (HCDCH) This change was short lived, however - HCDCH was again bifurcated in 2005, resulting in the creation of the Hawaii Public Housing Authority (HPHA). The HPHA's core functions were to manage the federal and State public housing programs and Housing Choice Vouchers. In the coming years, the agency's Homeless Programs were transferred to the Department of Human Services
