Federal legislation signed into law Thursday will close a loophole that dozens of Virginia Tech students are using to live in free or reduced housing.

President Bush signed the legislation four days after ESPN aired a story about how athletes, including 19 Virginia Tech football players, were taking advantage of Section 8 housing regulations while still accepting thousands in housing stipends from colleges and universities.

Students and student-athletes throughout the country have benefited from the loophole, though it is not known exactly how widespread the problem is.

The new law, part of an appropriations package, will force students to include parental income and any financial aid received that exceeds tuition when they apply each year for Section 8 housing certification.

Students who are 24 or older, married, have children or are military veterans will not need to include their parents' income when applying.

Since 1995, college students have been allowed to apply for subsidized housing through the Department of Housing and Urban Development without reporting financial aid or their parents' income. The changes were aimed at making higher education more accessible for the poor.

Stories by the Des Moines Register last year revealed how children of wealthy parents and students on full scholarships at the University of Iowa were using the decade-old regulations changes to acquire free or reduced housing.

In response to the newspaper stories, Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, proposed legislation to close the loophole. It passed the Senate last month and was on the president's desk Monday.

Harkin spokeswoman Maureen Knightly said Friday that the responsibility for enforcing the new regulations will now fall to HUD, which has 30 days from Thursday to issue regulations to carry out the law.

"HUD's got to get up to bat here," she said. "They're going to have to really work to enforce it."

HUD spokesman Lemar Wooley said the new regulations will include a date when they will go into effect.

He said existing residents will not be affected by the new regulations until they apply for their annual housing recertification.

Wooley said there are about 34,000 Section 8 housing units in Virginia and, other than normal turnover, all are occupied.

There is a two-year waiting list for most units in the state, he said, though the wait is not as long in Southwest Virginia.

Last Sunday, ESPN's "Outside the Lines" interviewed Virginia Tech football players living in Section 8 housing at Cambridge Square Apartments in Blacksburg.

Virginia Tech was featured in the ESPN piece along with the universities of Iowa and Nebraska to illustrate how athletes receiving housing stipends as part of their scholarships were taking advantage of the system.

Room and board stipends for Tech students can be as high as $5,040 a year.

Cambridge Square management would not comment, but residents said about 80 percent of residents in the 40-apartment complex are students. Three apartments were unoccupied.

After the ESPN story aired, Virginia Tech spokesman Larry Hincker said the problems had to be solved through political action, not the university. He said Friday that Bush's action corroborates that.

Virginia Tech awards athletic scholarships to 344 athletes, about half of which are full scholarships.

Students live on campus for free or, if they live off campus, receive their stipend in the form of a reimbursement at the end of the year, Hincker said.