Municipal groups are urging the Senate to approve the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, which garnered widespread support as it passed in the House Wednesday.
The wide-ranging housing bill addresses housing affordability and supply. If successful, it would be the largest affordable housing package approved by Congress in decades.
Local government organizations say cities have been dealing with the housing crisis largely on their own and welcome increased support at the federal level.
“The time is now for Congress to pass a major bipartisan housing package that embraces and capitalizes on the local leadership cities nationwide are embracing to confront the housing affordability crisis,” Kevin Kramer, National League of Cities president and Louisville, Kentucky, Metro Council member, said in a news release.
The proposed legislation improves on existing programs such as the Community Development Block Grants and HOME Investment Partnership Program, according to Kramer. It also reduces federal “regulatory obstacles that unintentionally add to the cost of housing,” he said.
“These provisions, alongside important private-sector improvements to expand access to private capital, will foster more and better public-private partnerships in communities across the country to preserve existing housing, increase new housing and reduce the cost to rent or buy a home,” Kramer said.
The bill that passed the House removes a provision that tied CDBG funding to local housing production and could have caused “unpredictable funding shifts” for counties, Jared Grigas, associate legislative director for the National Association of Counties, and Kevin Moore, NACo legislative assistant, wrote in a blog post. The amended text is “a major win for counties,” they said.
The bill’s 396-13 passage in the House is “a welcome sign of progress,” U.S. Conference of Mayors President and Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt said in a statement as the organization called for a final push to approve the legislation.
“The high cost of housing continues to be the biggest affordability challenge facing American families,” Holt said. “Mayors are taking steps every day to reduce regulation and incentivize investment to expand housing supply and lower costs, but lasting progress will require bipartisan partnership at every level of government.”
