Hundreds of public and assisted housing residents, advocates, policymakers and researchers converged on the nation’s capital March 25-28 for NLIHC’s Annual Housing Policy Conference and Lobby Day. Four outstanding plenary speakers provided inspiration and 40 workshops covered the gamut of issues of concern to the attendees.

Eugene Robinson. The conference opened with an address by Washington Post columnist and Pulitzer Prize winning author Eugene Robinson. He offered the stark contrast between the Obama Administration’s FY13 budget request and the FY13 budget resolution put forth the week of March 19 by House Committee on Budget Chair Paul Ryan (R-WI), which Mr. Robinson said relies on the private sector to address the needs of the nation’s most vulnerable. Mr. Robinson also said Chairman Ryan’s budget would be the biggest transfer of wealth from poor to rich in the history of the United States.

Mr. Robinson called on conference attendees to be active in this year’s presidential election, whatever their party affiliation. Responding to an audience question about voter fraud, Mr. Robinson said that voter suppression efforts are a solution to a problem that does not exist.

When asked why the media did not cover the shortage of rental housing for low income people, he lamented the decline in local reporters assigned to the housing beat. He also promised to write more about the issues himself.

The plenary was sponsored by the Bank of America. Ken Wade, Senior Community Affairs Executive, Global Marketing & Corporate Affairs, brought greetings from the bank.

Following his speech, Mr. Robinson signed copies of his latest book, Disintegration: The Splintering of Black America, for an eager crowd.

Barney Frank. In a rousing speech at the noon plenary on Monday, March 26, Representative Barney Frank (D-MA) said that of his time in Congress, the one thing he is “most proud of is the establishment of the National Housing Trust Fund.” Mr. Frank was the key legislator in the development and passage of the National Housing Trust Fund (NHTF) and has championed funding the NHTF in the House. As he prepares to retire from the House of Representatives at the end of the 112th Congress, Mr. Frank reflected that his two regrets are not having funded the NHTF and not having passed further laws to prevent discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Taking the podium after being greeted with a standing ovation, Mr. Frank said he is retiring because he is “kind of tired and I need to find other ways to find fairness in this country.” His motivation in public service, he said, has been to make peoples’ lives better. Mr. Frank said Sheila Crowley, President and CEO of NLIHC, has been “one of a handful of people that have been my mentors, my teachers.”

Mr. Frank said that Congress should fund the NHTF as part of its restructuring of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in the next Congress. “If Barack Obama is reelected, I believe that we will get funding for NHTF. If not, we won’t, it will get Etch-A-Sketched out.”

Mr. Frank discussed what he sees as the “denigration of rental housing,” saying that lawmakers only envision large public housing developments that have been underfunded when discussing rental housing. “While it is true that a lot of people live in terrible housing, it is also true that it was not their idea” to live in such conditions, said Mr. Frank.

“We are going to have to reduce the federal deficit. The amount we are spending on the military has to change,” Mr. Frank said. “It will be a scant victory if we get funding for the NHTF when other housing funding goes away,” he added.

“There should be no deal on housing finance without a portion of funding going to the NHTF,” Mr. Frank said. “There is now recognition that we were right when we talked about the need for a range of [housing] options for low income people,” Mr. Frank said.

In his closing words on the NHTF, Mr. Frank said, “funding the NHTF will be a major advance in social policy.”

In her introduction of Mr. Frank, Ms. Crowley recalled NLIHC’s long partnership with him and his staunch advocacy for the NHTF. She commended him on his effective style of leadership when he was Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. Ms. Crowley cited three qualities that she associates with Mr. Frank. She said he is brilliant and the country is fortunate that he used his great intellect for the public good. She also said he is scrupulously honest, and in a “town that is polluted with money,” Mr. Frank “never cashed in.” Finally, Ms. Crowley said that he was “rarely cheerful, but always funny” and that he used humor to make friends out of his opponents.
 
After Mr. Frank’s remarks, the Boston Housing Authority’s Resident Advisory Board presented Mr. Frank with an award for his unshakeable support for low income residents in Boston. “I will always remember the day that the first resident was appointed to the Boston Housing Authority board,” Mr. Frank said proudly to the resident group members.

Finally, Ms. Crowley presented Mr. Frank with a “Tribute Book” in which most of the people at the conference had written individual notes of appreciation to him for his many years of service.

Arlene Holt Baker. Arlene Holt Baker, Executive Vice President of the AFL-CIO, gave the lunch plenary address on March 27. Her wide-ranging address covered issues from the role of the union movement in American democracy to the importance of advocacy in the face of changing campaign finance laws.

Ms. Holt Baker began her speech by reflecting on the difficulties of low income people in the Texas town where she grew up, saying that knowing their struggle to maintain their housing and other basic needs is what drives her every day.

Describing the work of the AFL-CIO to hold banks accountable for their role in the foreclosure crisis, Ms. Holt Baker said the union movement understands the importance of housing and would continue to work to ensure those responsible pay their fair share. “The spirit of the 12 million members of AFL-CIO will be right there with you when you go to the Hill to see your elected officials,” she said.

Ms. Holt Baker devoted the core of her address to deconstructing the ongoing efforts to use voter identification laws to suppress votes, couching these laws in the context of broader efforts to de-fund public housing, eliminate prevailing wage laws and prevent workers from organizing. She noted that 11%, or 21 million, Americans do not have government issued photo identification, calling voter identification laws a “pretty targeted” effort to prevent elderly, poor, young and African-American people from exercising their right to vote.

Attendees were provided with an AFL-CIO toolkit for addressing voter suppression techniques in their communities. In spite of the mounting threats to civic engagement, Ms. Holt Baker assured attendees that there is hope for positive change. “We may not have the dollars, but we have our spirit, our communities and our neighborhoods,” she said. “The numbers are on our side.”

In closing, Ms. Holt Baker wove the journey of the union movement together with that of the civil rights movement, and current efforts to ensure marriage equality and immigration reform. “That’s why we continue to march,” she said. “There is so much left to be done…. You will go home, fight for what you believe and hold our politicians accountable. It is up to us.”

Ms. Holt Baker’s address was sponsored by the AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust and the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME).

Cecilia Muñoz. Cecilia Muñoz, Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council (DPC) was the final plenary speaker at the NLIHC conference. She is President Obama’s Advisor on all matters of domestic policy. The DPC is the coordinating body for the domestic policy decisions made in the White House.

Ms. Muñoz opened her remarks by “reaffirming the Administration’s support for the National Housing Trust Fund” and said that it is “long past time for a dedicated source of funding” to be established for the NHTF. The Administration included a $1 billion capitalization for the NHTF in its FY13 budget request and in its housing recovery plan (see Memo, 2/3, 2/17).

In her remarks about budget priorities for FY13, Ms. Muñoz noted that the Administration has placed a particular emphasis on veterans, as veterans are twice as likely to become homeless than the population as a whole. NLIHC held a series of workshops at its conference focused on strategies on ending homelessness among veterans by 2015, a goal articulated by the Administration in its plan to end homelessness, “Opening Doors” (see Memo, 6/25/10). Ms. Muñoz said that the Administration is on track to meet this goal.

Ms. Muñoz ended her remarks by describing how the priorities articulated in the House-passed “Ryan Budget” (see elsewhere in Memo) puts programs such as Tenant-Based Rental Assistance and McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Grants at risk, and that we are at a “make-or-break” moment for the nation.

The conference’s 40 action-packed workshops provided attendees with substantive and practical knowledge they could take home and apply in their communities. This year’s workshops were structured to allow attendees to maximize their time and focus their attention. Topics revolved around housing policy, research, resident issues and advocacy efforts. With the support of the Home Depot Foundation, three workshops focused on the housing needs of our nation’s veterans.

NLIHC hosted a Legislative Action Center, where NLIHC staff provided talking points, directions and data from the Congressional District Profiles to support advocates’ visits to their Congressional delegations. All conference attendees received NLIHC’s 2012 Advocates’ Guide to Housing and Community Development Policy, sponsored again this year by PNC Bank. Also, courtesy of Volunteers of America, attendees were given Congressional Directories for the 2nd Session of the 112th Congress.

NLIHC’s Lobby Day materials are available at: www.nlihc.org/whatwedo/conference/lobbyday