Washington, D.C. – Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) joins a growing list of Democratic presidential candidates who have released bold plans to address the nation’s affordable housing crisis. Senator Klobuchar’s "Housing First Plan" would invest significantly in expanding the supply of affordable homes for the lowest-income people and connecting them to affordable housing opportunities.
Senator Klobuchar’s plan would invest $40 billion per year in the national Housing Trust Fund (HTF) to support the construction, maintenance, and operation of homes for people with the greatest needs, including in rural areas and Indian country. The plan would provide rental assistance to all Americans who qualify (currently only one if four eligible people receives assistance), combat segregation and discrimination, and prohibit landlords from asking rental applicants about past criminal convictions and from discriminating based on the source of their incomes. The plan would also prevent the blacklisting of individuals who have been to eviction court and forbid landlord discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, or veteran status. Senator Klobuchar’s plan would invest significantly in the expansion of rural rental assistance programs.
The U.S. has a shortage of over 7 million rental homes affordable and available to the lowest-income households; there are fewer than four rental homes affordable and available to every ten such households. In 99% of counties in the U.S., a full-time minimum-wage worker cannot afford a one-bedroom rental home at the Fair Market Rent, and seven out of the ten fastest-growing occupations in the U.S. do not pay enough to afford a modest one-bedroom apartment. Millions of the lowest-income households – seniors, people with disabilities, low-wage families with children, and others – are spending more than half of their incomes on their housing, with little left for food, medicines, and other necessities and at high risk of homelessness.
NLIHC’s nonpartisan Our Homes, Our Votes: 2020 candidate and voter engagement project is elevating solutions to the nation’s housing crisis in the presidential campaign and tracking what all the candidates have to say about housing and homelessness. See: www.ourhomes-ourvotes.org
Read Senator Amy Klobuchar’s housing plan here: https://tinyurl.com/vamxlmc
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About Our Homes, Our Votes: 2020: NLIHC launched the nonpartisan Our Homes, Our Votes: 2020 voter and candidate engagement project to raise the issue of affordable housing in the 2020 elections, to urge candidates to discuss how they will deal with the crisis, to track their comments and proposals, and to engage more low-income renters in the voting.