Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) announced on November 18 that she will introduce a Senate companion bill to Representative Nydia Velazquez’s (D-NY) “Public Housing Emergency Response Act” (H.R. 4546), which was introduced in the House in September (see Memo, 10/7). Co-sponsored by Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), the bill would authorize a one-time appropriation of $70 billion for HUD’s Public Housing Capital Fund and prioritize funding for public housing agencies with the greatest capital repair needs.
The legislation aims to address public housing’s severe capital-needs backlog. Public housing plays a crucial role in ensuring people with extremely low incomes are able to remain safely, stably, and accessibly housed, but years of federal disinvestment have left public housing in a state of disrepair, forcing residents to live in unsafe, unhealthy conditions. NLIHC supports this legislation and commends Senator Warren for her leadership in introducing this bill.
Read Senator Warren’s press release at: https://bit.ly/2KDiwfI
Read the bill text at: https://bit.ly/2QCQ2Xb