Senators Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Dick Durbin (D-IL), and Cory Booker (D-NJ) introduced the “Averting Crises in Housing Assistance Act” (S.3088) on December 18. If passed, the bill would require HUD to partner with public housing agencies (PHAs) to create a plan of action to bring failing public housing developments up to satisfactory condition, with the goal of maintaining and rehabilitating the public housing inventory to the greatest extent possible. The bill would invest $70 billion in the Public Housing Capital Fund to help HUD make needed repairs to failing public housing developments.
Public housing residents would be given the opportunity to petition HUD to intervene if buildings pass inspection even though conditions are unsatisfactory. Residents would be granted the right to bring a legal private right of action against the federal government if building conditions are not improved within a year after a PHA’s revitalization plan of action is finalized.
The bill was introduced after an audit of two public housing complexes in Cairo, IL revealed mismanagement and worsening housing conditions that HUD “could and should have done more to oversee.” While public housing plays a crucial role in ensuring people with extremely low-incomes are able to remain stably, safely, and accessibly housed, years of federal disinvestment have left much of the country’s public housing stock in a state of disrepair. NLIHC supports this bill and commends Senators Duckworth, Durbin, and Booker for their leadership in introducing it.
Senator Duckworth’s press release is at: https://bit.ly/2Q1EgDZ
More about the bill will be at: https://bit.ly/38YTWAK
The bill text is at: https://bit.ly/2MbiXyI