A presidential assault on housing
The Record-Journal (Meriden,
Connecticut)
July 28, 2004
Community Commentary by Jeffrey Freiser
It is said that there is a charitable institution with a plaque that reads, "This hospital a pious person built, but first he made the poor wherewith to fill't." Although that inscription is likely apocryphal, the reality of President Bush's policies on housing and homelessness offers similarly cruel irony.
The Bush Administration trumpets its commitment to ending homelessness in America, such as its proposed $70 million Samaritan Initiative. Yet the president's budget for federal fiscal year 2005, announced in February, would provide $1.6 billion less than is needed to serve all those currently receiving Section 8 housing assistance, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. The sweeping changes he seeks in the Section 8 program might best be labeled "The Homelessness Creation Act of 2004."
The Housing Choice Voucher Program, commonly known as Section 8, has been an essential and effective tool to help low-wage families, the elderly and disabled to maintain safe and decent housing. Typically, participants in the program pay 30 percent of their income toward an apartment and the Section 8 program pays the balance, up to an established rent standard. The program began in 1974 under the Nixon Administration, designed to harness the private market to provide housing for the poor. Today, nearly 2 million households rely on Section 8, including 34,000 in Connecticut.
The need for housing help is stark, particularly in our high-cost state. A national study called "Out of Reach" found that, on average across Connecticut, a worker needs to earn $18 an hour to afford a modest, two-bedroom apartment. That's more than two-and-a-half times the minimum wage. Housing is so expensive in lower Fairfield County that someone making only minimum wage would have to labor an incredible 162 hours a week to afford a two-bedroom rental there. Fortunately, that computes to working over 23 hours a day, seven days a week — virtually eliminating the need for a home at all.
The Washington D.C.-based Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analyzed the Bush budget, concluding that up to 250,000 families nationally could lose Section 8 assistance next year. If the funding cut is carried out solely by eliminating vouchers, over 4,000 Connecticut families would be dropped from the program, including 74 in Meriden and 14 in Wallingford.
To soften the blow, President Bush seeks to convert Section 8 into a block grant, promising increased flexibility in exchange for decreased funding. Public housing authorities, which administer the Section 8 program locally, would be allowed to save money by throwing out current rules. For example, the housing authority could substantially increase the rent portion paid by Section 8 families, or might instead choose to serve higher income households which would need smaller subsidies.
The assault on Section 8 became more virulent in April, when the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development abruptly announced a new funding rule in the middle of the current fiscal year. HUD told housing authorities that they would now be paid based on a formula using the number of last year's vouchers, without regard to their actual costs this year. Crisis and confusion followed — many landlords were threatened with lower rent payments; voucher holders feared losing their homes.
The plot thickened further last week, when the House Appropriations Committee passed its version of the 2005 HUD budget. Responding to widespread outcry, the Republican-controlled committee added nearly $1.5 billion to Section 8 above the amount sought by President Bush. It did so, unfortunately, by cutting over 4 percent across-the-board from the rest of HUD's programs — including those serving the homeless, the elderly, people with AIDS and families with lead-poisoned children. Of course, it's all about priorities. Our most vulnerable families struggle to pay the rent, while our country's largest housing program — tax benefits for homeowners — remains sacrosanct. To be sure, these tax advantages — such as mortgage interest and property tax deductions and capital gains exclusions — are real subsidies from the federal government. If a homeowner and renter have identical incomes and housing costs, only the homeowner will receive a big tax refund check.
Tax expenditures for housing, benefiting primarily middle and upper-income homeowners, will cost the Treasury $119.3 billion this year. In comparison, the entire HUD budget, serving mostly lower-income households, is $30.4 billion. Meanwhile, the president's tax cuts for the wealthiest individuals and largest corporations have ballooned the deficit and extinguished hope for meeting domestic needs.
We should not have to make such choices among urgent housing priorities. In America, we once believed that if you worked hard and played by the rules, you would be able to put a roof over your children's heads. That can still be true today, if we have the political will to make it so.
Jeffrey Freiser is executive director of the Connecticut Housing Coalition and a Meriden resident. He is currently a guest member of the Record-Journal's Editorial Board.