Secretary Donovan: House HUD Budget Hurts Families (Leading Age)

Leading Age
(7/2/2013 2:35 AM, Carrie Paine)

Both the Senate and the House have worked up their Transportation and Housing and Urban Development appropriations bills for FY 2014. Funding in the House THUD subcommittee bill decreased to $44.1 billion from $51.6 billion in FY 2013, resulting in severe spending cuts to nearly all affordable housing and community development programs. Under the House appropriations bill, Section 8 Project-Based Rental Assistance is underfunded by $2 billion, $800 million below the president’s request.

Speaking on the House HUD appropriations bill, Secretary Shaun Donovan said that it would undermine HUD’s efforts to serve families and communities that have been recovering from the recession. Cutting nearly $3 billion from the President’a request for core low-income rental assistance programs. It would mean 125,000 fewer housing vouchers for low-income families and short-funded contracts with private housing owners and public housing authorities.

The Senate’s THUD bill is considerably more favorable compared to the House bill. Overall the Senate bill allocates $54 billion to HUD programs, 4.5% higher than FY13 funding. The Senate bill provides $10.7 billion for the Section 8 project-based rental assistance program for the renewal of project-based contracts, $500 million above the administration’s request but still insufficient to fund all contract renewals for the full 12 months.

Neither bill has been set for floor action. The House may take up their bill after the July 4 recess.