NEWS HEADLINES

Preston Confirmed as HUD Secretary

By Bendix Anderson

Washington, D.C. —There’s a new boss at the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). On June 5, the Senate unanimously confirmed Steve Preston as HUD secretary.

Preston will lead HUD for just a handful of months until the end of the presidency of George W. Bush. The short time is sure to be intense. The national crisis of high home-loan foreclosures has put HUD in the spotlight. Several proposals now before Congress would give the agency a starring role in the fight-back-against-foreclosures drama likely to unfold this year.

“ HUD will be central to restoring financial stability,” said Preston at his swearing-in ceremony in the HUD Auditorium on June 6.

Preston will also have to defend the Bush administration’s proposed HUD budget, already faulted by housing advocates for its deep cuts to housing programs and for once again proposing to eliminate funding for the HOPE VI program to revitalize distressed public housing.

“ I am committed to collaborating in a bipartisan fashion with Congress on the path ahead,” said Preston.

Since July 2006, Preston has served as the administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), where he earned a reputation as a reformer, according to housing advocates interviewed for this story. For example, he reduced by 90 percent the backlog of more than 120,000 Disaster Assistance Program loans that piled up in the 11 months after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast.