Readers of Affordable Housing Finance know full well the importance of the Affordable Housing Credit Improvement Act (AHCIA) introduced Tuesday. In mobilizing as an industry to amass overwhelming congressional co-sponsorship of the bills, we’ll need to show how the housing credit can help address national needs in addition to affordable housing.
We’ll need to make the case that, by passing the bills (S. 1703/H.R. 3077), Congress can make quick progress on several national priorities and show voters in every state that Washington still works for them.
In fact, the AHCIA means more resources right away for communities to:
· Bounce back from disasters. When Senate Finance Committee chairman Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) wrote the Heartland Disaster Tax Relief Act, the extra housing credits included in that package were instrumental in helping Iowa and nine other Midwestern states rebuild from devastating floods and tornadoes a decade ago. States throughout the Southeast and Mountain Plains, as well as California and Puerto Rico, now need that same proven tool to rebuild—and we know more will be needed in the future, unfortunately.
· Respond to the opioid crisis. President Trump’s opioid crisis commission noted the central importance of housing to combatting the crisis’ punishing human and fiscal cost on the nation. Recovery Kentucky, a partnership between Kentucky Housing Corp. and the state’s Department for Local Government and Department of Corrections, has used housing credits as part of the model that has helped more than 2,000 people, with significant reductions in associated opioid use and homelessness among those served. Other states have initiated similar efforts.
· Expand opportunity. States are increasingly using housing credits to help working families live in areas where they have the best prospects for success at work and school, which research also suggests saves the government money in the long run. Using sophisticated mapping to guide its housing credit efforts, Ohio is encouraging development of affordable housing in “strong, vibrant, and healthy communities.” Many states also target housing credits to transit-accessible areas.
The efficient systems states use to put housing credits to work are ready to go to deliver these practical benefits in all kinds of communities with the passage of the AHCIA.
Congress can count on the housing credit because states have used the credits to produce and preserve more than 3 million affordable rental homes in cost-effective partnership with the private sector for more than 30 years.
Every year, housing credit development generates nearly 100,000 jobs and $3.5 billion in tax revenue, according to the National Association of Home Builders. So more credits means a stronger economy, too.
Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), and Todd Young (R-Ind.) and Reps. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.), Kenny Marchant (R-Texas), Don Beyer (D-Va.), and Jackie Walorski (R-Ind.), the sponsors of the AHCIA, represent states and districts whose differences reflect our country’s dynamic diversity. Their important legislation represents a bipartisan investment in fixing challenges that transcend geographical and political boundaries.
