Housing Program Rescued Lobbying Effort Included Protests From Elderly Spokane Residents

Before leaving for Thanksgiving, Congress saved a subsidy program that helps provide about a fifth of Spokane’s low-income housing.

The so-called housing preservation program had been slated for elimination by both Congress and the White House.

But after an intense lobbying effort - including protests by elderly residents in a Spokane apartment building - Congress agreed to spend $624 million to keep the program breathing for another year.

Without the tax breaks and low-interest loans, building owners would lose their incentive to keep rents affordable for the poor, many housing advocates claimed.

Rents for as many as 600 Spokane County apartments could have risen if the program had been dashed.

Rep. George Nethercutt, R-Wash., examined the issue in October when he visited the Park Tower Apartments along Spokane Falls Boulevard downtown.

Residents asked him whether he realized the consequences of ending the program. Many of the tenants feared they would be forced to move.

Nethercutt wrote a letter to Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., the committee chairman overseeing the program.

“As we move toward balancing the budget, we must continue to honor our commitment to seniors and other low-income housing residents,” he wrote.

Low-income housing advocates declared victory Tuesday.

“It will preserve housing as affordable for upcoming generations, housing that would have been turned into condos, shopping centers or would have been otherwise lost to the national housing stock,” said Michael Bodaken of the National Housing Trust.

Owners and managers of Spokane apartments involved in the program also were relieved.

“I’m ecstatic,” said Cheryldean Rodgers of Goodale & Barbieri, which manages about 1,000 low-income units in Spokane.

The program will be scrutinized again next year as Congress continues to try to reform and improve a program that many claim is wasteful.

, DataTimes