Housing program policy senseless
The news on the low-income housing front never seems to get better. The combination of rising rents and dwindling subsidies yields a nomadic lifestyle that is costly for all of society.
The feds see a line on a ledger and they eliminate it. But the cost doesn’t go away. It’s merely shifted to the state and local level. A good example is the Section 8 housing program at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Public housing authorities across the nation have lost funding for this highly effective housing program, which makes up the difference between what a renter can afford and the total rent. Washington state is getting $9 million less this year. Spokane County is taking an $800,000 hit. Idaho is facing the same problems.
The money saved by the feds will cause state and local governments to spend more on housing, social services and law enforcement. The impact in low-wage areas such as the Inland Northwest is huge.
Exacerbating the problem is an improving housing market, which causes rents to climb. Good news for the housing industry is bad news for low-income people trying to maintain stability for themselves and their children. In addition, there’s also less incentive for builders to provide low-income housing and for landlords to participate in subsidy programs.
Dawn Yardley, who was featured in a news article on Wednesday, is just one example of the thousands of people affected by the Section 8 cutbacks. The young mother of two was forced to leave her apartment when her share of the rent rose by $185 a month. She is moving in with her father. Many families don’t have that option.
Such disruptions are typical of what low-income families face and they make it more difficult to attain self-sufficiency. Children also suffer as they endure untenable living arrangements and move from school to school.
Two former HUD secretaries, Republican Jack Kemp and Democrat Henry Cisneros, produced a report last fall that highlighted the nation’s low-income housing problem. In it, they wrote: “We are a nation that understands and asserts the promise of individual opportunity and we recognize that decent housing is a precursor to its realization.”
However, the feds’ current approach doesn’t recognize this. Housing is the largest expenditure for low-income families and the cost is rising faster than incomes. In a recent study, the National Low Income Housing Coalition found only four counties in the entire country where someone working a full-time job and earning the federal minimum wage could afford the rent and utility costs for a one-bedroom apartment.
The current course will only guarantee increased poverty, and the costs associated with that will continue to be borne by all. From a budgetary standpoint, it’s self-defeating. From a moral standpoint, it’s bankrupt.