{"id":12258,"date":"2020-01-29T12:25:16","date_gmt":"2020-01-29T17:25:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=12258"},"modified":"2020-01-29T12:25:25","modified_gmt":"2020-01-29T17:25:25","slug":"affordable-housing-spat-whos-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=12258","title":{"rendered":"Affordable Housing Spat: Who\u2019s Right?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Adam Pagnucco.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

County Executive Marc Elrich and his biggest critic, Council Member Hans Riemer, are feuding once again.\u00a0 This time, the subject is affordable housing.\u00a0 Elrich says his new recommended capital budget includes a record sum for affordable housing.\u00a0 Riemer says there are in fact no new resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Who is right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s consider the statements from each of them.\u00a0 First, here is Elrich<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Affordable housing is one of my top priorities. It is vital to our County\u2019s future success. We must maintain and expand our stock of affordable housing and we are taking this critical issue head on in the capital budget. That is why I am recommending we add $132 million for affordable housing to the capital budget over the next six years.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a record level of funding for affordable housing projects for our capital budget. These funds will be used by the Affordable Housing Acquisition and Preservation Project to facilitate efforts to preserve existing stock and increase the number of affordable housing units in the County. But that is not all.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this Capital budget, I am proposing a new Affordable Housing Opportunity Fund to leverage funding from other partners that will support short-term financing while affordable housing developers arrange for permanent project financing.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is Riemer\u2019s response<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On affordable housing, I was initially encouraged by the Executive\u2019s speech about increasing funding levels. Indeed, I am intrigued by his proposal to create a new housing preservation fund. However, while he claims to have added more than $132 million in the affordable housing fund, after further examination it became clear that the annual amount is unchanged at $22 million. Under the last Executive, affordable housing funding was only programmed for the first two years of the six year budget, but additional funding was always added in the subsequent years. We need to increase our affordable housing fund to at least $100 million annually. This change in accounting will not result in increased resources. In combination with his resistance to the Council\u2019s affordable housing goals, developed with and agreed upon by all the local governments in Washington region, the County Executive\u2019s housing policy continues to be a matter of serious concern.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

These two like each other about as much as Popeye and\nBluto.  (Which one is Popeye depends on\nyour point of view!)  But how can their\nstatements be reconciled?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since Fiscal Year 2001, the county\u2019s primary affordable housing vehicle has been its Affordable Housing Acquisition and Preservation program<\/a>, which appears in the county\u2019s capital budget.\u00a0 The program enables the county to buy or renovate, or assist other entities to buy or renovate, affordable housing.\u00a0 It is financed by several sources including but not limited to loan repayments and the county\u2019s Housing Investment Fund (which is mostly supported by recordation taxes).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The capital budget, which includes the Affordable Housing\nAcquisition and Preservation program, is a six-year budget.  In even years (like 2020), it is written anew\nand in odd years, it is amended. \nProjects in the capital budget can have up to six different years of\nfunding in them (with more scheduled outside of the budget\u2019s six year\nhorizon).  In the past, the affordable\nhousing program has only shown funding for the first two years of the capital\nbudget with zero money programmed in the last four years.  But since the capital budget is rewritten\nevery two years with affordable housing money renewed in each successive\nbudget, that has not mattered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The table below shows funding for the Affordable Housing\nAcquisition and Preservation program in the last 16 capital budgets.  Each budget covers six years.  Budgets labeled with an \u201cA\u201d are amended\nbudgets programmed in off years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

At first glance, Elrich appears to be right.  His new recommended capital budget includes\n$132 million for Affordable Housing Acquisition and Preservation, which is far\nhigher than any previous capital budget. \nBut let\u2019s remember what Riemer said about the annual amount of\nspending.  All the previous six-year\nbudgets included funding during the first two years only.  Elrich\u2019s new capital budget shows funding for\nthe Affordable Housing Acquisition and Preservation program in all six\nyears.  Riemer is correct: an accounting\nchange caused the apparent increase in this program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the story doesn\u2019t end there.\u00a0 Elrich created a new program in the capital budget called the Affordable Housing Opportunity Fund<\/a>.\u00a0 This program is dedicated to acquiring affordable housing in areas at risk of rent escalation, such as those near the Purple Line and other transit corridors, and is intended to use public funds to leverage private funds in acquiring and preserving affordable housing.\u00a0 This new program provides $10 million in each of the new capital budget\u2019s first two years for this purpose.\u00a0 That money comes from recordation tax premiums which are normally used to finance transportation projects, so it\u2019s not \u201cfree\u201d money.\u00a0 But it is more money for affordable housing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Combining the existing Affordable Housing Acquisition and\nPreservation program and Elrich\u2019s new Affordable Housing Opportunity Fund, the\ntable below shows the annual expenditures for affordable housing in the capital\nbudget since FY05.  Annual expenditures\nare drawn from the first two years of every amended capital budget with FY21\nand FY22 drawn from the executive\u2019s new recommended capital budget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Combining the two programs, Elrich recommends spending\nmore capital money for affordable housing in FY21 and FY22 than any annual\nexpenditure in the preceding published budgets. \nWhen adjusting for inflation, Elrich\u2019s FY21 and FY22 spending amounts\nare roughly equal to the Leggett administration\u2019s peak affordable housing years\nof FY09 and FY10, so one can quibble about whether Elrich\u2019s spending is truly a\nrecord.  But when Elrich\u2019s new Affordable\nHousing Opportunity Fund is included, the first two years of his new budget\ndefinitely show an annual increase for affordable housing over the prior\nbudget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The county\u2019s capital budget has been shrinking due to cutbacks in general obligation bond issuances and declining projected school impact tax receipts.\u00a0 That\u2019s a dire subject for another time.\u00a0 But given the county\u2019s budget difficulties, Elrich\u2019s financial commitment to affordable housing is meaningful.\u00a0 Friends and foes alike should give him credit for it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Adam Pagnucco. County Executive Marc Elrich and his biggest critic, Council Member Hans Riemer, are feuding once again.\u00a0 This time, the subject is affordable housing.\u00a0 Elrich says his new recommended capital budget includes a record sum for affordable housing.\u00a0 Riemer says there are in fact no new resources. Who is right? Let\u2019s consider the … Continue reading Affordable Housing Spat: Who\u2019s Right?<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[151,33,90,84],"tags":[1545,1368,1513,2085,1508],"class_list":["post-12258","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adam-pagnucco","category-budget","category-hans-riemer","category-marc-elrich","tag-adam-pagnucco","tag-budget","tag-hans-riemer","tag-housing","tag-marc-elrich"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4mKJE-3bI","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12258","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12258"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12258\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12264,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12258\/revisions\/12264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12258"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12258"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}