Silver Housing Lining in Budget

There are two provisions in the Wisconsin 2009-11 budget that I'd like to discuss. Those provisions benefit affordable housing and provides a tool that will be very helpful to communities.

The first item is a provision to extend the life of a Tax Incremental Financing (TIF) District by a year with the extra year of funding going to affordable housing in the community. This was initiated by the Milwaukee Housing Trust Fund advocates, and inserted into the Senate's version of the budget by Senator Coggs.

The second, the result of efforts of many advocates and legislators over the past few years, would "fix" the property tax exemption for "benevolent" housing. I won't go into the details, but there were two issues at stake here-the "rent use" by the housing provider (how the rent revenue can be used and still qualify for the "benevolent" exemption), and the fact that many municipalities felt that some senior housing providers were abusing the exemption with "affluent" housing for older adults. This was in the joint finance version of the budget, removed from the Assembly's version by the Democratic Caucus, modified in the Senate version, and the recounciled version was closer to the Senate's version.

Both were not vetoed by the Governor, and are now law.

This is very significant because it allows low-income housing providers to continue to provide housing without being slapped with a tax bill they never budgeted for which would drive many out of business.

The TIF District gives communities a powerful tool to raise revenue (however erratic) for affordable housing and to improve housing stock. A community can use at least 75 percent toward affordable housing, and the remainder to improve housing stock. This could be an ideal revenue source for a housing trust fund.

Record Number of Housing Discrimination Filed in 2008

Wow. Nationally, 10,552 complaints, 44% on basis of disability and 35% on basis of race.

The sad thing is, despite how many complaints were filed, it's still nowhere near the actual number of discrimination that happens. Very often discrimination is more subtle than the old days when landlords could openly advertise for "Whites Only" or "Protestants Only" or refuse to rent to single mothers, etc.

Today's discrimination are more in the vein of "sorry, we rented it already" or even simply encouraging favored applicants while subtly discouraging other applicants by not giving them the same information or downplaying the unit. Discrimination even may be unconscious with the landlord being unaware that he/she is doing it. Discrimination can also be structural with housing being built that does not have the required accessibility under Fair Housing.

To their credit, Waukesha County CDBG has given the Metropolitian Milwaukee Fair Housing Council funding to investigate possible discrimination in Waukesha County.

To find out more about Fair Housing rights, check out HUD.

Affordable housing is possible

We're about to embark upon an exciting phase in our campaign this month as we continue training advocates and gear up for some full-bore advocacy action.

But before we get around to doing all that exciting stuff (you can get in on that fun, too; just contact us for our meeting schedule!), we want to talk a bit about some press we received recently that might discourage a less determined group. An article in the Daily Reporter on April 21 was titled, "Budget gaps leave affordable housing in hole." The Daily Reporter is a news source for construction industry professionals, such as contractors and architects.

The article makes the idea of a housing trust fund sound financially ludicrous, which it is not. There are over 550 city, county, and state housing trust funds in existence nationwide. Housing trust funds at the county level around the country have used at least 20 different sources of funding, according to the Center for Community Change. Reporter Sean Ryan lists three possibilities for funding, but did not list the other two sources given as examples in our original proposal--sale of county-owned land and county investment income. (And a recent revision to our proposal does not list property taxes as a possible source of revenue, but rather a slight increase in the real estate transfer fee paid during the sale of a house).

When there's political will, there's always a way. After all, how did Waukesha County come up with money for a new highway bypass ($8.6 million) and a new interchange for Pabst Farms ($1.75 million)? Keep in mind those dollar amounts are just the County contributions; state and city contributions paid for the rest. And let's not even go into all the expenses of water diversions.

Although the Daily Reporter article seems to attempt to create an adversarial relationship between county officials and the task force, we are committed to working with the county executive and the county board to identify funding sources that would work. Because of the economic benefits of a housing trust fund, the County might not be able to afford not having one. But that's a different blog post ... so stay tuned!

-Betsy Foss-Campbell and Brian Peters contributed to this post.

Why Visitability is included

One of the things in the proposal for a Waukesha County Housing Trust Fund is the requirement for Visitability in new single-family homes funded by the Trust Fund. Visitability is the idea that people with mobility disabilities should be able to visit their families, friends, and neighbors. Too often people with disabilities are isolated from the community even if their own home is fully accessible-they cannot visit their family, friends, and neighbors. They cannot go to dinners, parties, picnics, or even simply to hang out and play games.

Visitability is surprisingly basic and inexpensive to do-a way to get in, a way to travel around on the main floor, and a way to use the bathroom. So that's simply one zero-step entrance with path of travel exterior and interior with hallways and doorways wide enough for a wheelchair and an usable half-bathroom.

A good site for Visitability information is Concrete Change and AARP has written a paper on it.

You can also watch a video of a motivational speaker, "The Strength Coach," discussing Visitability.

Making Home Affordable

Ran across this in the latest issue of HudUser's Research Works. In addition to learning that storm windows can make a difference in the energy a home uses and can be a low-cost alternative when new windows are too expensive, I found a website where people can find out if they qualify for loan modification and home refinancing.

People who may be struggling with their mortgage payments can go to Making Home Affordable for a self-assessment to see if they would qualify. The website links to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's websites to check to see if your current mortgage is insured by either companies, and if you qualify, it tells you what information you will need to bring to a housing counselor or your loan servicer. In Waukesha County, the housing counselor to contact is hbc Services, Inc.

Update: Corrected to reflect the mortgage is insured not owned.