NACo testifies on county impacts and recommendations for the housing affordability crisis

Key Takeaways

On January 31, the U.S. Senate Budget Committee held a hearing titled “A Blueprint for Prosperity: Expanding Housing Affordability.” The hearing investigated the nationwide shortage of affordable housing opportunities for Americans, recommendations on how to address this crisis and how expanding housing affordability drives economic growth. A full video of the recording can be found here.

President of the Franklin County, Ohio Board of County Commissioners, and NACo Housing Task Force Co-Chair Kevin Boyce testified before the committee on behalf of NACo. In his testimony, Commissioner Boyce testified on the local approach counties are taking to address rising housing costs and the critical role the intergovernmental partnership plays in crafting comprehensive solutions to ease the financial burden placed on our residents. Commissioner Boyce highlighted the impacts in his own county, stating “four out of every ten renters are cost-burdened, spending more than 30 percent of their annual income on housing,” and that “since 2010, the population within (Franklin) county has grown 14 percent to over 1.3 million, while total housing units in the county have increased only ten percent, further widening the gap.”

Counties support investing additional federal resources to adequately support housing needs, modernizing and strengthening current federal programs, providing more direct funding opportunities to local governments and simplifying programs to reduce burdensome administrative requirements on local governments.