What Does “Public” Have To Do With Affordable When It Comes To Housing?

Come Learn About the Threat to Public Housing and How We Can Fight To Preserve It!!

Empower DC’s Affordable Housing Campaign Will Be Hosting a

Public Housing Information Session
Where: 1419 V Street NW
When: Thursday, October 11, 2012
6:30 – 8:30 PM

For more information, contact Schyla Moore-Poindexter at 202-234-9119 ext.101 or housing@empowerdc.org.

ONE DC (Organizing Neighborhood Equity) is also putting the word out about a community meeting in Ward 8 this Saturday, October 13. The video below, shot by Judith Hawkins of It Is What It Is Mobile Talk Show, goes into the details.

Tenants of HUD Subsidized Apartments Demand Information

Tenants Protest Outside of NLHA Headquarters

We all know that the supply of quality affordable housing in the District of Columbia is dwindling and has been for decades.  This is not a problem unique to the District of Columbia, nor is it only a problem during bad economic times.  Finding affordable housing during the relatively lucrative 90s, for instance, was not much easier than it is now.

Fortunately, there are federal programs that subsidize the cost of housing that local governments can use to help low- and moderate-income residents.  The amount of affordable housing available dependents in part on regulations that determine things like how many units of an apartment building must be designated affordable and how low the rent must be before it fits into that category.

Landlords are often able to purchase buildings for relatively little money if they make a contract with a city or other jurisdiction to provide affordable housing.  These property owners are aware of the regulations they must follow to remain in compliance with the subsidy program, but the tenants who make their homes in their buildings are often left in the dark.

The National Alliance of Hud Tenants is working to change that fact.  Empower DC intern Chantal Taylor caught them in action as they took their case to the National Leased Housing Association on K Street.

Maturing Mortgages. Sounds Like A Good Thing, Right?

For the homeowner who’s been beholden to the bank for 30 years, finally paying off that mortgage is definitely a good thing.  But when a landlord who has a contract with  HUD to provide affordable apartments, pays off his or her debt to the bank, not everybody wins.

Everybody knows that DC has an affordable housing crisis.  One source of housing for moderate and low-income residents of Washington, DC has been apartments regulated by the department of Housing and Urban Development. DC residents whose income is less than the median of $57,936 have turned to HUD for rent subsidized apartments.  Property owners, looking for a good deal on a multifamily unit have bought these buildings at reduced rates.  In exchange, they made the apartments available to residents receiving rental assistance.  That arrangement stands for as long as the mortgage on the property is still in service, but once the building belongs to the landlord outright, he or she can do whatever they want with it.  So, where does that leave the residents who live in the property?

Empower DC’s Linda Leaks is educating tenants who live in HUD properties whose mortgages are on the verge of expiration about their rights, and lobbying Congress to implement legislation that would safeguard low- and moderate-income tenants.  WPFW reporter Peter Tucker interviewed her on the steps of the U.S. Capitol.    It’s another story that you won’t hear on the nightly news or even read about in the Washington Post, but we have it here.
A Massive Maturing of Mortgages
[audio:http://www.grassrootsdc.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/Linda-Leaks-6-13-101.mp3]