Congress

The U.S. House of Representatives passed the following financial services bills to support veterans, benefit investors, provide housing opportunities, hold regulators accountable, promote Minority Depository Institutions (MDIs) and improve cybersecurity:

Yesterday the House of Representatives voted to approve federal funding for the remainder of FY 2020, which will provide $738 billion to the military and $632 billion to non-defense agencies. The Senate is expected to pass the measures before the current continuing resolution expires on December 20, and the White House has indicated President Trump will sign them into law.

Senators Michael Bennet (D-CO) and Rob Portman (R-OH) introduced the Eviction Crisis Act of 2019 to shed light on the root causes of the eviction crisis, reduce preventable evictions and limit the devastation to families when eviction is unavoidable.

Senator Bernie Sanders (D-VT) and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) introduced the Green New Deal for Public Housing Act. The legislation would create seven grant programs to upgrade public housing units through decarbonization and mixed-use development and repeal the Faircloth Amendment, which prohibits new public housing units above the amount of units owned, operated or assisted by a PHA as of October 1, 1999.

Representative Ilhan Omar (D-MN) introduced the Homes for All Act of 2019, which will dramatically expand the public housing stock in the U.S. and guarantee housing as a human right. The bill will authorize construction of 12 million new public housing and private, permanently affordable rental units.

House Committee on Financial Services Chairwoman Maxine Waters (D-CA) and Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) introduced the Housing is Infrastructure Act of 2019 (H.R. 5187/S. 2951). The bills contain the following investments in housing:

On November 19, the House of Representatives voted 231-192 on H.R. 3055 to approve a continuing resolution (CR) that would fund the federal government through December 20. The new CR maintains an important adjustment for the Section 202 Housing for the Elderly program that will prevent renewal delays for Project Rental Assistance Contracts set to […]

Representatives Jim Clyburn (D-SC), Alma Adams (D-NC) and Lacy Clay (D-MO) introduced the Opportunity Zone Reform Act (H.R. 5042) which would eliminate Opportunity Zones that are not low-income and allow states to replace those zones with ones that are low-income as defined by the New Markets Tax Credit. The bill also would prohibit investments in […]

Representative Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) sent a letter to the chairmen of the House Committee on Ways and Means, Committee on Oversight and Reform Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy, and the Committee on Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations to request an investigative hearing on whether political contributions influenced the designation of opportunity zones in her district and across the country.

Representatives Hank Johnson (D-GA) and Bobby Rush (D-IL) introduced H.R. 4999 which would require investments that benefit from the opportunity zones (OZs) incentive to reach certain benchmarks in diversity and affordable housing. The bill would require all qualified opportunity funds (QOFs) to have advisory boards for each OZ in which they invest.

Last week the Senate voted 84-9 to pass a four-bill FY 2020 spending package that includes funding for Agriculture, Commerce-Justice-Science, Interior-Environment and Transportation-HUD. The bill includes modest increases over FY 2019 funding levels for rental assistance programs but cuts funding for Choice Neighborhoods, Housing for Persons with AIDS, Indian Housing Block Grants and Community Development Block Grants.

The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs will hold a hearing at 10:00 am ET on November 7 entitled “Examining Bipartisan Bills to Promote Affordable Housing Access and Safety.” The hearing will take place in Room 538 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building and via webcast. The witnesses are Ivory Mathews with Columbia […]