Funding Request Seeks 15% Increase to HUD Budget

President Biden recently sent the administration’s fiscal year 2022 discretionary funding request to Congress. The HUD budget requests $68.7 billion, a $9 billion or 15 percent increase from the 2021 enacted level.

One level deeper: The funding request doesn’t include line-by-line program requests but includes requests for a few key HUD programs. The request seeks expanding the Housing Choice Voucher program to serve 200,000 more families, with funding for mobility-related supportive services to provide low-income families who live in racially and ethnically concentrated areas of poverty with greater options to move to higher-opportunity neighborhoods.

And to address the affordable housing shortage, the discretionary request provides a $500 million increase to the HOME Investment Partnerships Program, for a total of $1.9 billion, to construct and rehabilitate affordable rental housing and to support other housing-related needs.

In addition, the discretionary request provides $180 million to support 2,000 units of new permanently affordable housing for the elderly and persons with disabilities, supporting the administration’s priority to maximize independent living for people with disabilities.

The president is also requesting $800 million for modernization and rehabilitation aimed at energy efficiency and resilience to climate change impacts, such as increasingly frequent and severe floods, in HUD-assisted housing. In the Department of Energy, the budget requests $400 million for the weatherization of low-income homes.

Between the lines: The discretionary spending request of $1.9 billion for the HOME Investment Partnerships Program is the highest level for this program since 2009. And, at this time, we don't know how the funds to support 2,000 units of new permanently affordable housing for the elderly and persons with disabilities will be spit between Section 202 and Section 811 housing.