Senior Veterans Housing Assistance Act of 2011

Floor Speech

* Mr. TURNER of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, we must ensure that the men and women who bravely served our country have access to affordable housing. My bill, the Senior Veterans Housing Assistance Act, seeks to make sure that government regulations do not pose an impediment to achieving this important goal.

* This issue came to light because of conflicting rules and regulations between the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Veterans Affairs. In Dayton, Ohio, the St. Mary's Neighborhood Development Corporation has been attempting for several years to construct senior housing on the campus of the Dayton VA Medical Center. St. Mary's was able to obtain an enhanced-use lease from the VA to construct the housing and also obtained HUD Section 202 funding to allow for the financing of the construction for low-income senior housing. So we had VA providing the land and HUD providing funding, and both VA and HUD agreeing that this would be an excellent project to help homeless veterans, provide low-income housing for veterans, and respond to the needs of seniors in the community.

* However, HUD asserted that St. Mary's was unable to use these critical dollars if the VA lease required a specific preference for veterans to occupy the proposed facility on the VA grounds. The VA rules and regulations require that the VA assert and request a preference for veterans for housing to be built on its campus.

* In the 111th Congress, this body unanimously approved and the President enacted into law a provision I authored to solve this issue. Specifically, the Fiscal Year 2010 appropriations measure included a prohibition on enforcement of HUD's restriction against a veterans preference. However, this solution was only temporary.

* To ensure that these conflicting regulations do not present further, long-term obstacles for our veterans and seniors, I have introduced the Senior Veterans Housing Assistance Act. My bill will permanently ensure that organizations that seek to provide our senior veterans with affordable housing with HUD funds on VA property are able to overcome the HUD and VA conflicting rules and regulations. Specifically, the bill will allow HUD funds to be used for supportive housing for the elderly that provide preference to veterans if the property is or would be located on VA land, or is subject to an enhanced-use lease with the VA.

* Mr. Speaker, I urge all my colleagues to support this important measure.

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