Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. Chairman, two of our central responsibilities as Members of Congress are to support a strong national infrastructure and to ensure that every American has a place to call home. The funding levels provided in this legislation will make it impossible to fulfill either of those responsibilities.

There can be no question that we must put people back to work and bring our crumbling, outdated infrastructure into the 21st century. At the funding levels provided in this bill, few of those goals can be accomplished.

The bill cuts the FTA's Capital Investment Grant Program, more commonly known as New Starts, by $252 million. It includes a $500 million cut to the TIGER grant program, funding it $1.15 billion below the President's request, and it cuts $200 million from Amtrak's capital funding, while providing no funding for high-speed rail.

Beyond simply cutting critical funding, the bill places restrictions on the use of TIGER grants and high-speed rail, and it exempts three States--Wisconsin, Mississippi, and Idaho--from truck size and weight limits on Federal highways.

Congress should not preempt the comprehensive study currently being conducted by USDOT, required as part of MAP-21, the last legislation we enacted on the subject, by enacting piecemeal riders on appropriations bills.

The devastating impacts these cuts will have on our economy will only be exacerbated by the cuts to vital housing programs for hardworking families.

The HOME Investment Partnership Program is funded at its lowest level since its creation in 1992, and the Public Housing Capital Fund falls below its sequestered funding level, adding at least $1 billion to the backlog of capital needs, but perhaps most startling is the failure of this legislation to provide enough funding for every low-income senior and hardworking family to access affordable and secure housing through HUD's tenant-based rental assistance program, or section 8.

My amendment finally provides enough funding for HUD to renew every section 8 voucher, including the 70,000 vouchers lost under sequestration, and to support robust staffing at public housing agencies around the country.

Rental assistance helps 2.1 million very low-income households rent modest homes in the private market at an affordable cost. Households who use Section 8 have incomes well below the Federal poverty line, and nearly every household using a section 8 voucher includes children, seniors, or people with disabilities.

Research consistently demonstrates that this program reduces poverty, housing instability, and homelessness, and helps families live in safe, healthy communities.

Despite the success, only about one in four eligible low-income families receives Federal rental assistance. Long waiting lists remain in nearly every community, even as the number of poor families who pay more than half their monthly income for housing costs has risen 28 percent since 2007. These long wait lists are exacerbated by a lack of administrative funding for public housing agencies.

In the past, Congress consistently provided the necessary funds to ensure that no one receiving a Section 8 voucher loses access to affordable, decent, and stable housing year to year, but sequestration has had a devastating impact on section 8.

With inadequate funding for voucher renewals and extreme cuts to administrative fees, State and local housing agencies assisted an estimated 70,000 fewer families at the end of 2013 compared to a year earlier.

The increased funding that Congress provided through the FY14 budget agreement restored less than half of those vouchers, leaving 40,000 very low-income families with no access to affordable housing. This bill does nothing to help those families.

My amendment will ensure that public housing agencies can renew every current voucher and restore those lost under sequestration. The amendment funds Section 8 voucher renewals at the President's request of $18 billion and provides an additional $320 million to provide vouchers to the 40,000 families who lost access due to Congress' inability to address sequestration.

Of course, this additional funding would go a long way to ensuring that every family who qualifies for rental assistance finds a home. However, at the funding levels for administrative fees in this legislation, it would be impossible for public housing agencies to hire and maintain enough staff to process and renew vouchers.

We cannot continue to undermine our hardworking public housing agencies by failing to provide them enough money to function; yet, once again, this bill woefully underfunds administrative fees for public housing by providing only $1.35 billion, a $150 million reduction from last year's enacted level.

My amendment would finally address the undercutting at public housing agencies by providing an additional $335 million to match the President's request of $1.7 billion for administrative fees.

Mr. Chairman, our first priority must be to ensure that every working family, every senior, and every child has access to a safe, healthy, and affordable home. This amendment will guarantee that no one has to choose between paying their rent and putting food on the table.

I urge my colleagues to support this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. Chairman, we can all agree, I think, that this amendment is necessary.

We are talking about denying tens of thousands of families and seniors access to an efficient, cost-effective program that keeps families together and lowers the government's costs over the long term.

Without this amendment, we will see a spike in homelessness, a spike in medical costs, and a spike in hungry kids.

I understand the point of order. I understand that the rules demand an offset for any funding increase in the bill. I also appreciate the chairman's efforts to support Section 8 and public housing.

But when funding levels are this restrictive across the board, as they are in this bill, it is impossible to offset such drastic underfunding without hurting other people in need. The rules and the drastic underfunding of this bill make it impossible to meet basic human needs.

I hope that, as we go forward, we can find a way to provide these funds so that kids, working families, and seniors are not out on the street, as I guarantee you this bill at this funding level will do.

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