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

Floor Speech

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Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, my amendment prohibits the Department of Housing and Urban Development grants from being used to repay loans from the same agency.

Under current practice, taxpayers can find themselves on the hook not only for loans to private developers, but also for repayments on those loans.

Now, even if one agrees with the questionable practice of government money being used to finance the building of hotels, parks, arenas, and restaurants, it is absurd that the government grants are also being used to repay such loans when the projects fail. This practice encourages cronyism and economic distortion while throwing away taxpayer money on projects that couldn't survive on their own with private funding.

Now, my amendment simply bars the use of grant money from the Department of Housing and Urban Development from being used to pay back loans from the same agency. This commonsense amendment will ensure that taxpayer money isn't used to bail out developers or local governments when they make poor investment decisions--especially when these bad investments were made using taxpayer-funded loans to begin with. And I would note that an identical amendment to the one I am offering now was offered in the U.S. Senate by Senator Tom Coburn in October 2011, and it passed that body 73-26.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

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