Recent
Announcements

Hurricane Legislative Links

Urban homesteading: In a speech in New Orleans on September 15, President Bush announced his intention to create a new Urban Homesteading program. The Hurricane Katrina Recovery Homesteading Act was introduced on December 13 as H.R. 4514 and S. 2088. Vacant properties owned by various federal agencies would be transferred to local governments, who would select participating families and find resources for construction within three years. Neither house acted on its bill before adjourning until 2006. The bills are at http://thomas.loc.gov.

Testimony on HUD and FEMA housing relief efforts: On December 8 and 14, 2005, the House Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity held hearings entitled “Housing Options in the Aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.” Representatives of FEMA and HUD testified. Their written testimony is online at http://financialservices.house.gov/hearings.asp?formmode=All&congress=11.

Testimony on Rural Impact: On Sept. 15, the House Financial Services Committee's Housing Subcommittee held a hearing on Katrina. Clanton Beamon, Exec. Director of the Mississippi-based Delta Housing Development Corp. and a long-time HAC partner, testified on behalf of the National Rural Housing Coalition. He called for short-term repair of up to to 10,000 rural units and funding for 5,000 vouchers. For the longer term, Beamon said, Katrina-hit rural areas need development of 20,000 single- and multi-family units. He recommended immediate relief of $430 million in eight USDA rural housing programs, plus a rebuilding total of $2.75 billion in the USDA Sec. 502, 515, 514/516 and 521 programs. Beamon also decribed movingly how his agency acted quickly to place evacuees in Delta Housing's vacant units. For Beamon's full testimony (and others'), see http://financialservices.house.gov/hearings.asp?formmode=detail&hearing=414.

Updated December 23, 2005; Originally Posted September 19, 2005