H.R. 217: Homeless Program Consolidation Bill

H.R. 217 the House of Representatives Homeless Programs Consolidation bill passed the House of Representatives on March 3^rd by a vote of 386 to 22, with 23 Representatives not voting. This is welcome news only in that the House now has completed its work on this particular bill. The Senate has yet to introduce companion legislation. It is understood from Senate staff that there will be no companion bill this year. The Senate has decided to undertake a study to determine the need for homelessness funds and how the various federal agencies participate in this issue. Homeless program consolidation will not become a reality this year.

A series of meetings with congressional staff lead us to believe that there probably will not be any housing bills enacted this year, particularly ones related to public housing reform (H.R. 2). This is highly unlikely given that there are only approximately 60 working days (in Washington) for members to put together bills that could make it to a full vote before Congress recesses for the election process. Appropriations will take up most of their time this year. Other time will be spent on "clean-up" of outstanding issues left over from the first session of the 105^th Congress. such as ISTEA.

Note: As reported in the February 19, 1998 issue of the NCDA WASHINGTON REPORT, HUD had gone on record as withdrawing their own homeless program consolidation and would not support the consolidation of other homeless program legislation. This has now changed. In a letter to Rep. Rick Lazio (R-NY) HUD has taken a different approach. As it now stands, HUD will not oppose homeless program consolidation and will support H.R. 217 if certain "caps" currently in the bill are removed. See the attached letter from HUD Secretary Andrew Cuomo to Representative Rick Lazio, Chairman of the subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity and chief sponsor of H.R. 217.

S. 1173: ISTEA Reauthorization

Mark-up on the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) 1997 will take place during the week of March 4^th through March 11^th. Transportation funding, which impacts the entire nation, will be Congress' top priority this budgetary season and is expected to impact all other parts of the budget. Leaders of the transportation committee, including Senator John Chafee (R-RI) pushed through an amendment to increase highway spending by 40 percent from $145 billion to $171 billion increase over the next six years. Of this increase, there is no funding requested for mass transit systems. This is different from the case in previous years. The formula had been, 80 percent for highways and 20 percent for mass transit. This formula for the additional highway funding has not been invoked in this latest round of negotiations for ISTEA reauthorization. Senator Alfonse D'Amato (R-NY) continued to press for more mass transit spending and succeeded with an additional $5 billion to the existing $36 already included in the bill. Senator Trent Lott (R-MS) originally resisted adding additional mass transit funding as he believes that compromise passage of the bill would be jeopardized. The addidtional money for mass transit is supposed to have come from unexpended highway monies.

Another interesting facet of this bill was the passage by voice vote of 62-32 for a national standard on blood alcohol limits. The passage of this amendment will require states that have not already lowered the limits for intoxication (to be considered legally drunk) to 0.08 percent to do so or risk losing funding. The GOP split 26-26 on this vote, with just six democrats voting against. This amendment, strongly supported by the White House, will require states to lower the blood alcohol limits to 0.08 or lose five percent of their federal funding in the first year and up to 10 percent in succeeding years. Many of those who voted against this amendment see this as more than an improper mandate, "It's a gun to the head of states" said Don Nickles of (R-OK). For example, if the state of Texas does not comply, it could lose up to one billion dollars.

H.R. 2727: Superfund Reauthorization

H.R. 2727, the Superfund restructuring bill went to mark-up on Wednesday, March 4^th. The major emphasis on this bill is reducing liability on innocent parties as it relates to clean-up and redevelopment of "hot properties" or brownfield sites. The bill refocuses the Superfund statute on redevelopment and recycling of America's land. Some notable highlights of interest to community development practitioners are as follows.

• remedies are based on returning land and water use to their reasonably anticipated beneficial uses;

 
• innocent parties, like good samaritans and developers, are protected from liability;

 
• people who clean up brownfields under state law will not be subjected to federal liability, except in exceptional circumstances, such as finding a superfund site situation; and

 
• brownfields grants are authorized.

H.R. 3206: Amendments to the Fair Housing Act

H.R. 3206, an amendment to the Fair Housing Bill was introduced on February 12, by Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-CA) passed the Constitution Subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee last week. A full committee (House Judiciary Committee) vote on this amendment could come as soon as this week. The City of Los Angeles passed a resolution opposing the bill by a vote of 13-1. Both HUD and the Department of Justice have sent letters to the bill's sponsors in "strong opposition" to the bill. The National Housing Conference and the Low Income Housing Coalition strongly opposes this amendment. It is not clear whether this amendment to the fair housing act has broad political support, particularly within the Senate.

What H.R. 3206 Does:

• H.R. 3206 changes the definition of familial status by narrowing the protection for abused and neglected children in group homes (familial status is a protected class under FHA);

 
• removes important protections for persons with disabilities in choosing to live in a residential neighborhood aby allowing localities to restrict groups homes;
• allows any occupancy restriction on homes for people recovering from drug addition or substance abuse, for people with disabilities and for persons convicted of crimes;

 
• creates an unnecessary burden on complaint filing which reduces the efficiency of the administrative process; and

 
• attacks the first amendment by legalizing all "expression of opinion" in, for example, the advertising of homes sales and rentals.

HUD ANNOUNCES ADDITIONAL IDIS TRAINING DATES

HUD NOTICES
At the National Association for County Community and Economic Development community Development committee meeting Deirdre Maguire-Zinni, Director of the Entitlement Division at CPD, informed participants that guidance on the treatment of excess program income will be coming out soon. She also indicated that HUD will be posting several notices to offer guidance and direction to grantees.

98-01 Subsidy Layering

97-09 HOME and Program Income

97-08 HOPE VI Guidance

Ms. Maguire-Zinni also discussed several issues that HUD continues to have discussions on; timeliness of expenditure; eligibility of CDBG/HOME/ESG funding for illegal aliens, and analysis of impediments (AI) to fair housing performance standards. On the AI issue, CPD and FHEO will work together to look at grantee performance standards, namely, how grantees determine how they will address identified impediments and how to deal with issue of race in the AI's and in the consolidate plan.

HUD STAFF MOVING ON

• Kevin Marchman, Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing recently announced his departure from HUD. Mr. Marchman has served HUD as Acting Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing for more than 18 months until he was finally confirmed. It is assumed that Mr. Marchman has returned to his home city of Seattle. We wish him well.

• Former NCDA President Nicholas P. Retsinas, Commissioner of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) and Assistant Secretary for Housing at HUD has announced he will leave HUD to assume a teaching position at Harvard University. His new position will begin this fall. NCDA also wishes him well.

National Community Development Week: Get Your T-Shirts & Posters Now!  They're Going Fast!!
April 6-12, 1998 is National Community Development Week. Please forward a schedule of your community's CD Week activities. NCDA and the U.S. Conference of Mayors will be initiating a calling campaign to find out what our members are doing for National CD Week. We can't emphasize how important conducting CD Week activities are during an election year. The recent trend in the proliferation of set-asides could be exacerbated when members a seeking re-election. Regardless of the President's budget proposal, set-asides happen during conference. Conducting events during National CD Week and encouraging participation from your Congressional Delegation is an excellent way of getting the word out on the importance of reducing set-asides, thereby increasing funding to Congressional Districts. If you need additional promotional materials, including poster, t-shirt and postcard order forms, please contact NCDA staff as soon as possible.

Brownfields Survey Forms
Thanks to all our member for returning those brownfields surveys. We need to keep up the pace. So far, we have received approximately 40 surveys. Our goal is to send HUD at least 100. If you have not returned your survey, please mail, or fax it to Chandra Western as soon as possible. Thanks.

Posting Job Announcements
NCDA staff is ever willing to include position vacancies of member communities in the NCDA Washington Report. To better assist members as well as staff, we ask member communities to e-mail position vacancies to Karen Means, karen@ncdaonline.org, whenever possible. If you are not set up for e-mail, please fax them to Karen. An electronic copy makes it easier to post the position on NCDAonline.

• The NCDA Washington Report is now available on the internet! Just point your browser to http://www.ncdaonline.org

 
• NCDA's e-mail address is karen@ncdaonline.org — DO WE HAVE YOURS???

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