Mr. Hobbs goes to Washington (briefly)
The Homes Act, Walz Debate, Minnesota Twins.
I had the opportunity last week to be in Washington DC and speak at a press conference with Senator Tina Smith and Representative Ocasio-Cortez to introduce legislation they both authored called “The Homes Act”. In brief this is what the Homes Act would accomplish:
● Establish a national Housing Development Authority to acquire and develop real estate to create and maintain a stock of permanent, sustainable, affordable housing, including single- and multi-family housing, with robust tenant protections.
● Empower local communities to address their specific housing needs by financing real estate acquisition or conveying property to public housing authorities, mission-driven nonprofits, tenant- or resident-owned cooperatives, state or local governments, and community land trusts.
● Require the housing development authority to maintain portfolio-wide affordability by setting aside 40% of units for extremely-low income households and 30% of units for low-income households.
● Cap rents for units financed under the Act at 25% of a household’s adjusted gross income with reasonable limits on subsequent rent increases.
● Support homeownership by allowing residents to purchase limited equity in properties and authorizing the Housing Development Authority to provide relief to mortgage borrowers at risk of foreclosure due to market instability or economic distress.
● Provide strong labor protections for the jobs created in building and maintaining the new units.
● Provide tenants with opportunities to come together to purchase their buildings prior to large, for-profit developers buying them.
● Provide funding to rehabilitate and address the backlog of necessary improvements for public housing and repeal the Faircloth Amendment to allow new public housing.
● Authorize $30 billion in annual appropriations, combined with a revolving loan fund to recoup and reinvest funds back into housing. Annual appropriations include a 5% minimum set aside for Tribal communities and a 10% minimum set aside for rural communities.
I’ll use this substack the next couple of weeks to go over various points, because it is a lot. There is a lot to like in the bill and if it were enacted would be a game changer on addressing our nations housing shortage as well as addressing our housing affordability crisis as well. It also would be the single most single action taken on housing in over 30 years, outside of the housing market collapse of 2008 and the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) that many cities and counties used across the country for housing activities.
In the mean time here are a few news stories about the Homes Act
New York Times Op Ed By Sen. Tina Smith and Rep. Ocasio Cortez (Gift Article)
Minnesotans Join in Unveiling Affordable Housing Bill (Gift Article)
Ocasio-Cortez and Tina Smith Push Bill to Create More Housing
Tim Walz Debate Watch Party-
Several of Governor Walz former students are hosting debate watch parties across the country on October 1st. Here in Duluth I’m hosting at the Zeitgeist. Zeitgeist bar and restaurant will be open from 4:00pm to 10:00pm come early to grab a drink and a bite to eat before joining the watch party at 7:30. You can register here. Space is limited so please do sign up.
Minnesota Twins
I’m a huge baseball fan. And the Twins are by far my favorite team. I remember being heartbroken during talks of contraction and even wrote Bud Selig, the baseball commissioner at the time a letter as an 11 year old asking him to not contract the Twins. While they are cratering at the moment, I think they will still make the playoffs this year. If they don’t take a minimum 2 of 3 from the Marlins in this upcoming season you can stop watching.
Thanks for reading!