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THE FUTURE OF HOUSING IN AMERICA: 

50 YEARS OF HUD AND ITS IMPACT 

ON FEDERAL HOUSING POLICY 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

OCTOBER 22, 2015 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Financial Services 

Serial No. 114–57 

( 

(II) 

HOUSE COMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES 

JEB HENSARLING, Texas, Chairman 

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina, 

Vice Chairman 

PETER T. KING, New York 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California 

FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma 

SCOTT GARRETT, New Jersey 

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas 

STEVAN PEARCE, New Mexico 

BILL POSEY, Florida 

MICHAEL G. FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania 

LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia 

BLAINE LUETKEMEYER, Missouri 

BILL HUIZENGA, Michigan 

SEAN P. DUFFY, Wisconsin 

ROBERT HURT, Virginia 

STEVE STIVERS, Ohio 

STEPHEN LEE FINCHER, Tennessee 

MARLIN A. STUTZMAN, Indiana 

MICK MULVANEY, South Carolina 

RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois 

DENNIS A. ROSS, Florida 

ROBERT PITTENGER, North Carolina 

ANN WAGNER, Missouri 

ANDY BARR, Kentucky 

KEITH J. ROTHFUS, Pennsylvania 

LUKE MESSER, Indiana 

DAVID SCHWEIKERT, Arizona 

FRANK GUINTA, New Hampshire 

SCOTT TIPTON, Colorado 

ROGER WILLIAMS, Texas 

BRUCE POLIQUIN, Maine 

MIA LOVE, Utah 

FRENCH HILL, Arkansas 

TOM EMMER, Minnesota 

MAXINE WATERS, California, Ranking 

Member 

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York 

NYDIA M. VELA ́ ZQUEZ, New York 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts 

RUBE ́ N HINOJOSA, Texas 

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri 

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts 

DAVID SCOTT, Georgia 

AL GREEN, Texas 

EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri 

GWEN MOORE, Wisconsin 

KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota 

ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado 

JAMES A. HIMES, Connecticut 

JOHN C. CARNEY, JR., Delaware 

TERRI A. SEWELL, Alabama 

BILL FOSTER, Illinois 

DANIEL T. KILDEE, Michigan 

PATRICK MURPHY, Florida 

JOHN K. DELANEY, Maryland 

KYRSTEN SINEMA, Arizona 

JOYCE BEATTY, Ohio 

DENNY HECK, Washington 

JUAN VARGAS, California 

SHANNON MCGAHN, Staff Director 

JAMES H. CLINGER, Chief Counsel 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hearing held on: 

October 22, 2015 ............................................................................................... 1 

Appendix: 

October 22, 2015 ............................................................................................... 53 

WITNESSES 

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2015 

Briggs, Xavier, Vice President, Economic Opportunity, the Ford Foundation ... 10 

Cabrera, Orlando J., Of Counsel, Squire Patton Boggs; and former Assistant 

Secretary for Public and Indian Housing, U.S. Department of Housing 

and Urban Development ...................................................................................... 5 

Glover, Renee Lewis, Founding and Managing Member, the Catalyst Group, 

LLC ........................................................................................................................ 7 

Husock, Howard, Vice President, Research and Publications, the Manhattan 

Institute ................................................................................................................ 8 

APPENDIX 

Prepared statements: 

Velazquez, Hon. Nydia ..................................................................................... 54 

Briggs, Xavier ................................................................................................... 55 

Cabrera, Orlando J. .......................................................................................... 63 

Glover, Renee Lewis, ........................................................................................ 70 

Husock, Howard ............................................................................................... 81 

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD

Luetkemeyer, Hon. Blaine: 

Written statement of the National Multifamily Housing Council and the 

National Apartment Association .................................................................. 86 

Letter from representatives of the real estate industry, dated October 

20, 2015 .......................................................................................................... 91 

Kildee, Hon. Daniel: 

Written responses to questions for the record submitted to Xavier Briggs . 93 

(1) 

THE FUTURE OF HOUSING IN AMERICA: 

50 YEARS OF HUD AND ITS IMPACT 

ON FEDERAL HOUSING POLICY 

Thursday, October 22, 2015 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

COMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES, 

Washington, D.C. 

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in room 

2128, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Jeb Hensarling [chairman of the committee] presiding. 

Members present: Representatives Hensarling, Royce, Lucas, 

Garrett, Neugebauer, Pearce, Posey, Fitzpatrick, Luetkemeyer, 

Huizenga, Duffy, Stivers, Stutzman, Mulvaney, Hultgren, Ross, 

Pittenger, Barr, Rothfus, Schweikert, Tipton, Williams, Poliquin, 

Love, Hill, Emmer; Waters, Maloney, Velazquez, Sherman, Hinojosa, Clay, Scott, Green, Cleaver, Ellison, Himes, Carney, Foster, 

Kildee, Murphy, Delaney, Sinema, Beatty, and Vargas. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The Financial Services Committee will 

come to order. Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare 

a recess of the committee at any time. 

Today’s hearing is entitled, ‘‘The Future of Housing in America: 

50 Years of HUD and Its Impact on Federal Housing Policy.’’ 

I now recognize myself for 3 minutes to give an opening statement. 

In launching the war on poverty, President Johnson told us its 

purpose was, ‘‘not only to relieve the symptoms of poverty, but to 

cure it and, above all, to prevent it.’’ One of the chief weapons of 

this war was to be the Department of Housing and Urban Development, a Cabinet-level agency President Johnson signed into law 50 

years ago this month. 

In its history, HUD has clearly achieved good. It has made commendable progress to aggressively fight immoral and illegal racial 

discrimination in housing. It has proven vital to many of our lowincome elderly and disabled citizens and has undoubtedly made 

poverty more tolerable. 

But it has also dramatically failed to meet President Johnson’s 

noble aspirations, much less deliver any measurable results. In 

fact, poverty levels are largely unchanged since HUD’s creation. 

With some notable exceptions, HUD’s public housing projects are 

typically any city’s most despairing places where generations of 

poverty-stricken families are warehoused and sealed off from the 

best schools, the best job opportunities, and the safest neighborhoods. 

2 

It is simply not enough to marginally improve the lives of the 

able-bodied poor through perpetual government dependency; a caring and compassionate society must always have a ladder of opportunity on which everyone can climb. 

Thus, our collective goal cannot be limited to helping people tolerate poverty; it must be to help them escape poverty. And whether 

I have met them at the Salvation Army women’s shelter, Habitat 

for Humanity homes, or the Jubilee Center in my native Dallas, I 

know that is the aspiration of our low-income brothers and sisters. 

We must help find ways for them to provide for their families, 

to conquer generational cycles of dependency, and to have the opportunity to enjoy the dignity of meaningful work. Most importantly, they must have a chance to enjoy a quality not measured 

in dollars and cents: the pursuit of happiness. 

We can no longer measure success by taxpayer dollars expended 

and new HUD programs launched. Measuring success based on 

how many Americans are standing in line for welfare checks versus 

earning growing paychecks is a sure sign that the system has 

failed. 

And now is also the time to acknowledge this fundamental truth: 

There can be no real progress in the cause of affordable housing 

without recognizing that government policies are often the impediment: first, by making housing more expensive, up to 30 percent 

according to some studies, due to regulatory and zoning restrictions; second, by shrinking paychecks and harming economic 

growth through poor policies; and third, by denying educational 

choice for families to escape failing schools and improve themselves. 

This hearing will be the first in a series on the future of housing 

in America where we will investigate questions that ought to matter to all Members concerned for the dignity and well-being of the 

poor among us. What are the precise problems HUD is trying to 

solve? Why doesn’t it seem to work? How should we measure success? And what should we be doing in the 21st Century? 

A decent society has a moral responsibility to help make affordable housing accessible for the elderly, the disabled, those who cannot provide for their dependents, and those who find themselves in 

hard times and in need of a second chance. The question here is 

not, should we honor that commitment, but how do we best honor 

that commitment in the 21st Century, and can we work together 

on a bipartisan basis to do that? 

I now recognize the ranking member for 5 minutes. 

Ms. WATERS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

I would like to thank you and our witnesses for being here today. 

Mr. Chairman and Members, I just returned from a homeless 

program. I was there this morning with a few of my colleagues, including Mr. Cleaver and Mr. Green. We visited N Street Village, 

a homeless service provider, which is just footsteps from the halls 

of our Capitol. 

As this hearing seeks to examine the effectiveness of HUD programs over the last 50 years, I thought it would be important to 

help make the connection between what we have talked about here 

in the committee and what HUD is doing to support providers like 

3 

N Street Village, which are working on the front lines of our Nation’s effort to end homelessness. 

This morning, we spoke with women struggling to find work and 

fighting to overcome addiction, physical and mental illness, and 

abusive situations. What we saw today is how HUD programs directly touch and impact the lives of America’s most vulnerable. 

We also saw the opposite of the many assertions we have heard 

about dysfunction and ineffectiveness at this agency, a rather ironic charge given productivity levels here in Congress. 

Mr. Chairman, in the wake of a foreclosure crisis that pushed as 

many as 11 million families out of their homes, a fully funded HUD 

is needed now more than ever before. This is an agency that, in addition to reducing veterans’ homelessness across the Nation by 33 

percent, currently supports 1.2 million affordable housing units for 

low-income families through the HOME program, including almost 

500,000 units for first-time home buyers in rural and urban communities alike. 

This is an agency that over the last 50 years has provided housing assistance to tens of millions of families, 35 million in the last 

20 years alone. This is an agency which has ensured that 44 million families have access to the American Dream by ensuring they 

have mortgages that they can actually afford. 

Without question, HUD is the backbone of our Nation’s safety 

net. 

Today, many of our Members have provided examples of HUD at 

work in their districts. These pictures demonstrate the transformative ability of HUD programs, particularly the Neighborhood 

Stabilization Program, which has infused over $7 billion into local 

communities to rehabilitate foreclosed homes and breathe new life 

into distressed neighborhoods in every corner of this great Nation. 

However, this good work continues to be misunderstood or undermined by harmful cuts to these programs. And so I think it is time 

for us to truly focus on the good that HUD has done and commit 

ourselves to dealing with problems such as homelessness that really can be addressed. 

In addition to the visit that we made this morning, last week I 

was at Vermont Village, a project that has been developed in my 

district in partnership with the private sector. 

We had Chase Bank involved. We had a private developer. We 

had the County of L.A. We had another nonprofit. We had Enterprise. They all came together and built a wonderful unit, and it is 

serving homeless veterans. And the veterans were there, some in 

their wheelchairs. They were so proud of all of these opportunities 

that are being provided with the help and direction of HUD. 

And so what I wish, Mr. Chairman, is that we could focus in a 

bipartisan way on what we can do from this committee in support 

of HUD to provide housing and home opportunities for the least of 

these. I believe that it is possible. 

In Los Angeles, homelessness has risen 12 percent. We have declared a state of emergency. The County and the City are coming 

together and combining resources, but they need help from us. And 

so I appreciate this hearing, but I appreciate that we should actually put more focus on what we can do for the homeless and for 

4 

the least of these in providing a basic safety net for those who need 

our help so badly. 

I will yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The gentlelady yields back. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. 

Luetkemeyer, chairman of our Housing and Insurance Subcommittee, for 2 minutes. 

Mr. LUETKEMEYER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The Nation’s housing system is struggling and, in some instances, failing. Since 2002, the Federal Government has thrown 

more than $550 billion at HUD. Still, Los Angeles has seen a 12 

percent increase in homelessness over the past year. In New York 

City alone, there are roughly 122,000 families on the Section 8 wait 

list. 

When the City of St. Louis opened its wait list in 2007, the housing authority received more than 27,000 applications in one week. 

It was not until late April that St. Louis County opened its wait 

list again for the first time since 2010. 

While we continue to see the need to grow and opportunities 

stall, we experienced a dramatic increase in Federal policies that 

drive up the cost of housing and impose an onslaught of red tape, 

keeping people in the private sector out of affordable housing. Our 

failed housing policies make no sense. 

Since HUD Secretary Castro has spent the last year talking 

about all he will do to reform housing, to date we have seen very 

little in the matter of dramatic advances in HUD’s ability to serve, 

and no new metrics by which HUD can measure success. One has 

to wonder if there is any success to report at all. 

The time to talk about what is needed is over. It is time to reject 

political rhetoric and push ourselves to do something to help people 

in need. 

I recently introduced H.R. 3700, the Housing Opportunity 

Through Modernization Act. This bill is composed of noncontroversial provisions which aim to clear out the regulatory underbrush. 

Yesterday’s subcommittee hearing showed that there is a tremendous bipartisan support for that effort. 

I hope we can continue the collaboration in bringing bolder 

changes that are needed to HUD. Let us work together to create 

opportunity and choice in housing. 

Mr. Chairman, with that, I yield back. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The gentleman yields back. 

We will now turn to our witnesses. Today, we welcome the testimony of the Honorable Orlando Cabrera, who is today of counsel 

to Squire Patton Boggs. He previously served as the president of 

an affordable housing developer, and was HUD’s Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan and the University of Wisconsin Madison. 

Ms. Renee Glover is the founder and managing member of the 

Catalyst Group. She previously served as the president and chief 

executive officer of the Atlanta Housing Authority for almost 20 

years. She is also Chair of Habitat for Humanity International, and 

has worked as an attorney in private practice. Ms. Glover holds degrees from Boston, Yale, and Fisk Universities. 

5 

Mr. Howard Husock is the vice president of research and publications at the Manhattan Institute. He previously served as a director at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, and 

has authored numerous publications relating to the non-profit sector and on U.S. housing and urban policy. Mr. Husock is a graduate of Boston University. 

Finally, Dr. Xavier Briggs is the vice president of economic opportunity at the Ford Foundation. Dr. Briggs also holds an appointment as professor of sociology and planning at MIT, and previously 

served as an Associate Director in the White House Office of Management and Budget, as well as in HUD’s Office of Policy Development and Research. Dr. Briggs is a graduate of Columbia, Harvard, 

and Stanford Universities. 

For those who have not testified before, each of you will be recognized for 5 minutes to give an oral presentation of your testimony. 

And without objection, each of your written statements will be 

made a part of the record. 

Mr. Cabrera, you are now recognized for a summary of your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF ORLANDO J. CABRERA, OF COUNSEL, SQUIRE 

PATTON BOGGS; AND FORMER ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR 

PUBLIC AND INDIAN HOUSING, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT 

Mr. CABRERA. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, and thank you. 

Thank you, Chairman Hensarling, Ranking Member Waters, and 

members of the committee for inviting me to testify. I approached 

this a bit differently knowing who was going to be on this panel. 

The folks to my left are all people I know or know of. Two of them 

in particular are both professional and personal friends and they 

speak to issues that I think are critically important, but in which 

I have less experience. 

For example, Renee ran a housing authority, Xavier was a policydriven person at HUD entirely, and Mr. Husock knows a lot more 

about markets. 

I decided that I would bore everybody and go inside baseball, and 

inside baseball means to focus on metrics. 

The overarching theme of this testimony is not so much focused 

on HUD’s past or previous impact. Over the decades, HUD and its 

many arms have undoubtedly impacted housing policy in both positive and negative ways. If we know that HUD has impacted Federal policy unevenly, and it has, I propose that there is a value in 

exploring how we can achieve better future housing policy outcomes. 

Better serving all Americans, but particularly the elderly, the 

disabled, very low-income, and low-income Americans should always remain at the core of our Nation’s housing policy. Moving towards a legislative policy that is relevant to our current century, 

not the 20th Century, would be a great step in helping HUD 

evolve. 

Change is inevitable for HUD. Its personnel is aging and many 

are retiring. Important institutional memory has been lost already. 

Similarly, its current infrastructure is also aging, making it harder 

still to capture important and relevant data. 

6 

Many believe that one way to improve HUD’s impact would be 

to begin new programs or housing solutions or do away with them. 

Perhaps. But my starting point would be a bit different. I believe 

that the way to improve HUD’s impact is through the more adept 

and intensive use of technology. 

More specifically, a critical area at HUD that deserves focus, 

careful design, and investment is information technology. Providing 

HUD with the appropriate tools that relate to our century’s housing policy model and needs will produce better outcomes for residents and taxpayers. 

There are three essential steps to improving outcomes: define 

your desired result; know more about how to measure that result; 

and do what needs to be done faster and better than was previously the case. 

In HUD’s case, the first step should be to decide that HUD needs 

to break away from the silo organizational mold that HUD uses 

currently, into a more fluid and flexible organization. HUD has always depended on silos out of statutory and operational necessity. 

Though silos were probably appropriately designed organizational 

components decades ago, those silos are now impediments to improving HUD’s capacity to more effectively serve our Nation. 

Essentially, HUD has four basic rules: HUD allocates resources; 

HUD insures financial products; HUD regulates certain stakeholders; and HUD is charged with policing and prosecuting fair 

housing violations. That is a relatively narrow set of tasks which 

is currently bundled in a far more expansive organizational setting 

at HUD. 

HUD’s organization and activities should be integrated into an 

information technology platform that allows it to more effectively 

perform those four basic roles in a more seamless manner than is 

currently the case. 

Secondly, the American taxpayer would benefit if HUD developed 

more relevant metrics than those currently being used. More specifically, Congress should begin by first providing HUD with the 

tools that HUD needs to capture not just better and relevant data, 

but complex, fluid data that can lead to defining better outcomes 

for very low-income and low-income Americans. 

Integrating technology would, for example, allow us to improve 

people’s lives by measuring and determining better educational 

achievements, health care services, and other important services in 

a more dynamic way than is currently possible. That would mean 

better outcomes for residents and better efficiencies for the Federal 

Government. 

HUD desperately needs the appropriate tools to obtain usable, 

scalable, sharable, and relevant information that all of HUD’s 

stakeholders can use. Providing HUD with the right data tools and 

maintaining those tools will go further towards creating a more efficient system than nearly any other investment. 

I believe that it would be time well worth the effort to match desired housing policy outcomes in a new century with the new century’s information technology tools needed to appropriately achieve 

those outcomes. 

Thank you again for your invitation to testify. I am happy to answer any questions you may have. 

7 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Cabrera can be found on page 63 

of the appendix.] 

Chairman HENSARLING. Thank you. 

Ms. Glover, you are now recognized for your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF RENEE LEWIS GLOVER, FOUNDING AND 

MANAGING MEMBER, THE CATALYST GROUP, LLC 

Ms. GLOVER. Thank you. Chairman Hensarling and Ranking 

Member Waters, thank you for the opportunity to speak with you. 

I think it is very important when you think about the issue of 

housing to remember that America is a nation of immigrants, so 

new people will continue to come and new challenges are going to 

arise. And poverty is not a static condition; it is also a function of 

what happens in the economy and in the larger social setting. 

So I think when you look at how we are making progress, we 

have to put it into the context of what is going on in history and 

also in the economy, because we made great progress over the 

years. And I think if we take an objective measure of the programs 

that have been implemented to date, we will see that many of the 

families who have been assisted have gone on, have made progress, 

and are contributing to our country. 

But for the Great Recession—we cannot underestimate the impact that it had on the housing programs and how families are 

faring. 

And I think it is now universally accepted that there is income 

disparity, and so that has implications in terms of what type of investment we need to make to have a strong America. 

One of the things that I have enjoyed with serving Habitat for 

Humanity is that we have observed that not only here in America, 

but all over the world, housing is at the center of everything that 

is needed to have a great society. It is the center of great education 

outcomes, health outcomes, healthy families, and healthy children, 

and there are no great nations without great communities. 

So the question is, what should we be doing as a country to rebuild, because there is no question that America is the greatest nation in the world. But how do we help everyone in the country 

achieve the American Dream? 

And Dr. Martin Luther King challenges us to build the beloved 

community here on earth. And that means all of us are God’s 

hands, feet, and heart to build the society. So when you think 

about that, we cannot afford to leave one child behind. And the 

question is, how do we go about doing it? 

In my written testimony, I mention that there have been several 

big ideas that have been put forth and have been implemented successfully. But no program is perfect because human beings are 

doing the implementation. So the question is, can we lift out the 

lessons learned and best practices to see what has worked and then 

do more of what has worked and less of the things that haven’t 

worked? 

So what are the things that we have learned? Well, first of all, 

we know that every American needs a decent home and a great 

community. 

Second, we know that home ownership, where feasible, builds 

stability and helps build wealth. 

8 

And we have also learned that government must be a part of the 

solution. But the question is, how do you go about doing that? 

And so we have learned that providing mobility and choice is important, that ending concentrated poverty is important, and I think 

the HOPE VI program and the Promise Neighborhood, Promise 

Zones programs have shown that with people coming together and 

connecting the dots, we can make a huge difference. 

I am sure that in all of your different localities, you have seen 

that with a small investment and working in public/private partnerships and leveraging private resources and creating environments where the foundation community, the families themselves 

and the larger community come together, we can create additional 

communities of opportunity. 

We have also learned that the Section 8 voucher, if it is implemented appropriately, can provide access to communities of opportunity. And that is because the families who are using these resources want better lives for themselves and their children. I know 

that with 100 percent certainty. 

The other thing is we need to incent innovation. And I think we 

have seen that the Moving to Work (MTW) deregulation program 

has been very effective in incenting innovation and creativity and 

leverage. And so, I would simply say, let us continue to invest in 

our families and in our country, and working together, there is 

nothing that we can’t do. 

I appreciate the time and thank you for the opportunity. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Glover can be found on page 70 

of the appendix.] 

Chairman HENSARLING. Mr. Husock, you are now recognized for 

your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF HOWARD HUSOCK, VICE PRESIDENT, 

RESEARCH AND PUBLICATIONS, THE MANHATTAN INSTITUTE 

Mr. HUSOCK. Thank you, Chairman Hensarling and Ranking 

Member Waters, for the invitation. 

As we reflect on the 50th anniversary of the founding of HUD, 

the chairman is quite correct that President Johnson focused his 

hopes on uplifting the poor. That should mean helping as many of 

those of low income as practical, ensuring that low-income housing 

is in good condition, and helping the poor move up toward the middle class. 

On these counts, HUD’s housing assistance today is falling short. 

There is little doubt, of course, that HUD does serve the poor, often 

the very poor. Half of households living in one or more of the onemillion-plus public housing apartments or two-million-plus housing 

choice voucher units earn less than $10,000 a year. Many are not, 

however, moving up the economic ladder. 

HUD data shows that the median tenure in public and subsidized housing is more than 9 years, 4 years longer than the time 

limit for cash public assistance. In New York City, that figure is 

17 years. 

Put it this way: The face of HUD is the face of long-term poverty 

in the United States. In part, that is a result of the way that we 

have structured the rules of the system. And I hope to offer some 

9 

suggestions that will have some bipartisan appeal to improve that 

situation. 

First, a little bit more background. Both public housing and 

voucher tenants who work hard to increase their income face what 

amount to high marginal tax rates. Unlike private market tenants 

who sign a lease at a fixed rent, tenants in HUD’s affordable housing must pay rent equal to 30 percent of their income. That means 

the more they earn, the higher their rent. 

Just as bad, our subsidized housing system often consigns the 

poor to live in the sort of conditions that public housing was specifically designed to replace. In New York City, for instance, a 2014 

report by the City’s Community Service Society noted mounting 

resident outcry about elevator breakdowns, water leaks, and untreated mold, and said that the housing authority should qualify as 

the City’s largest and worst landlord. A 2010 report by Abt Associates found that the public housing system’s capital needs as a 

whole topped $21 billion. 

It is fortunate then that there are important green chutes of reform among local housing authorities, chutes which the Congress 

and HUD should strongly encourage. 

As Renee Glover mentioned, Moving to Work, a waiver program 

that has been, to date, limited to just a few localities, allows the 

flexibility authorities need. 

A 2014 report by Abt Associates found that 20 of 34 Moving to 

Work authorities changed their rent rules to encourage self-sufficiency. Eleven have adopted work requirements, and eight have 

adopted time limits for some new tenants, all with the goal of encouraging upward mobility. 

In San Bernardino, California, the housing authority, in explaining why it has asked for short-term assistance, emphasizes twin 

goals: making room for families who qualify for aid and have faced 

long waiting lists; and helping current tenants outgrow the need 

for help. Self-sufficiency should be the goal, it says. 

Incomes among those admitted to the authority under time limits 

have risen by more than 12 percent, employment by more than 17 

percent. I know that in Atlanta, work participation went from 

under 20 percent to over 60 percent. 

Spreading a Moving to Work approach through all or at least 

many of the 3,000-plus public housing authorities would help align 

our housing policy with our overall social policy. 

There are other imaginative innovations going on. In New York, 

Mayor Bill DeBlasio has announced plans to begin to lease 

underused public housing open land for new private apartment 

construction with ground lease payments available to fund the system’s desperate maintenance backlog. 

The fledgling HUD Rental Assistance Demonstration program 

can be a means through which authorities avoid being penalized 

when they save money. That happens when they reduce operating 

costs and find their subsidy is reduced the next year. 

A guaranteed fixed-per-unit HUD annual payment can be used 

as a bond payment guarantee that can bring in private investment 

capital to do such things as upgrade antiquated heating systems 

that hemorrhage money. 

10 

At its 50th anniversary, it is time for HUD to think about how 

it can become not just a funder of housing, but an agency that can 

enable and encourage some of the reforms that I have discussed. 

At the same time, it must never forsake its fair housing mission 

to ensure that any household that can afford a home or a rental 

unit not be turned away on the basis of race or ethnicity. 

It should also begin to encourage experimentation with new 

housing forums. One of the core ways to make housing affordable 

is to have more units in the same amount of land: density. And 

HUD can encourage experimentation. 

In short, the time is right for HUD to encourage upward mobility 

and to foster it and to adjust its rules so that it does so. 

Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Husock can be found on page 81 

of the appendix.] 

Chairman HENSARLING. And Dr. Briggs, you are now recognized 

for your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF XAVIER BRIGGS, VICE PRESIDENT, ECONOMIC 

OPPORTUNITY, THE FORD FOUNDATION 

Mr. BRIGGS. Thank you, Chairman Hensarling, Ranking Member 

Waters, and members of the committee. 

In light of HUD’s 50th anniversary, I would like to begin by putting policy goals briefly into some historical perspective. 

The earliest goal of Federal housing policy was to help meet the 

needs of factory workers and their families when America entered 

the First World War. When public housing came along, there were 

additional goals. The official ones emphasized upgrading slums and 

providing stable, low rents to workers who had been affected by the 

Great Depression. But the large-scale construction that the public 

housing program required also served the interests of the building 

industry and organized labor. 

The same mix of public and private purposes was true for FHA 

mortgage insurance, which has benefited millions of families as 

well as the real estate industry. 

When HUD was created, it inherited this mix of public and private purposes, but the economic and social contexts for Federal 

housing policy has begun to shift in very significant ways. First, 

after several decades of economic growth and broadly shared prosperity in America, cities in many parts of the country were hit with 

large-scale disinvestment and joblessness. 

And second, migration patterns had transformed the racial and 

economic makeup of cities profoundly. In this context, and particularly after widespread civil unrest, media accounts and major 

works of scholarly research began to ask whether well-intended 

housing policies were solving problems or making them worse. 

Lesson one is that these sweeping changes in America meant 

that HUD and its congressional overseers began to grapple with 

fundamental questions about the proper goals of Federal housing 

policy and, by many measures, began to swim against the tide of 

larger economic and social trends virtually from day one. 

Lesson two is that we have been set back at a great human and 

fiscal cost by our inability to agree enough on the goals of Federal 

policy, let alone the most effective means of achieving those goals. 

11 

Without agreement, we lack adequate commitment. And without 

that commitment, we struggle to make more progress. 

Fast forward 50 years from the founding of HUD and this lack 

of agreement on fundamental goals manifests in several powerful 

ways. First, Federal housing assistance produces enormous benefits, as you have heard. But we are not focusing enough resources 

or reform on the biggest problem: the structural gap between income and housing costs at the base of the American economy, especially for the lowest-income households. 

The biggest drivers of this gap by far are local housing costs and 

tenant incomes, not HUD’s operating capacity or practices. As 

wages stagnated after the 1970s, especially for those earning below 

the median, and as an older stock of affordable units was demolished or converted and land prices climbed significantly in many 

local markets, millions of the lowest-income households in America 

came to face back-breaking rents, homelessness, or endless commutes to find affordable housing. 

Those two driving factors—along with a policy decision in recent 

years to add new vouchers to combat homelessness, especially 

among veterans—explain why the total costs of the voucher program, to cite one example, have grown. It is very much a function 

of our strategy since the 1970s to rely primarily on the private 

rental market to meet the housing needs of those who cannot afford decent housing. 

It is also increasingly clear that the costs of this quiet crisis of 

unaffordable housing show up in children’s health, emotional development, and educational achievement, as well as adults’ health, 

mental health, and employment. So we pay severely, both through 

government spending on health, criminal justice, and other sectors, 

and also through lost productivity and well-being. 

Second, several of the most important levers for affecting the 

structural affordability gap lie outside HUD’s budget and authority. The Tax Code is the most obvious example. It helps to modestly 

expand the supply of affordable rental housing, most directly 

through the low-income housing tax credit, but it also structures 

the rewards of work, for example through the earned income tax 

credit, and it targets most Federal housing aid, through the mortgage interest tax reduction, to the middle class and the affluent 

rather than the very low-income households who face the most 

unaffordable costs. 

Third, housing assistance has not been designed or funded to act 

as a cure-all for poverty. In other words, housing affordability is a 

necessary, but not a sufficient, condition to produce economic mobility and self-reliance. 

Fourth and finally, we will exacerbate the challenges we face if 

we seek to expand housing assistance only within the limited geography that contains most affordable housing now. That is, we will 

deepen the problems associated with geographically concentrated 

poverty if we don’t take deliberate steps toward greater inclusion. 

In closing, it is vital to make housing policy a force for self-reliance and economic mobility. To accomplish this, four things need 

to happen. First, we need to go beyond the HUD budget for leverage. Second, for HUD and other agencies, it is vital to make our 

housing delivery system as efficient and well-targeted as possible. 

12 

Third, it is crucial that we support effective pro-work housing policy for households that are not elderly or disabled. Fourth and finally, we should make inclusionary housing a full and integral part 

of the larger agenda of Federal housing policy to help States and 

localities encourage more balanced development and mitigate 

harmful segregation. 

Thank you again for the opportunity to testify. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Briggs can be found on page 55 

of the appendix.] 

Chairman HENSARLING. The Chair now recognizes himself for 5 

minutes. 

Ms. Glover, on page seven of your testimony with respect to 

work, you mention for non-elderly, able-bodied adults, it ‘‘restores 

dignity and has proven to be a positive game changer for families 

and their children.’’ 

Specifically, you mention in your testimony the Moving to Work 

demonstration project and you say that it ‘‘has had transformational impacts and proven very effective.’’ 

Would you elaborate on your views, please? 

Ms. GLOVER. Yes, thank you. When we adopted the work requirement for non-elderly, able-bodied families, we did this in consultation with the residents who were affected by those policy changes. 

And what we consistently heard is that the requirement was the 

additional boost coupled with an investment when we had the deregulation agreement and we also were operating under the HOPE 

IV grant. 

We were able to invest in long-term counseling and coaching to 

help families rebuild their resiliency, change their mindsets, and 

deal with the actual family problems that they were confronting. 

And in terms of families’ self-worth, we heard consistently from 

each of the families that work restored dignity and respect, and it 

also gave them the ability to have more mobility and more control 

over their lives. 

And so when I talk about game-changing impacts, this really was 

transformational for the families. And all of the research that has 

been done shows that not only do the families start out working, 

but if they lost their jobs, they have been able to go back into the 

workforce and find new jobs and they have resiliency. 

And so the work success has been greater than 90 percent with 

the appropriate support and the right policies. 

In terms of Moving to Work being transformational, it allowed 

agencies in their local communities and certainly in Atlanta working with the local players to design programs that work. All real 

estate is local and it is very hard for anyone in a central location 

to devise the solutions for very different geographies. 

Chairman HENSARLING. I think I heard all of the witnesses 

speak laudably of work programs, but specifically with respect to 

the Moving to Work program. Just a show of hands, would each of 

you advocate expanding that current HUD program? Just a show 

of hands. 

Thank you. 

Mr. Husock, you actually had some data with respect to at least 

one of the Moving to Work programs, in San Bernardino, where inVerDate Nov 24 2008 17:16 Nov 03, 2016 Jkt 099755 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\99755.TXT TERI
13 

comes rose 12 percent and employment rose by 17 percent. Have 

you looked at other Moving to Work programs? Is the data similar? 

Mr. HUSOCK. I have not, but the Abt Associates report that I cite 

refers to a number of other programs with similar results. And as 

Renee Glover knows well, in Atlanta the work participation rate 

was about 18 percent when the work requirement began and rose 

to over 60 percent. 

I believe that is correct, Renee? 

Ms. GLOVER. That is correct. 

Chairman HENSARLING. Also, again, I will note that all four witnesses raised their hand to the Moving to Work question of expansion. 

You mention, Mr. Husock, in your testimony about the, and I 

don’t know your exact phrase, but essentially punitive marginal 

rates for those who expand their employment opportunities. So 

what public policy might that suggest? 

Mr. HUSOCK. I think within the Moving to Work framework, and 

remember there is nothing mandatory in Moving to Work, I think 

that is the most important thing to understand, it gives flexibility 

to local housing authorities based on their understanding of local 

conditions. 

But in terms of that specific question, right now if I am leasing 

a unit in a public housing authority, my rent goes up as my income 

goes up. That is a counterproductive approach. 

And so I think the right way to do that, to repair that, is either 

to allow under Moving to Work authorities to set fixed rents; you 

sign a lease just like you do in the private market. Or to have— 

I know in some authorities, they have set so-called income bands, 

that is, within a certain framework your rent will not go up until 

you earn a good deal more. That would be second best. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the Chair has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the ranking member for 5 minutes. 

Ms. WATERS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

First of all, let me make sure that the record reflects that those 

of us on this side of the aisle, as I am sure on that side of the aisle, 

all believe in work. We believe that it is important for people to 

have jobs. We also agree that it gives a sense of dignity and pride 

to work. 

Many of us started working when we were 12 and 13 years old. 

I, for example, started working at age 13 in a segregated restaurant; I cleaned tables where I couldn’t eat. So let us be clear 

about the value of work and what we think about it. Because we 

do not want people to leave with the impression that somehow 

there is a difference in what we think about work. We think that 

is very important. 

Secondly, we need to get some facts on the record. How many of 

you believe that HUD is important, it has done credible work in 

providing housing opportunities, even though you may disagree 

about how to do it better? How many agree that it has in 50 years 

been important? Okay, so let us all agree on that. 

How many agree that even with new technology and some of the 

reset of the recommendations that you may have about not increasing the rent, that if we are to deal with the unhoused population 

in this country, we are going to have to spend credible resources 

14 

in order to do it? How many people would agree with that? Okay. 

Thank you very much. 

Now, let us move to the discussion about Moving to Work. Who 

can tell me what percentage of public housing tenants are physically disabled, mentally disabled, and incapable of being put on 

jobs? What percentage of public housing tenants in America fall 

into the senior, too old to go to work, too disabled to go to work, 

too mentally incapacitated to go to work? Who knows that information? 

Mr. Briggs? 

Mr. BRIGGS. Thank you, Ranking Member Waters. The answer is 

a majority of housing-assisted households, particularly those on 

vouchers and public housing, face those barriers to work. They are 

either elderly or they are disabled. I have spent a good deal of time 

with these households and also the work ready and the working, 

many of them working poor, but working hard, and as you said, everyone believes in the pride and the dignity that comes with work. 

They are struggling to make ends meet, they are juggling an awful 

lot. 

But it is extremely important, whether you are looking at Moving 

to Work, whether you are looking at Moving to Opportunity or 

other important efforts that HUD has launched over the years, not 

to be confused about what is attainable for a given population. 

Ms. WATERS. Okay. I hate to cut you off, but I only have so much 

time. So one thing that we must agree on is that there are tenants 

in public housing, no matter what you do with Move to Work or 

anything else, who can’t live anyplace else but in subsidized housing, such as public housing, when we talk about seniors who are 

too old to work, when we talk about the disabled, when we talk 

about the mentally incompetent. 

When we went to this program, this homeless program today, 

most of the women were 60 to 75 years old. And they are not going 

to get hired by anybody, particularly in this market that we have 

where people who are graduating from college can’t find jobs. Nobody is going to hire them. How many people really understand 

that, that you have people who fall in this age range who are not 

going to get any jobs? 

How many people understand that this population that we are 

talking about is something that we have to recognize is a population that we are going to have to deal with and subsidize whether 

we like it or not? 

Now, having said that, how many of you have the statistics on 

Move to Work programs that can tell me exactly how many people 

who have gotten job training and have moved on to a job? Where 

is the data? Where are the stats? Who has that information in this 

country? 

Yes, ma’am, Ms. Glover? 

Ms. GLOVER. There have been a number of studies done by 

economists and universities. And I will commit to this committee 

to reach out to the various networks. I think one of the problems 

is that the research has been done, but it is all over the country 

in different databases or whatever. 

And I think it would be magnificent if this committee could have 

that information through a central funnel. Because I think that you 

15 

will see that the policies that have allowed for innovation at the 

local level has yielded tremendously positive results and— 

Ms. WATERS. But the point is, we don’t have the data, we don’t 

have the information. Nobody knows. People talk about how great 

Moving to Work is, but nobody can tell me exactly what has been 

accomplished. We don’t have the information. 

I yield back. 

Ms. GLOVER. I will get it to the committee. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentlelady has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. 

Luetkemeyer, chairman of our Housing and Insurance Subcommittee. 

Mr. LUETKEMEYER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I welcome the individuals testifying today. 

Mr. Cabrera, you had some interesting comments a while ago 

with regards to trying to have a different model for HUD to be able 

to deliver services and provide and support housing in this country. 

One of the problems that Secretary Castro talks about, and you 

mentioned as well, is use of technology. They need more funds to 

be able to do that, to do the simplest things such as certifying some 

of the individuals to be able to do certain things and different 

groups to be able to do certain things. 

So, that is certainly an area that we need to consider, and I appreciate you pointing it out. 

You also talk about how they need to be thinking outside the box 

and redo their model. Can you elaborate a little bit more on that 

and give us some ideas and what kind of costs you are talking 

about? 

And is this something that HUD can restructure themselves or 

do we legislatively have to make the changes? 

Mr. CABRERA. Absolutely, I would like to pick up where we just 

left off on MTW as an example. 

Mr. LUETKEMEYER. Sure. 

Mr. CABRERA. I think the stress over MTW has to do with, I hate 

to say this sometimes, but has to do in part with its name and in 

part with when it was passed. MTW, from the perspective I had, 

really had to do with maximum local flexibility. And in terms of innovation, I think that is always a good thing, particularly with 

high-performing housing authorities. Housing authorities are 

State-chartered entities, not just local entities. They are created by 

States. 

They are created for the purpose of being property managers, for 

the most part. That is what they have been since their inception. 

Almost until very, very recently, the last decade, those housing authorities that are more forward-looking, that have been more transformational, they tend to be MTWs and the reason that they tend 

to be MTWs is because they align their local concerns first as opposed to Federal concerns. That is why MTW has value. 

I am sure that if you were to ask the—I think we are up to 36 

or 39—MTW jurisdictions, their statistics on who it is that has 

been moved to work, they would tell you, but they would also tell 

you, in their own plans, people who should not be working are not 

being compelled to do anything. Folks who are elderly or disabled 

16 

aren’t being compelled because that is generally the case in most 

low-income housing plans in most jurisdictions. 

What this is really about has as much to do with how it is housing authorities operate, have them be bigger market participants 

than they currently are, as anything else. Housing authorities traditionally were not that. Housing authorities were essentially these 

trapped, real estate, property management concerns that had a 

very restrictive environment. When you un-trap it, they do some 

pretty remarkable things. 

The other thing I would add is I think one of the things that people might be missing has to do with competition. There has to be 

a more competitive environment in order to improve results and 

outcomes and make it a more efficient process. So much of what 

we are facing right now in terms of the debate over, because I 

think Xavier got it right, the debate is holding up progress. 

But there are some places nobody debates, there are some things 

nobody debates. 

One of those things is that we have to do this better. And doing 

things better necessarily means better and more competitive settings. So those are just two quick examples. I am trying to make 

sure you can ask whatever you want of somebody else. 

Mr. LUETKEMEYER. Yes, thank you. That’s interesting. 

Last week, I had the opportunity to talk to some housing folks 

in Great Britain. They have a unique system there, where 17 percent of the people are on public housing. And because they can no 

longer afford to support that level of people on public housing, they 

are trying to find a way to move some of them off of the public 

housing rolls into their own home, and figure out a way if they can 

come up—and this obviously doesn’t work with the elderly or disabled, but it does work for the folks who are gainfully employed or 

can be gainfully employed. 

And so they get into the public/private partnerships and some of 

the rent money, the subsidy goes toward the purchase of, the lease 

purchase of the property. What do you think about something like 

that? Is it feasible here in this country? It doesn’t solve all the 

problems, but I think there is a group of people that this may help. 

What do you think? 

Mr. CABRERA. The British conversion of public housing to a public/private model depends upon essentially creating inclusionary 

areas that are thereafter sold and taxed in order to fund what we 

here call down payment assistance. I think from a market perspective, a lot of market participants would struggle with that. 

The second thing I would say that would need to be worked out 

is financing of something like that. It would be a very difficult 

thing to finance. 

The British system has worked marvelously for Britain because 

they work under a different real estate regimen than the United 

States. We are both common law, we are both heavily statutory, 

but the way that property is owned in Britain is very different than 

the way it is owned in the United States, in many cases. 

It is a very difficult question to answer. But certainly, you see 

little pieces of that, right, in some parts of the United States. In 

California, there are inclusionary— 

Mr. LUETKEMEYER. I see we are out of time. 

17 

I appreciate your response, and I look forward to the discussion. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentlelady from New York, Mrs. 

Maloney, ranking member of our Capital Markets Subcommittee. 

Mrs. MALONEY. I thank the gentleman for yielding and for calling this hearing. 

And I thank all of the panelists for your work in this important 

area. And congratulations to HUD at 50. They have played an incredible role in the great City that I am privileged to represent, 

New York, and I would say the whole country in building and 

maintaining affordable housing. 

But I am distressed about the future because there is no funding, 

there is really no Federal program and housing is so expensive it 

is hard for a city or a State to go forward with their own plans. 

Specifically in public housing in New York, there are over 900,000 

people on a waiting list to get into public housing. There is no 

money for new housing. The money for maintenance is being cut 

back dramatically. 

One of you testified that the public housing authority was the 

worst landlord in the country, but that is because they don’t have 

the money to maintain the housing. 

I think it was Mr. Husock who mentioned the program that 

Mayor DeBlasio has come forward to take vacant land or land 

within the housing project—the tenants there say they need that 

land for playgrounds and for fresh air—and lease it. And the proposal is that half of the money would go to market rate to maintain 

the modernization and the running of the housing authority because they are running at a deficit, and the other half would be ‘‘affordable.’’ 

But the tenants in the public housing in my district tell me that 

it is not affordable to them. It is really a higher income than they 

could ever afford to be in. 

So I don’t see the future. And even that is not a sustainable program. Once all the land is leased, you don’t have the money to 

maintain the affordable housing that is right there in public housing, which has been a huge success in New York in assisting lowincome households. 

The only Federal program that is out there now is the Housing 

Trust Fund, and even that is a limited one. And the first funding 

awards will be focused on creating affordable housing. But what we 

are confronting in New York and probably in the rest of the country, and I am going to address my question to Mr. Briggs, is that 

we can’t even afford or the money is not there to maintain the 

housing that is already there so that you do have the broken elevators and everything else. 

And so, where are we going? 

Now, the tenants are afraid that if they take their playground 

land and put it into affordable housing that they can’t afford to live 

in, then the next step would be what happened in Chicago. You 

tear down the public housing to build or you start renting the vacant units to market rate. And where is your very important housing goal of the Fair Housing Act which is responsible for enforcing 

and Congress in creating and has been a positive thing? 

18 

So I am really concerned about this. And I think the Ford Foundation, I am going to publicly ask you to do a study and a report 

on where do we go. It is not maintainable, it is not feasible. And 

the tenants are very afraid. They don’t want them to take their 

open land, but then they think their apartments are next. It is on 

the water, and it is beautiful housing. They think their apartments 

will be next, and they will say, well, we will rent your apartment 

out at market rate to sustain the system. 

And right now all of the money coming for maintenance in public 

housing is Federal money now, it is all Federal money, very little 

from the city and States. Their budgets are starved. So we face a 

real crisis for affordable housing. 

One of the most popular programs in Congress has always been 

the 202 affordable housing program for seniors. There is now no 

new money for new starts. All of the money in that program is now 

just going to maintenance. So all of the Federal housing programs 

are not creating new housing, they are going to maintaining the 

system that exists, but not doing it at an appropriate level because 

there is not enough money to pay for the repairs that need to take 

place to modernize it. 

So it is a crisis. I would like to congratulate HUD on 50 years 

of not only providing affordable housing, but really economic development, I would say, in this great country, across this country. But 

I am concerned about the future because there is no funding on a 

Federal level. 

I know that the chairlady would support additional funds and I 

believe many Democrats, but given the reality of the makeup of 

Congress it is not going to be there. So it is a crisis. And I am asking really for the Ford Foundation and other foundations to look 

into what do we do as a Nation for affordable housing when all of 

the existing programs are not being funded to go forward? 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentlelady has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. 

Garrett, chairman of our Capital Markets Subcommittee. 

Mr. GARRETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for scheduling this very 

important hearing. 

One of the goals of this hearing is to examine the extent to which 

HUD has improved access to affordable housing while reducing 

poverty, and potential housing innovations designed to encourage 

self-sufficiency. 

So I am going to begin, Mr. Chairman, maybe with this comment 

that may surprise you, that I am going to agree with our ranking 

member on a couple of points. The ranking member made a comment as to how hard it is for even college graduates to get a job. 

And she is absolutely right. After 7 years under the Obama Administration and their economic policies, it is still hard for a young person to go through 4 or 6 or 8 years of college and come out and 

get a job. And still today, she is absolutely right, and it is deplorable that young people cannot find work in this environment. 

And it is therefore hard for seniors to get a job as well. And I 

would look forward to working with the ranking member to try to 

reverse a number of these economic policies that have had a devastating impact on both seniors and college graduates. 

19 

The second point that I agree with the ranking member on is the 

dearth of data on this matter. Now, that is a little bit confusing because someone pointed out that in a press release of the ranking 

member, she says that numerous studies have highlighted that 

Moving to Work demonstration programs have shortcomings. So I 

am not exactly sure whether she agrees that there is a dearth of 

data or there is data. 

But let us take it from what the panelists have said. Ms. Glover 

has said there is no coordination of the data that is out there. 

Is that your basic— 

Ms. GLOVER. Yes, the data is there, it is really funneling it into 

policies. 

Mr. GARRETT. Right. And I really do appreciate the fact that you 

are willing to go out and try to bring all that data together so that 

at the next hearing on this, both the ranking member and I would 

have a compilation on that. 

But shouldn’t the agency that is responsible for doing this have 

already collected the data? Hasn’t the Moving to Work program— 

Mr. Husock, you are nodding your head. How long has this program been put in place, the Moving to Work? 

Mr. HUSOCK. Since 1998. 

Mr. GARRETT. Since 1998, so it has been in place that long, but 

we are still sitting here without a compilation of all the data. Why 

is that? 

Mr. HUSOCK. Congressman, it is because, as a general rule, what 

MTW means is that you are exempt from the Housing Act of 1937. 

And so therefore, by virtue of that, what HUD has said is, you are 

released from all of these things that you are responsible to us for, 

including reporting data. 

Mr. GARRETT. But there are studies out there, right? 

Mr. HUSOCK. Yes, but the studies are, how might I put this, they 

are somewhat—they bend one way or the other, how about that? 

Mr. GARRETT. Should the public be concerned that we have a 

Federal agency that is allowing money to be spent and has absolutely no data to support whether those programs are working or 

not? If there are studies out there that are bent one way or bent 

another way, shouldn’t the public be concerned that their government really isn’t spending the money the most effective way? 

I think they are, because that goes to another point of the ranking member that I agree with as well. She says the majority—or 

actually, Mr. Briggs, you answered this question for her. Her question was, what is the percentage of people in public housing who 

are disabled, who are senior citizens, who can’t work, and you said 

the majority of the people. And I think the rest of the panel agreed. 

But if we are a country of finite resources, you all agree there 

is not unlimited dollars to pay for all these programs, right? If we 

are a country of finite resources, don’t we really want to make sure 

that those limited resources actually get to the people who need it 

the most: the disabled, the senior citizen, the person who can’t 

work because of this disastrous economy that we are in right now 

because of this Administration? So shouldn’t the limited dollars actually go to those people most in need? 

Ms. Glover, you seem to be ready. 

Ms. GLOVER. Yes, well, I wanted to— 

20 

Mr. GARRETT. Yes? 

Ms. GLOVER. —refine the answer. 

Mr. GARRETT. Okay. 

Ms. GLOVER. The data, in terms of the traditional measures, 

whatever the conditions are that are set forth in the Moving to 

Work agreements, has been gathered by the Department. Over and 

above that, because of the transformational impact, agencies have 

gone out to professionals, either economists or colleges and universities and those who look at the work, to independently validate 

and verify the— 

Mr. GARRETT. I get that, and what the validation would show, 

studies or anything else aside, is that the actual agencies that are 

running these programs and even more every day are actually asking to be put into that program. 

Isn’t that correct, Mr. Husock, that more people want to be into 

these programs? 

Ms. GLOVER. Oh, absolutely. And so the reason that HUD may 

not have the research and studies is that is over and above the requirements. But the required data that is needed to validate is indeed— 

Mr. GARRETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think that is really 

all the data we need, is that more people want to be in these programs than before. 

Thank you. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentlelady from New York, Ms. 

Velazquez. 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And to all the panelists, welcome to la-la land. We suffer here 

in Washington from amnesia. For people to say that things are so 

bad under this Administration, they are quick to forget that at the 

height of the economic crisis, we were losing roughly 800,000 jobs 

a month. Obama wasn’t in the White House back then. 

The other day in my committee, the Small Business Committee, 

they talked about the highest numbers of regulations issued by any 

Administration, this one. Well, I put out a report on analysis conducted by The Washington which that concluded that the highest 

numbers of regulations put out by any Administration was under 

George W. Bush. 

Oh, my Lord. 

Anyway, so let us talk about housing. 

Mr. Cabrera, many housing authorities, including NYCHA, New 

York City housing plan to use an expanded RAD program to finance public housing repairs. However, we still do not know the 

impact of RAD on residents. And HUD has not indicated whether 

they will pursue an optional final RAD evaluation that will include 

a resident survey. 

Do you think it is necessary to fully understand the impact RAD 

has on tenants before rushing to expand the program? 

Mr. CABRERA. I don’t think that the purpose of RAD—I think the 

purpose of RAD is focused upon the properties more than anything 

else. And the reason for that is because, in the case of New York 

for example, there are— 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. But who lives in those properties? 

21 

Mr. CABRERA. Residents. 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. And the program is to serve who? The tenants, 

residents, right? 

Mr. CABRERA. Residents, but— 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. So you don’t think that it is important for us to 

know or to have any input from those who are going to be subjected to this program? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think it is more important to take—let us see, 

there are 153,000 units online for NYCHA right now out of 

190,000. And trying to figure out how to put the remaining 37,000 

or 40,000 units back online to serve those residents, it seems to me, 

would be the higher priority. That is what NYCHA is trying to do. 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. But that has to be coupled—those are not RAD 

units, sir. 

Mr. CABRERA. No, no, that is not it. Public housing units, 

190,000. They have approximately 153,000 units online, if I recall 

correctly. Just my recollection. 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Yes. 

Mr. CABRERA. It is 10 years old now, but it is rough. 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Have there been any studies conducted to show 

RAD or MTW will generate the billions needed from the private 

sector? In New York, we have a $17 billion backlog of needed repairs and improvements. Has there been any study? 

Mr. CABRERA. RAD was just enacted out of appropriations in late 

2012. There would be no study because they are really just now 

starting. RAD is just now going, they just increased it to 185,000 

units, and for some of those units, it makes sense to refinance and 

convert, and for others, it doesn’t. There would be no study. 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. So before we embark on that journey of expanding RAD, shouldn’t we know what it will accomplish, in terms of 

the numbers and the resources that it will bring from the private 

sector, before we expand it? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think at the end of the day, we already know 

when the private sector will get in to finance or not, and they will 

get in to finance when underwriting the deal makes sense. In the 

case of New York, some of those deals are not going to make sense, 

which is why New York is going through the exercise that it is 

going through. 

But in other parts of the country, it is indispensable to go 

through RAD, because they can’t otherwise keep the units. 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. I am not saying not to expand or not go into it. 

What I want to make sure is that the public assets are not 

privatized. Because once they are privatized, we are going to lose 

them. 

Mr. Briggs, the Housing Trust Fund, which should see its first 

funding award next year, is the only Federal program focused on 

creating affordable housing for extremely low-income households. 

Why is this an important piece of Federal housing policy today? 

Mr. BRIGGS. It is extremely important, ma’am, for two reasons. 

One, the source of revenue, mainly Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. 

In other words, it looks beyond the appropriations envelope which 

has been insufficient for years and years now to meet these needs. 

22 

And number two, because of the targeting you mentioned. Without Federal capital, as Mr. Cabrera said, to make these financings 

work, they do not pencil out, they will not happen. 

Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Thank you. 

I yield back. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentlelady has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Neugebauer, chairman of our Financial Institutions Subcommittee. 

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to go back to Mr. Cabrera for just a minute and talk 

about these data and the metrics. We have been talking about 

Moving to Work and there is not data in one place. And Ms. Glover 

makes a great point there. 

But if you are an agency and you are going to do pilot programs, 

doesn’t it make sense for you to measure the success of those programs? 

Mr. CABRERA. As a pilot program for services, absolutely, yes. 

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Does anybody disagree that if you are an 

agency or a company or anybody that is doing a pilot program, that 

you should measure the success of that program so that you can 

determine whether—because the word ‘‘pilot,’’ to me, means, let us 

try this on a limited basis and see if it works on a larger basis. 

Mr. Briggs, would you agree or disagree with that? 

Mr. BRIGGS. I would strongly agree with that, sir. However, as 

a long-time evaluator and a funder of evaluation— 

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. I’m sorry, I don’t have time for a lot of elaboration. But I think I— 

Mr. BRIGGS. No, sir, but I wanted to explain myself. 

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. The point I wanted to be on the record here 

is that we need—if we are going to have HUD expand its mission, 

I am a little perplexed by some of my colleagues who don’t want 

to do these programs because of the limited resources. 

The whole purpose of doing these programs, RAD, whether it is 

Moving to Work, I think Mr. Husock mentioned looking at ground 

leases and thinking outside the box, is that we are trying to expand 

the resources coming into housing for American families. But you 

can’t do that if you don’t think outside the box. 

But if you are going to think outside the box, it does make sense 

to me, and maybe it is just the old accountant in me, that if we 

are going to try these things we need to be able to measure their 

success. 

Ms. Glover, one of the things that I think you said on page 10 

of your written testimony is that after a period of transition of larger agencies to Moving to Work and the deregulations of smaller 

agencies is accomplished, the public housing side of HUD should 

reposition itself to become an asset manager and work with its various customers to agree on a set, desired outcome based on congressional mandates. 

What do you mean that HUD should become an asset manager? 

Ms. GLOVER. What I mean is looking at the impact that the investments that are being made by HUD is having on the families, 

the communities, and the cities. And so that is the skill set. And 

one of the things that Mr. Cabrera talked about are the systems 

in order to do that. 

23 

And so when you gather the data, if you can imagine with over 

3,000 housing authorities, there is a lot of data coming in consistently. And so taking the time to streamline the systems, agree on 

outcomes. 

I think one of the problems is that too many of the regulations 

are so prescriptive that you are measuring too many things. So if 

you can simplify it to identify the 5 or 10 things that you want to 

achieve through a program, and then bring that data in, then all 

of this discussion about impact, data, and all of that will be at the 

fingertips and you can push a button and be able to roll up all of 

that data. So a good asset manager will be able to have that data 

readily available to inform the policymakers. 

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Go back to the Moving to Work. One of the 

things that we hear from folks is bringing more capital to the table. 

In your experience with Moving to Work, were you able to attract 

private sector capital with some aspects of that program? 

Ms. GLOVER. Absolutely. And I want to just take 2 minutes on 

the RAD demonstration. The way the additional capital comes in 

for underwriting purposes is that you took the operating subsidy 

and the capital funds, which basically made an underwritable rent 

that could then be used to go to the private market because the private investors are going to want to know if debt is raised that there 

is sufficient rent to cover not only the operating costs, but the debt 

cost. 

And by doing public/private partnerships you are able to attract 

other resources because the foundations will typically play their 

other resources. And so these are complicated deals, but through 

leverage and looking at things in creative ways, it can attract additional resources to the programs. 

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Thank you, ma’am. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. 

Cleaver, ranking member of our Housing and Insurance Subcommittee. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I was interested in the conversation for a lot of reasons. One, 

when the question came about when the program started, I turned 

to Mr. Green immediately and said it was approved in 1996. I 

know because I was mayor and ran the HUD housing authority. Or 

more accurately, I appointed the board that ran the housing authority. 

The program was actually implemented in 1998. The problem, 

and I think we are debating issues that are not the problem, from 

my perspective, is that this program is more of a deregulatory program than it is a Moving to Work program. 

I think HUD made a mistake frankly in trying to bill it as something else. Deregulation of requirements in the voucher program is 

what made, in some quarters, the Moving to Work program attractive. And I think the Moving to Work program, which started as 

a demonstration project, can be massaged and developed into a program that is workable. 

And keep in mind, I think it is important to understand this, 

that the Moving to Work dollars actually takes money out of the 

24 

voucher program and sends it elsewhere. And so it creates some 

problems. 

One of the assumptions is that private investment or investors 

are waiting to become part of this program. I would like for any 

of you to address the issue of private investment and how they are 

standing in line to invest in the program. 

Mr. Cabrera? 

Mr. CABRERA. Congressman, it is good to see you, as always. 

Moving to Work does not take Section 8 dollars and move them 

somewhere else. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Voucher? Yes, yes. 

Mr. CABRERA. Moving to Work removes the division between Section 8 of the Housing Act of 1937 and Section 9 of the Housing Act 

of 1937 to allow fungibility, if that is what you mean by taking 

money. 

Mr. CLEAVER. That is exactly what I mean. 

Mr. CABRERA. That is a very different issue. It just becomes one 

big pool, not two or actually three divided pools. So that is the one. 

It is not so much a correction, it is that it is not a pool, it is a pooling. And that pooling allows for, it actually is part of my answer, 

that pooling allows for the leveraging of capital in order to undertake many of the developments that MTW jurisdictions undertake. 

And a person who did that marvelously is sitting to my left. So 

I am going to let her answer. 

Mr. CLEAVER. But before—I would like anybody to answer, even 

people sitting out there or walking the halls. What I am interested 

in is somebody telling me about the private sector waiting to become involved. 

Mr. CABRERA. Oh, I’m sorry, I misunderstood your question. So 

what happens is, remember that when you have land that is public 

housing it is subject to a deed of trust unless it is converted out. 

And so therefore the public housing authority generally goes out 

and looks for private sector developers. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Right. 

Mr. CABRERA. They do public/private partnerships. And yes, most 

MTWs, candidly beyond MTWs, these days a lot of housing authorities, MTW and not, are becoming not just property managers, 

which is what they traditionally were, but developers. They go out, 

and they partner with a developer, they develop units, using typically, as Howard said, the low-income housing tax credit or the private activity bond operation. And they develop it, absolutely that 

is moving in that direction inexorably. 

Mr. CLEAVER. You do understand that the low-income tax credits 

are becoming increasingly difficult to obtain? 

Mr. CABRERA. Oh, Congressman, I ran a housing finance agency. 

They have been difficult to obtain since 1996. They are a very competitive setting. But private activity bonds are—private activity 

bonds generally are upon application because volume cap is basically flush everywhere. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Yes. 

Mr. CABRERA. So there are options. The point is you have two options. 

Mr. CLEAVER. Yes, we are together on that. 

Ms. Glover? 

25 

Ms. GLOVER. In terms of what Mr. Cabrera was talking about, 

by eliminating the silos between the funding, an agency is able to 

devise a strategic plan and say, for example, like with the issues 

of homelessness, the support of housing, put the money in a pool, 

use that to attract a private sector development partner to go out 

to the market to either raise tax credits or private activity bonds 

so that the housing can be developed and supported. 

The key thing is that the amount of subsidy that is needed when 

added to the tenant rents has to be sufficient so that the debt service or other requirements can be serviced. And by having the flexibility of the money, that enables creativity on the ground as opposed to having to act strictly— 

Mr. CLEAVER. My time has expired. I’m sorry. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin, Mr. 

Duffy, chairman of our Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee. 

Mr. DUFFY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I appreciate the panel being here. 

I think oftentimes when you talk about HUD and poverty, there 

is an urban perspective or urban prism which we look through. I 

come from rural Wisconsin and this is the third year we are 

hosting a summit, a homelessness and hunger summit where we 

bring in all the players who help provide housing and food assistance to those who are in need, to talk about the bright spots of who 

is using the community and programs in the best way to help the 

most people out. 

I am honored this year that Secretary Castro is going to come. 

I think it is important that he sees a little different perspective on 

poverty. And we are honored that he is going to come and participate in our third annual event. 

But I hope as we have this conversation, we make sure we look 

at everybody who comes across these difficult problems in their life. 

I am not sure if the chairman gave this quote, but in 1964, President Johnson said, and we have heard this quite a bit, ‘‘We have 

declared unconditional war on poverty. Our objective is total victory. I believe that 30 years from now Americans will look back 

upon these 1960s as the time of the great American breakthrough 

toward the victory of prosperity over poverty.’’ 

Does anyone on the panel believe that we have actually met that 

objective, we have reached that victory? 

Mr. Briggs and Ms. Glover, we have? 

Mr. BRIGGS. Thank you, Mr. Duffy. 

Mr. DUFFY. Yes. 

Mr. BRIGGS. Any skilled evaluator would recommend that we ask 

the ‘‘but for’’ question: But for HUD or other agencies for that matter, what would conditions on the ground be, what would the outcomes be? 

But if you ask the question, would poverty be worse and would 

the poverty rate be higher, but for HUD, the answer is unequivocally yes to both those questions. 

Mr. DUFFY. I am going to reclaim my time because, first of all, 

I want to be clear. I agree with the mission, we have to help people 

26 

out. And I agree with Ms. Waters, we want to, and I think the 

whole panel, our objective should be to put people back to work. 

I’m sorry, Ms. Glover, did you want to add something? 

Ms. GLOVER. I was just going to add that if you put everything 

in perspective, not only are the HUD programs operating in the 

larger economy, but there are things that happened to the economy 

as well. And there is no question that the great recession was a 

setback for many people. There are many more people living in 

poverty today than there were before. 

And so I think that if you try to keep everything static, it is not 

realistic that the larger impact of the economy is not going to pull 

some people down. 

I think the question is, it is a but for. And people have risen and 

they are coming, but we have new people coming into the economy. 

So the question is, can we adopt policies that are flexible enough 

that we can react and respond to the needs? And it is important 

that people are rising up. 

Now, the income gap is a huge challenge and we have to stay focused on building the middle class. That is absolutely the right 

focus. But HUD’s programs have indeed helped. And I think the innovations of the last 50 years have been very impactful and we 

need to do more of those. 

Mr. DUFFY. And I am going to give you some more time in one 

second, Ms. Glover. 

First of all, I don’t think the mission of defeating poverty has 

been met; poverty still exists in our communities. And I think that 

was the mission of President Johnson. 

I get concerned because in our communities, I hear there are a 

lot of people who have disabilities, but there are disabilities that 

they can actually overcome if they get some assistance and some 

help. So not long-term disabled, but with some help, especially for 

mental illness, they can get out of the assistance of government 

and back into self-sustainability. 

And I think it is important that we make sure that we provide 

that assistance and help to them. 

I am not going to ask another question except to Ms. Glover. I 

have to tell you, your biography and all the great work that you 

have done in the Atlanta housing authority is absolutely amazing. 

I have about a minute left. Would you just kind of recap your story 

and the successes that you have had in Atlanta? 

Ms. GLOVER. In the short time I have, we were fortunate to be 

able to have great public/private partnerships in solving very deep 

issues. And we worked not only with private sector players, but 

with the residents, and the larger community. And it was really 

about a community coming together to solve problems where people 

were living in absolutely deplorable conditions. 

And so we have been able to help families move responsibly from 

those terrible places and actually redevelop mixed-income, mixeduse communities, supportive housing. We have had families invested in terms of changing mindsets, rebuilding lives, and building family resiliency. 

And so we are going to do more of that and that is continuing. And we have leveraged—we took $300 million and leveraged over 

$3 billion of economic impact and investment. 

27 

Mr. DUFFY. Not many people have the opportunity to take dysfunctional organizations and turn them into well-functioning organizations that actually help so many people. You are one of the 

bright spots, so thank you. 

I yield back. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Hinojosa. 

Mr. HINOJOSA. Thank you, Chairman Hensarling and Ranking 

Member Waters, for holding this important hearing on HUD and 

its impact on Federal housing policy. 

I would also like to thank our panelists for testifying today. 

Housing programs under HUD are a lifeline for many of our children in low-income families, yet we have long waiting lists for 

HUD programs. 

As we celebrate HUD’s 50th anniversary, I urge my colleagues 

on both sides of the aisle to work together to increase Federal investments in innovative programs that address housing and at the 

same time take a holistic approach at helping our disadvantaged 

citizens move up the economic ladder. 

My first question is for Ms. Renee Glover. As you know, there 

has been much talk about consolidating many of the rural housing 

programs currently under the United States Department of Agriculture into the Department of Housing and Urban Development. 

Given the difference in the populations and the geographic areas 

served by rural housing programs as compared to HUD programs, 

as well as the manner in which HUD and the USDA service their 

respective housing programs, do you think consolidation is a good 

idea? 

Ms. GLOVER. Let me say this. I am not familiar with the proposal, but the concern would be that resources are not lost if there 

is a consolidation. And I think what happens too often is that the 

consolidation occurs, but the resources that were being dedicated to 

that population aren’t following the clients and customers who are 

being served. 

I think one of the big issues in terms of supporting families with 

mental disabilities is that as the State mental institutions were 

closed, the thesis was that the resources that were being dedicated 

there would follow the families and then there would be supportive 

housing developed in local communities to support those families to 

be successful. 

But what happened is that as those institutions were closed, the 

resources didn’t follow, they were redirected to other resources and 

challenges. So I think the devil is always in the details. 

So I think that a thoughtful approach should be looked at, but 

also with the strong recommendation that the resources that are 

there not get lost in the consolidation. 

Mr. HINOJOSA. Thank you. 

My next question is for Dr. Xavier Briggs. In 1970 we had 

300,000 surplus of low-cost rental units relative to the low-income 

rental households. According to the national low-income housing, 

today there is a shortage of 7 million affordable rental units. What 

are the factors driving the shortages in affordable housing? What 

28 

should the Federal Government be doing differently? And are market-based approaches working? 

Mr. BRIGGS. Thank you, Mr. Hinojosa. You have two main drivers, sir. You have the drivers holding down incomes and then you 

have the drivers driving up costs. In other words, this is a structural gap that was decades in the making; it didn’t happen overnight. 

Mr. HINOJOSA. That is right. 

Mr. BRIGGS. And there are significant forces operating on both 

the cost side of the equation and the income side of the equation. 

In brief, on the cost side of the problem or the gap, you have 

largely local land-use decisions and other factors making it expensive, in some jurisdictions impossible, to develop affordable housing 

or to preserve what we have. And we have seen a tremendous erosion of supply and that contributes to the numbers that you cited. 

That is on the cost side of the equation. 

On the income side of the equation, as the Members know quite 

well—this has been widely documented in the media—we have 

seen a lot of wage stagnation in this country. The minimum wage 

is stuck at a quite low level in inflation-adjusted terms. So we have 

had stagnant incomes, limited incomes, rising housing costs, that 

produces the kind of shortfall that you called off. 

One clear implication of that applies to Congress as a whole and 

not only this committee, with due respect. You don’t want to fight 

a challenge like that or address a gap like that with one hand tied 

behind your back. You need to address both the income and the 

cost side of the equation or we won’t be successful. We won’t act 

in a way that is commensurate with the scale of the problem, 

which we are paying for in so many systems, health, education, 

and beyond. 

So, the Tax Code is implicated here. The minimum wage is implicated here. And yes, local regulations also are implicated in this 

gap between income, especially from wages, and housing costs on 

the bottom. 

Mr. HINOJOSA. You have made some very good points and I wish 

we had more time to let me ask two more questions. But my time 

has expired. I yield back. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. 

Fitzpatrick. 

Mr. FITZPATRICK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for calling this 

hearing. 

And I thank the witnesses for their testimony here today. 

I think it is important that after 50 years declaring the war on 

poverty and against homelessness and close to $2 trillion spent, it 

is appropriate that we look back and ask, how are those dollars allocated and how are they spent? 

My first question is for Dr. Briggs. On page seven of your testimony—and by the way, your background is in urban planning, and 

I come from Bucks County, Pennsylvania. I have lived my entire 

life in Levittown, which is a community that was hyper-planned, 

some say; a lot of returning World War II and Korea veterans were 

able to obtain a house in that community based on the VA mortgage. 

29 

But what I noticed growing up in that community was that in 

Levittown there seemed to be in the 1970s and 1980s more jobs 

than houses. And so, the community was doing well. And in my experience in looking back, communities that had more houses than 

jobs are those that are in trouble. 

You say on page seven of your testimony as part of your solution 

of making housing assistance a contributor to self-reliance and economic self-sufficiency, there is a quote from your testimony: ‘‘It is 

crucial that we support effective pro-work housing policy for households that are not elderly or disabled.’’ And you go on to mention 

that work has long been a prized and deeply felt goal and that 

‘‘Work provides income and dignity.’’ And I agree with all of that. 

So my question to you, Dr. Briggs, is, would you support work 

requirements for non-elderly and non-disabled, able-bodied working 

individuals perhaps as a condition of the Section 8 housing voucher? 

Mr. BRIGGS. Thank you. It really depends on how they are constructed. Sorry to offer what might be a complex answer and we 

want these things to be simple, but they are not. 

I don’t think that an across-the-board work requirement would 

produce the effect that we want to see. There is a tremendous motivation to work, amongst the great majority of housing-assisted 

households. The question is, what jobs are available? Are we investing in skills? Are we investing in work supports like child care? 

And are there good, affordable housing alternatives available for 

households that obtain work and wish to move out? 

If you look at the number-one reason people leave housing assistance, it is because they get work. So the motivation is clearly there 

and we need to be extremely careful about across-the-board requirements. 

Mr. FITZPATRICK. But do you support a requirement for work for 

able-bodied individuals? 

Mr. BRIGGS. The one answer I can give you is that it very much 

depends on how that is constructed. It depends on whether it 

comes with supports for child care, intensive skill investments, the 

kinds that we see in Jobs Plus. 

I also would agree with Mr. Husock that there are disincentives 

in rent policy now. And if we change those—as Jobs Plus did, and 

it was very rigorously evaluated and produced, as you probably 

know, with very significant effects—that would be a very, very 

smart way to go and to support work by very poor households. 

Mr. FITZPATRICK. Mr. Cabrera, do you support work requirements? 

Mr. CABRERA. I am very much in the same place as Xavier. The 

reason is because here is what happens. If you wind up with work 

requirements and you have someone, and I will just come up with 

a common example, a single mother with more than one child, you 

have just essentially kept her from housing and they will wind up 

homeless. So you are going to be dealing with it as a Federal subsidy on the homeless side. 

I am not in favor of compelling that kind of activity generally. 

It is just it is something I hope we will work through, but it is very 

difficult for me to— 

30 

Mr. FITZPATRICK. How about local flexibility, providing flexibility 

to State and county housing authorities, public housing agencies? 

And Ms. Glover was responding to a question from the ranking 

member earlier on that question of local flexibility where if you can 

tailor programs, federally funded programs to what is happening in 

a local community, should a local community be permitted to have 

some sort of work requirement as a condition preceding to getting 

a Section 8 certificate, especially for those communities where you 

have generational poverty and one generation after the other living 

in the same community on the same Section 8 housing certificate. 

Mr. CABRERA. That is extraordinarily rare, just so I say it. The 

concern I have is that compelling thing, we as a government compelling people to do things in that way is something I think I am 

just anathema to. So it is going to be really hard for me to say yes 

to that. 

Mr. FITZPATRICK. Ms. Glover, you were cut off earlier when you 

were responding to the ranking member’s question and it had to 

do with providing local flexibility to housing authorities. You had 

some experience in Atlanta with that. Can you expand on that 

briefly? 

Ms. GLOVER. Yes. I think it is very important that the people on 

the ground and in the locality have the flexibility to do the problem-solving, because first, they understand the conditions, they are 

able to reach out to the other players. 

And on the work requirement, what we did with disabled and elderly persons is they were exempted from the requirement. But 

those families who were able-bodied, we work with the various civil 

society groups to do job training, counseling, child care. We had a 

whole network of some 60 organizations to support success. And I 

think if you provide those types of resources and the program is 

both job and/or education, you are building resiliency and the ability to be successful— 

Mr. FITZPATRICK. Thank you. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr. 

Sherman. 

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this hearing 

today. 

We had an interesting subcommittee hearing yesterday on much 

the same subject. And I commend, for those of you looking for more 

material to read, to look at the transcript of that hearing. 

We dealt with flood insurance, which is important to me, even 

though I represent a city built in the desert in the midst of a 

drought, and H.R. 3700, which I think has come up in this hearing, 

has some excellent provisions to encourage condominiums. 

I own two suburban homes so I am a really bad advocate for it, 

but I am an advocate for multifamily housing. It is affordable, and 

our homeless problem can also be viewed as just a housing affordability problem. And we have to help our struggling families. It is 

more energy-efficient and even more energy-efficient than the housing itself is that multifamily housing is the first step toward a viable mass transit system. And it offers flexibility. 

Told by many that if you buy a place, you really shouldn’t buy 

a place if you are not pretty certain you are going to be there for 

31 

4 or 5 years, a lot of people can’t know where they are going to live 

4 or 5 years from now. Every 2 years, people suggest that I stop 

living where I am living and find another line of work. 

[laughter] 

With this in mind, Mr. Cabrera, what can HUD do to encourage 

the private sector to expand its role in providing affordable housing? I refer to property owners, managers, developers. And are 

there regulations in place at HUD that discourage private participation in affordable housing? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think that the best step forward in terms of what 

HUD can do is to provide the market with as much certainty as 

it can have and to have reasonable standards that can be met. 

One example is actually cited in my written testimony and it is 

in the case of FHA. There is a program, an FHA program, a very 

useful program, their 223(f) program, it is a refinancing program. 

It helps reposition affordable housing deals that are already going 

to be impacting the Federal budget if they go sideways and helps 

them become healthier. 

And a couple of years ago, HUD revisited its underwriting guidelines, it increased the reserve requirements in the FHA program, 

the 223(f) program, by a multiple, I mean, several multiples. It was 

huge. And what it did was it killed deals. So today you have 50 

percent fewer units being financed through the 223(f) program as 

there were just 24 months ago. 

And similarly, there are other places there that conversation 

pops up. It popped up in RAD. So they will make a rule, the rule 

negatively impacts the utilization of RAD, the rule in that case, 

again, had to do with operating reserves because what they make 

is a bureaucratic decision that isn’t aligned with the marketplace 

and it is— 

Mr. SHERMAN. I am going to try to sneak in one more question. 

Mr. CABRERA. And it gets messy. 

Mr. SHERMAN. We need 300,000 or 400,000 new constructed 

apartments every year. Last year, we just got 255,000. That is up 

37 percent from the year before, but it is still inadequate. In addition, we are losing 100,000 to 150,000 units to obsolescence and 

those are the units that are affordable. 

Are there any government programs that we can tweak here that 

would be helpful in getting some of these 150,000 units rehabilitated rather than withdrawn from service? And what else can we 

do to solve the supply crisis? 

Mr. CABRERA. The supply crisis, from a HUD perspective, can be 

helped simply by revisiting how it is HUD approaches all underwriting and facilitating responsible underwriting wherever it can 

without adding things that don’t make sense in the marketplace. 

Now, I have to laud the prior Administration and the current Administration. Secretary Donovan did a terrific job of having that revisited and it improved. That isn’t to say that it improved perfectly. 

It did not. And I think what happens is that just knowing HUD 

as I do, what you see is retrenchment, and that retrenchment 

causes static in the marketplace and it keeps good deals from happening. 

One of the things HUD can do is just learn how to get out of the 

way. You don’t always need to be in the way. You need to be in 

32 

the way when the taxpayer is at risk in an unreasonable way. But 

there is always going to be risk. If there isn’t risk, there is a problem. 

Mr. SHERMAN. Thank you. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Kentucky, Mr. 

Barr. 

Mr. BARR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I thank the witnesses for your testimony. 

I represent a congressional district in central Kentucky where 

the Lexington housing authority is one of those Moving to Work 

programs that has been a great success. Austin Simms, who runs 

that housing authority, does a great job and I think is a model for 

how the Moving to Work program offers that flexibility and 

fungibility of dollars. And they have made it work very, very well. 

I do want to revisit this issue of work requirements that my colleague Mr. Fitzpatrick was talking about, because I think that we 

need to look at work not as a punishment, but as a blessing that 

we want to celebrate, a road to self-sufficiency. 

And I noted, Mr. Cabrera and Mr. Briggs, your reticence to fully 

embrace universal work requirements as a condition of Section 8 

or other public housing assistance. But I want to challenge you a 

little bit on that because it seems to me that if the concern is child 

care, or if the concern is job training as a necessary part of that, 

we could certainly offer that as part of modernization of a universal 

work requirement. 

So what is it that is holding you back from fully embracing a 

work requirement, not as a means of punishing beneficiaries, but 

as a means of recognizing that poor people in need of housing are 

not liabilities to be managed, but they are assets and they have 

tremendous potential if we offer them the blessing of work? 

Mr. CABRERA. Then I think I would answer in the following way: 

It shouldn’t be a precondition of someone being housed. It should 

be structured in a different way such that it is not compelling 

someone to work, it is compelling someone to get in a position to 

find better work. That is a very different proposition. 

If the issue becomes, look, if you live here you need to improve 

the circumstances in which you are in in order to improve your economic circumstance for your family and for yourself, I think—I 

can’t speak for my colleagues, but I am willing to bet my bottom 

dollar that they will all agree that would be the right way to go. 

What I am concerned about is having as a precondition, is you 

cannot live here unless you have a job. That, I think, is counterproductive. 

Mr. BARR. If I could just jump in there. What if it is not that, 

but for—and by the way, the Congressional Research Service is 

telling us here that non-elderly, non-disabled households account 

for a full 45 percent. So it is just not true, at least according to the 

Congressional Research Service, that all of the Section 8 beneficiaries out there, assisted-housing individuals are elderly or disabled. There are plenty of non-elderly, non-disabled people out 

there who don’t have wage income, but yet are receiving taxpayer 

assistance for housing. 

Any thoughts? 

33 

Mr. CABRERA. The vast majority of the people who are already 

receiving a wage income and who are receiving, let us go by each 

pot, Section 8, work for a living, those people actually that is not 

the issue. 

I think if I am hearing this correctly, and I am asking to be corrected if I am not, you are concerned about those who aren’t, who 

can work, but don’t. And if that is the case, usually it has to do 

with whether it is we are willing to, as a Federal entity, help them 

put themselves in the best position and condition housing upon 

that. In that case, sure. 

Mr. BARR. And maybe if they are underemployed or need skills, 

maybe it shouldn’t just be a work requirement, but a requirement 

that you are either working or that you are pursuing some kind of 

job training, and that as part of that assistance, there is some child 

care if that is needed. 

Mr. CABRERA. Absolutely. That is the biggest piece. In my experience, and again I am going to defer to Renee, but in my experience 

the biggest impediment for, and the person I have in mind is a single mother with children, is their children. The reason they have 

such a tough time going out there is because someone has to deal 

with their children. 

Mr. BARR. Absolutely. 

Mr. CABRERA. That is why I am saying the training and the child 

care is sensible. 

Mr. BARR. And that is perfectly reasonable; that makes sense. 

And Ms. Glover, I think to your testimony earlier, that is how 

you all did it successfully in Atlanta. 

Ms. GLOVER. That is correct. 

Mr. BARR. 1Mr. Briggs, did you have a— 

Mr. BRIGGS. Thank you, sir. Just briefly, so the effects of any 

such requirement would depend on a few things, actually quite 

straightforward to think about: conditions in the labor market; provision of work supports; and those other factors that directly affect 

families’ or an adult’s ability to get and to keep work, let alone to 

get ahead. 

There is a great deal that is appealing in principle about the 

compact, Congressman, that you are outlining. 

Sadly, I have to note that we have a history as a country of reneging on some part or another of that deal, either not funding the 

child care or not directing TANF funds, State TANF funds properly 

to job creation in order to improve labor market conditions. 

There is, I think you are right, sir, great bipartisan agreement 

that we should move in this direction. The question is how, and the 

different pieces of that compact do need to be in place. 

Mr. BARR. Thank you. My time has expired, but I would love to 

work with all of you on crafting that. Thank you very much. 

I yield back. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. 

Clay, ranking member of our Financial Institutions Subcommittee. 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and Ranking Member 

Waters, for conducting this hearing on the future of housing in 

America. 

34 

Let me start with Mr. Briggs. And I would like to ask about the 

effectiveness and cost trends in the housing voucher program. 

President George W. Bush’s Fiscal Year 2008 budget request said 

the Section 8 tenant-based rental assistance program is the Federal Government’s foremost program for assisting low-income families to rent decent, safe, and sanitary housing in the private market. 

Based on an assessment of the program, this is one of the Department’s and the Federal Government’s most effective programs. 

This program has been recognized as a cost-effective means for delivering safe, decent, and sanitary housing to low-income families, 

that in fact in nominal terms the average housing assistance payment per voucher rose from $7,553 in 2010 to just $7,673 in 2014, 

an increase of only 1.6 percent. During the same period, rent and 

utility costs in the private market rose by 10.6 percent. 

If the purpose of today’s hearing is to discuss the impact HUD 

has had on housing policy in reducing poverty over the past 50 

years, it seems that the Section 8 housing choice voucher program 

is something we should hold up and celebrate. 

Mr. Briggs, what recommendations do you have for how we 

might build on the success of this program? 

Mr. BRIGGS. Thank you, Mr. Clay. I have several recommendations for this committee. The first is to ensure that funding for the 

program is sustained as a floor. Congress, this is both sides of the 

aisle, have acted, as you are well aware, to cut veterans’ homelessness. That was a direct result of adding incremental vouchers in 

the form of VASH as they are known. That is a direct indicator 

that this program is this country’s number-one tool for preventing 

or ending homelessness on a very large scale. 

And as you have heard Orlando and other panelists underscore, 

we will pay the costs somewhere, we will pay them in health, we 

will pay them in jails, we will pay them in education systems, in 

some system if we don’t address these needs. It is tremendously 

important to fully fund the program. 

There are flexibilities. There are connections between the vouchers and capital subsidies so the vouchers can help to ensure that 

the very lowest-income households can lease up in mixed-income 

dwellings. Those kinds of things should be encouraged, in my judgment, by Congress. 

HUD is on that road already. It needs the encouragement, and 

streamlining can be a part of that. 

Mr. CLAY. This program is one of the government’s most cost-effective programs. And your recommendation is that we continue to 

support it and fund it properly? 

Mr. BRIGGS. That is absolutely right, sir. And from the standpoint of national policy goals, expanding it would be the right thing 

to do. I would add, however, that the big costs in the program are 

not driven by HUD practices, but by local housing costs that HUD 

doesn’t control directly and by tenant incomes which are a story 

about what is going on in the wider economy. 

So again, if we want to address this, we need HUD to be at its 

best, but we also need more than HUD. This program is extremely 

important and effective. 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you for your response. 

35 

Mr. Cabrera, you mentioned the 223(f) program. And a few years 

ago, you said HUD increased reserve requirements and it killed 

deals. What do you think, in the best of all worlds, should HUD 

do now to revise this program? 

Mr. CABRERA. The 223(f) programs, like all FHA programs, is an 

insurance program. There is a private lender that is lending the 

money that is being insured. They are the at-risk party, the initial 

at-risk party. And the Federal Government’s responsibility is when 

the deal goes sideways. 

Have faith in the private market. The private market knows that 

deal as well as anybody. The person looking for the deal knows it. 

The idea that the private market would request or want or require 

rather one set of reserves and that HUD would, in order to get the 

insurance which would facilitate the deal, multiply that by 3, 4, or 

5 times is a little bit out of kilter. 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you for that. I think HUD needs to reevaluate 

what they have done. 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, and I yield back. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from North Carolina, 

Mr. Pittenger. 

Mr. PITTENGER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I thank each of you for being here with us today. 

I am reading from the HUD Inspector General’s report that was 

a report from the period through 2014 up through this month in 

2015. And in the report, they identify, I will just read to you, ‘‘Public housing authorities provide public housing assistance to as 

many as 25,226 families whose income exceeded HUD’s 2014 eligibility income limits.’’ 

Going on, they say, ‘‘As a result, HUD did not assist as many 

low-income families in need of housing as it could have. We estimate that HUD will pay as much as $104 million over the next 

year for public housing units occupied by over-income families that 

otherwise could have been used to house eligible low-income families in need of housing assistance.’’ 

How do you respond to that, Mr. Cabrera? 

Mr. CABRERA. I struggle with that report. There are considerable 

inaccuracies in the report that I would love to have responded to. 

But the first one is it is 25,000 residents out of a pool of roughly 

990,000. There are always going to be mistakes. Should we fix 

those mistakes? Absolutely, I am all for it. I think that addressing 

the issue pertinent, but I think it is important— 

Mr. PITTENGER. Is that kind of glossed over? Can we fix mistakes? 

Mr. CABRERA. No, I don’t think it is being glossed over. I think 

what has to happen is we have a system that encourages how we 

count income for public housing in very strange ways. And I don’t 

question that there are people who are wrongly over-income in public housing. 

Mr. PITTENGER. Let me give you some income amounts. Los An- geles, the member with the highest income earned, $132,224. New 

Bedford housing, the member with the highest income earned, 

$129,789. 

36 

Mr. CABRERA. Right. But Congressman, under the Brooke 

amendment, 40 percent of public housing units have to be leased 

to people at 30 percent of area median income (AMI) and below. 

Everything else is really up to the housing authority. And to some 

degree, some of those folks are going to be outside of the bandwidth 

anyway. 

I am not encouraging this, I am not saying the result is good. I 

am saying it is not throwing the baby out with the bathwater— 

Mr. PITTENGER. You are doing a good job trying to justify it. 

Mr. CABRERA. —it is, let us think about it as opposed to—let us 

think about how to solve it as opposed to anything else. 

Mr. PITTENGER. No, I think that is what we are about here today 

is reforming and not glossing over things. 

Mr. CABRERA. Right, I would never gloss over it. 

Mr. PITTENGER. The American taxpayer really deserves accountability on these dollars. 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes. 

Mr. PITTENGER. And by just assuming, well, these things are 

going to happen and it is part of the process, I think the American 

people are tired of that. I think they want real accountability inside 

of our government and we are not seeing that when we are showing right now that in New York alone there are 10,250 people who 

have over-income housing. Why isn’t there accountability? 

Mr. CABRERA. I would rather— 

Mr. PITTENGER. How do you have people living in housing who make $129,000? 

Mr. CABRERA. I would far rather that resource go to people who 

need it than people who don’t. I agree with you. 

Mr. PITTENGER. I think that is what we are about today. It is not 

the status quo that should be acceptable. I think what we are 

about is bringing reforms in here that make it so we are really 

helping the people who need the help. Nobody is saying we are 

going to take an eraser and erase it all. But what we do want to 

bring is real fiscal accountability back to our government and this 

is part of it. 

If people are abusing the system, and the American taxpayer is 

very tired of that, we need to eliminate the abuse. 

Mr. CABRERA. We agree. 

Mr. PITTENGER. Ms. Glover, do you have any comments? 

Ms. GLOVER. No. My only observation is that we fix the problem 

and not just throw the baby out with the bathwater. And too often, 

problems are fixed where there aren’t any. So target the correction 

to the offender and the problem as opposed to recasting the entire 

program. 

Mr. PITTENGER. I think you sense from us our interest and our 

commitment to help those who really need the safety net. We have 

always been about that. But I think what we are as much about 

is making sure that the American taxpayer is protected and that 

we not just have a slush fund where there are 100-plus million dollars that could be given to people who actually have a need. 

Ms. GLOVER. I couldn’t agree with you more. 

Mr. PITTENGER. Mr. Husock, do you have a comment? 

Mr. HUSOCK. Yes. The over-income is certainly a problem. And 

Moving to Work (MTW) gives local authorities the chance to sugVerDate Nov 24 2008 17:16 Nov 03, 2016 Jkt 099755 PO 00000 Frm 00040 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 K:\DOCS\99755.TXT TERI
37 

gest a time limit and that would address that situation quite possibly. 

I think it is just as much of a problem that we have such longterm tenancies. 

Mr. PITTENGER. Absolutely. 

Mr. HUSOCK. And I would address the committee’s concern to 

that as well. 

Mr. PITTENGER. I certainly agree. 

Thank you very much. My time has expired. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. 

Scott. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

The first thing I want to do is say hello to my good friend, Ms. 

Renee Glover. Your work in housing and your contributions to this 

Nation are just extraordinary and they are of a soaring magnitude. 

And we are very grateful for your work and your service. And I 

personally have enjoyed working with you, not only in my tour as 

Congressman, but as you know, I served in the State Senate. 

But before I get to this, I must respond a bit to what my ranking 

leader, Ms. Waters, said. There is this myth that we need to put 

to bed about people not wanting to work, and especially people who 

want to work so badly. 

I represent a district, as you know, Ms. Glover, in the State Senate before I got here for 20 years that had most of the housing 

projects in the City of Atlanta. And I knew then what the issue 

was. And that was helping people to get the jobs. Started that jobs 

fair there and it all blossomed up every year, as you recall. We 

worked with that. 

We worked with your formula of using your innovation in housing to leverage, for you knew that at the core of this is an economic 

issue. And each year we would do the jobs fair. 

And let me just tell you something, committee members. Last 

year, our jobs fair attracted 20,000 people. We were able to get jobs 

for 5,522 people, 98 percent of whom were African American, and 

most of whom were men. But two categories: African Americans 

and veterans. 

Now, the reason I mention that is these are the two most basic 

groups that are crying out to get help with jobs to help stay in 

their homes. And so there must be a structure, an infrastructure 

that is built, not only just to moan about this moving back to work 

program, yes, but we have to have something in there that provides 

the work, job fairs, other kinds of structures, to be able to make 

sure because people want to work. They are not out there not 

wanting to work. 

We have to research and get into these communities and build 

that structure in there to get the job opportunities to them. 

Now, Ms. Glover, Carver Homes and Techwood Homes, it is very 

important that I kind of set the stage for this because Carver 

Homes is located, because many people have been to Atlanta, but 

in order to show what you did, Carver Homes is right there where 

the Atlanta stadium is, the home of the Braves. Techwood is up 

where Georgia Tech is. So if you have been to Atlanta, you know 

where that is. 

38 

Can you share for us a bit, Ms. Glover, how you have used this 

economic leverage and your input in getting jobs for people in the 

community and how that worked in the mixed-use projects that you 

did in Carver Homes and Techwood Homes? 

Ms. GLOVER. Thank you, sir. And let me return the compliment 

to you. You have been a magnificent public servant and an outstanding Congressman and Senator at the State level. And I, too, 

have enjoyed working with you and think the world of you. So 

thank you for all that you do. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

Ms. GLOVER. In terms of our revitalization of those communities, 

we worked with the private sector, the foundation sector, the supportive services sector so that we could create communities of opportunity. And those communities were in terrible condition when 

we started in the 1990s. The workforce participation was at about 

13 percent and people were desperately poor. And rather than the 

families being able to rebuild their lives, they were trapped structurally out of the mainstream. 

So in working with the families and working with the private 

sector, we were able to create a master plan that leveraged the 

human potential as well as the real estate potential. And we always say that all people are children of God with unlimited human 

potential, and so the work was directed to tap into that human potential. 

So it is at both ends, so it is working with the real estate and 

that leveraged typically 10 to one of the public dollars that were 

in either through the tax credit program, private activity bonds and 

tax credits, other affordable housing programs, to close the gap on 

the development. 

And it is a true economically integrated community that had 

market rate families, families who needed assistance, typically 40 

percent, and these are long-term affordable units and will always 

be as long as the ground lease is in effect, at least 60 years, and 

then tax credit affordable units. And that was developed and it has 

been magnificent. We have also developed single-family homes. 

But we also worked with the neighborhood schools. So housing 

policy and education policy, too, are important because we wanted 

to have great neighborhood schools because that attracts families 

through the neighborhood. And so it has been a very, very 

impactful and tremendous program. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

Thank you, Ms. Glover. 

And thank you, Mr. Chairman, for giving me that extra minute. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has definitely 

expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Illinois, Mr. 

Hultgren. 

Mr. HULTGREN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you all for being here to discuss a very important topic, 

something that absolutely impacts all of our constituents. 

And it is so clear to me that home ownership advances the American Dream, encourages responsible citizens, and promotes lasting 

community involvement, which is something we all want. 

39 

I believe that the people in my district should have access to the 

financial tools they need to be able to invest in this worthwhile 

goal to provide a lasting home for their families and also to build 

their net worth. Federal housing policy should reflect our commitment to those Americans who include home ownership on their list 

of life and financial objectives. 

We should also hold agencies like the Department of Housing 

and Urban Development accountable to ensure that Federal housing programs are exceptional stewards of taxpayer dollars and 

meaningful mechanisms through which we can help people out of 

poverty. 

I am interested in exploring ways that we can more effectively 

serve seniors and low-income families in our communities. And I 

am grateful for this opportunity to be able to learn more from you 

all and the work that you have done. 

I want to address my first couple of questions to Mr. Husock, if 

that is okay. America is facing significant challenges when it comes 

to providing our citizens with affordable housing. The 5 years ending in 2014, the number of renter households was up by 4.7 million, while the number of homeowner households was down by almost 600,000. 

The United States is on the cusp of fundamental change in our 

housing dynamics as changing demographics in housing preferences drive more people away from the typical suburban house. 

I wonder if you could offer insight as to what can be done to prepare our Nation for a more balanced housing policy, one that recognizes the realities of the changing housing market that we are facing? 

Mr. HUSOCK. Thank you so much. Of course, a lot of what is a 

local decision is beyond the reach of HUD. However, I know that 

under Secretary Kemp’s leadership, there was a good deal of emphasis that has fallen by the wayside somewhat to call attention 

to local communities as to how they may adjust their zoning codes 

in a way to encourage balanced construction of different housing 

types so as to accommodate the range of needs that may go beyond 

and do go beyond, as you point out, a desire simply for single-family home ownership. 

So a lot of these decisions, most of these decisions are driven by 

local zoning and land-use decisions. However, HUD can use its 

good offices to set an example, suggest model zoning codes and to 

call attention to those efforts at the local level that have been effective. 

Mr. HULTGREN. Let me ask you specifically, since 1986, the lowincome housing tax credit program has leveraged Federal dollars 

with private investment to produce nearly 2.8 million affordable 

units. If we still need more affordable housing, how can LIHTC dollars be further leveraged to provide more affordable housing? 

Mr. HUSOCK. I think as with public housing and housing first 

voucher units, we should consider making those units that are affordable under the LIHTC a short term in the nature of their assistance because we have long waiting and we have a limited supply. 

And so aligning our housing policy with our overall social policy 

we spend as much, if not more on housing choice voucher as we do 

40 

on TANF today. And yet, the regulations regarding TANF dollars 

and housing choice voucher dollars are very different. 

So to make assistance short term and targeted is maybe the most 

practical way that we can accommodate more households. 

Mr. HULTGREN. I have one last thing I want to address quickly 

with Mr. Cabrera. How have Section 202 capital advances affected 

the market for affordable, supportive housing for low-income seniors? Has the cessation of funding for these advances discouraged 

investors from building affordable senior developments to add new 

units? 

Mr. CABRERA. The short answer to that is yes, it has discouraged 

the production of 202 units. Section 202 has traditionally been the 

engine that drives elderly housing. There is a bitter struggle within 

the portfolio itself, as FHA would tell you, because it is very difficult. In some rural areas where you have 202s, you have performance issues. It is simply you don’t have enough people living there 

to support the debt service so that it keeps going if it is alone as 

opposed to a grant. 

But I think 202 or a vehicle like 202 is going to be an important 

conversation to have given that no one here is getting younger. 

Mr. HULTGREN. I feel it. 

My time is almost done. I will yield back my last 10 seconds. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The gentleman yields back. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Green, 

ranking member of our Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee. 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I thank the witnesses for appearing as well. 

And I think the ranking member for her support of HUD. 

Mr. Chairman, I will style this brief statement why I oppose cutting funds to HUD. I oppose cutting funds to HUD because I have 

before me an article from the Huffington Post, dated July 11, 2014. 

It reads, ‘‘The $400 billion to create a fleet of F-35 Joint Strike 

Fighter jets, which as the Hill points out is 7 years behind schedule 

and chronically plagued with misfortunes and incompetencies, 

could have housed every homeless person in the U.S. with a 

$600,000 home.’’ 

I oppose cutting funds to HUD because we currently have a $38 

billion gimmick to fund the military with a separate war account 

that has no cap on it. Spend as much as we like on war, but cap 

what we spend on peace in terms of homelessness. 

And why do I say peace? Because I know how we acquired HUD. 

HUD was not acquired easily. Unfortunately, and I don’t condone 

what happened, but I can tell you the truth, the Watts riots influenced the creation of HUD: 6 days; 34 deaths; 1,032 injured; 4,000 

people arrested; and $40 million in property damage. HUD was not 

easily acquired. 

There had been an effort to do this for years in this country. And 

unfortunately, history records that the Watts riots influenced the 

creation of HUD. 

I know how we acquired the Fair Housing Act. It was after the 

demise of Dr. Martin Luther King that we were able to get the Fair 

Housing Act through Congress. 

41 

So I am here to protect HUD. I am here to protect it because I 

know about the good that it has done, notwithstanding all of the 

cuts through the years. The intelligence indicates that in the last 

20 years, HUD has provided housing assistance to more than 35 

million individuals. 

The HUD HOME program has produced nearly 1.2 million affordable housing units, almost 500,000 units for first-time home 

buyers. The HOME program has assisted nearly 300,000 tenants in 

obtaining direct rental assistance. CDBG has helped over 1.2 million low- and moderate-income persons. 

And I tell you, Mr. Chairman, that I oppose cutting HUD. 

I am here to hold back the rollback and that is what I see happening. There are people of good will, by the way, with the best of 

intentions, who would roll back to a time when people were unable 

to get assistance with rent, unable to acquire the holistic approach 

that we just witnessed this morning. 

I was with the Honorable Maxine Waters when we were over at 

this location right here in this City, that takes a holistic approach 

to dealing with housing issues, gets 25 percent of its funding from 

the Federal Government, has a $5 million a year budget. I want 

to protect that. I want to expand that. I would like to see that become pervasive. I would like to see it in my City. 

We cannot allow a program that has benefited Americans in 

times of need after a crisis, such as what happened in 2008, to be 

cut to the bone to the extent that it becomes ineffective. 

And I will yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Arizona, Mr. 

Schweikert. 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And obviously, once again, I believe our collectively ultimate 

focus is actually not the agency, it is the people who need the services, and are we doing it the best way to touch the most lives for 

the maximum benefit. 

Mr. Briggs, you have actually a couple of times touched on what 

many of us have been fixated on and that is particularly in our 

higher-density areas within the country. We have sort of a twopronged problem, both income, the ability to earn a living, but then 

the cost of housing. 

In land-use policy, what some people like to refer to as a model 

zoning code, a lot of our urban areas really do lack creativity and 

variability in both the way they regulate, but also the land use. 

What can we do as Federal policymakers to turn to those urban 

centers and say, you are boxing out the next opportunity for affordable housing, not because of money coming from us, but because of 

the regulatory costs, the zoning costs, the land use, and actually 

your NIMBY problem? What can we do policy-wise? 

Mr. BRIGGS. Thank you, Congressman. I am so glad you asked 

this question and asked it the way you did. In many senses, many 

communities around the country are federalizing their costs. And 

we are not going to make the progress we need to as a Nation if 

we don’t come at this in more creative ways. 

In my judgment, one of the best studies ever done of this was by 

the late housing economist, John Quigley. He looked over a 40-year 

42 

period and showed very rigorously that we have seen the problem 

you underline, this structural gap I talked about earlier. And a 

principal driver of it is what economists call supply constraints and 

local land-use regulation is among the most important. 

I would suggest approaching this as a question of both rules and 

incentives because both have mattered historically. That is what 

the record shows. And encouraging through contingent Federal 

funding, for example, contingent investments, both streamlining 

and more inclusionary approaches are going to be crucial, in my 

judgment, to encouraging density and a greater flexibility of housing types, as Mr. Husock noted. 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. And if you ever see a good article on it, will 

you send it our direction? Somewhere in my binder, I have one 

talking about how a housing unit built today, about 40 percent of 

it ultimately is some form of regulation. Now, we like certain regulations, but I live in the desert and yet some of the regulations require certain types of construction materials that are absolutely inappropriate for my part of the country, but they are within the rule 

set. 

Mr. BRIGGS. Right. 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. So somehow we are going to have to holistically break this down. 

Mr. BRIGGS. I have a 10-second response, if you will allow me. 

I think we will agree that regulations exist for a variety of reasons, 

to protect health and safety, to promote environmental sustainability, including— 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. But it also creates barriers. 

Mr. BRIGGS. Absolutely, it is a mixed picture. 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. Okay. 

Mr. Husock? 

And I prefer the words ‘‘on ramp’’ instead of ‘‘off ramp.’’ If right 

now you were designing income, job incentives those things, so let 

us just use this because it is something I am familiar with. 

I am in Section 8 housing. I am able to get that promotion in the 

job because I have been a consistent worker. We know there is a 

math problem, there is a disincentive problem where you make a 

certain income leap, all of a sudden much of that is lost over here 

in the change of your housing cost. 

Within seconds, can you share with me a conceptual approach of 

what you would do to incentivize accepting that extra work responsibility and the extra income without being punished on the other 

side so it is a reasonable on ramp? 

Mr. HUSOCK. Fix the tenant’s share at the outset of the lease and 

keep that for a fixed period of time, just the way typical renters 

in the private sector have a fixed-cost lease. 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. Okay. 

Ms. Glover, everyone seems to love you. You have an amazing 

story here. One of the curiosities I have is knowing some of my 

housing projects in the Phoenix area are—rent credit, is also the 

discussion of incentivizing work, but the ability to manage that. 

Are you seeing discussions of reaching in and doing things more 

creatively, babysitting co-ops, a ride-sharing vehicle that is actually 

at the property, things that actually make the ability to go and 

43 

work that job using sort of the modern sharing economy? Are you 

seeing that adoption anywhere? 

Ms. GLOVER. I think that is the power of local devolution that 

you can actually incent those types of things. The great news is 

that if you are not constrained in terms of what can be experimented with and investigated, I think there is a lot of opportunity. 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. So that decentralization and rural changes 

from my housing density or housing rules to your creativity to 

incentivize folks to have a future. 

Ms. GLOVER. Absolutely. And one other quick observation on 

some of the local communities— 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. Very quickly. 

Ms. GLOVER. —is that many localities are trying to subsidize 

their own budgets, so with the cuts of CDBG and HOME what you 

are seeing are impact fees and raising and higher fees because at 

the end of the day, we have to connect the dots because all of these 

things come together and have impact. 

Mr. SCHWEIKERT. Yes, that is the other side of the cost equation. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Minnesota, Mr. 

Ellison. 

Mr. ELLISON. Let me thank the chairman and the ranking member. I appreciate having this hearing. 

My first question is a very quick question. Are the poor lazy? 

That is my question. Some of my colleagues made the point that 

we need work requirements. I have a panel up here and I would 

like to direct the panel’s attention to the board. 

Under the voucher program, 49 percent of those folks are elderly 

or disabled, 33 percent of them have jobs in the voucher program, 

so you don’t need to force them to work with a work requirement. 

And then you have another percentage of people who are if you 

are on TANF, you are a TANF recipient, then there is another 

under the voucher, 12 percent, who could be veterans, who could 

be people with a whole lot of different stories. 

I think the point here, though, is that saying that you can’t have 

housing unless you have a job, at least for the voucher program, 

is probably poorly thought through. 

Public housing, same story. People are working and the ones who 

aren’t working, the greater majority of them are elderly or disabled. 

And then, project-based rental assistance is the same story all 

over again. 

So Mr. Briggs, is a work requirement smart, is it right, is it necessary, does it help? 

Mr. BRIGGS. Congressman, thank you. In my judgment, it misses 

the point. If the idea is to make work pay and to ensure that there 

are work supports, given the ample evidence that there is a high 

level of motivation to work, as Members from both sides of the aisle 

have said, then let us focus on those things. 

As your data show, many of the assisted households are either 

not work-ready or aged out of working age or they are in fact attached to the labor market. So to some extent, one wonders about 

whether we are focused on the wrong issue. 

Mr. ELLISON. Thank you. I will just move on from there. 

44 

Can we get the next slide up, please? 

So here is the thing. I have asked for chart one to be shown on 

the screen. 

According to the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies’ report, one in two households spend more than 30 percent of their 

gross income on rent and utilities, and one in four households pay 

more than 50 percent of their gross income for rent utilities. 

We currently have more than 11 million families who pay more 

than half of their income for housing and utilities. And we know 

that one in four families eligible for housing assistance receives it, 

only one in four. In my district, we have more than 10,000 low-income families on a waiting list. 

So I wonder, Mr. Briggs or any of the panelists, I would like to 

hear from Mr. Briggs first, when you consider the current HUD 

budget, what percentage of its funds go to help existing recipients 

of assistance? How does that percentage compare with funds available to help cost-burdened families receive vouchers or gain a slot 

in a subsidized home? 

Mr. BRIGGS. Mr. Ellison, as the data show, we have this tremendous gap. The blue line is coming down over the last several years. 

That, by the way, is because of the economic recovery. The underlying data analysis show that is about improvement in tenant incomes, which is a terrific thing, and a sign of how we can create 

more success. 

But only about one in four households who are eligible for housing assistance actually get it. And that is a huge problem. 

And again, we are paying costs; we are just paying them in other 

systems. 

Mr. ELLISON. That brings me to the next slide. 

It is funny you should mention that. So here, this next slide, I 

think, is interesting because we spend more than $270 billion a 

year on housing. We spend a lot of money on housing, just not too 

much of it goes to poor folks. 

This chart shows that the bulk of the investment benefits the 

most financially well-off because of all of the tax benefits for home 

ownership, the mortgage interest deduction, property tax deduction, capital gains exemption. 

In general, upper-income homeowners receive the greater benefit 

than do the low-income renters. And why is all this focus on trying 

to shrink the small pie we already have for low-income people trying to find a leg up in this system? Can anybody talk to me about 

this? 

Ma’am? 

Ms. GLOVER. In one of my recommendations, I recommended that 

in the context of overall tax reform, some thought be given to rebalancing home ownership and rent, but also directing the assistance 

to those with the greatest need. 

Mr. ELLISON. Thank you. 

Ms. GLOVER. And we know we are in resource-constrained environments, but we need to direct it to where the greatest need is. 

And I think that is the rebalancing of the approach. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr. 

Royce, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. 

45 

Mr. ROYCE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

And I thank the witnesses here for joining us today. 

As Chairman Hensarling already mentioned, the Moving to Work 

program has largely been a success and also an initiative that the 

housing authority of the County of San Bernardino has pioneered 

to the benefit of many of my constituents. 

And I think the extension of preexisting MTW contracts at public 

housing authorities, including San Bernardino which has a rental 

assistance utilization rate of higher than 90 percent, has been significantly delayed. It still remains undone. 

Mr. Cabrera, let me ask you, what ramifications will the delay 

by HUD have on MTW housing authorities? And how is HUD gutting the original intent of the program, as you referenced in your 

testimony? 

Mr. CABRERA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think that the real 

concern I have about HUD delaying is that eventually those contracts expire and what you have is a housing authority going back 

to the usual rubric, the Housing Act of 1937, and all of the impacts. 

San Bernardino County is currently developing in San 

Bernardino itself and they are redeveloping public housing, their 

own public housing. That is the kind of thing that will stall that 

effort. And that would be the case in San Bernardino County. That 

would be the case for the San Diego Housing Commission. That 

would be the case for Santa Clara. 

It is important that the flexibility that has been inherent in the 

MTW agreements that were drafted frankly from 1999, because it 

came into being in 1998, through roughly 2008, that it stay that 

way. 

If you take away that flexibility, you will take away the capacity 

of these housing authorities to do as much as they can do with respect to their properties and their tenants. 

Mr. ROYCE. I appreciate that. 

Changing gears, Mr. Husock, when you think about Fannie Mae 

and Freddie Mac and the central role they played in the financial 

crisis, do you ever ask yourself, if only they had listened? And I say 

that because, as you wrote in the pages of The Wall Street Journal 

in 2004, ‘‘Federally chartered but privately owned, Fannie Mae, 

with a trillion dollars in assets, is not the riskless public service 

entity it represents itself to be.’’ 

And while you and I and then-Federal Reserve Chairman Greenspan and others cried loudly at that time of systemic risk regulation, I had a bill to regulate systemic risk there, and it called for 

higher capital and less leveraging, it was 100 to one leveraging, 

and scaled back GSEs. Sadly, those warnings fell on deaf ears here 

on Capitol Hill. 

And I don’t say this to rehash history, although I think amnesia, 

as my colleague from New York mentioned earlier, is suffered on 

a bipartisan basis, but rather I hope that we might learn from the 

past. 

And specifically, I was hoping that you could comment briefly on 

the role the affordable housing goals had in the collapse of the 

GSEs and the potential impact of reopening the credit spigot with 

FHFA this year, calling for the Housing Trust Fund to be capitalized by Fannie and Freddie. 

46 

Is there not a better way to accomplish the goals of home ownership within a market-based system than replaying this particular 

angle? 

Mr. HUSOCK. Thank you, Congressman Royce. I am pleased that 

somebody dug out that 2004 article, and I am flattered that you 

mentioned it for the record. 

Mr. ROYCE. Oh, I have quoted you over the years. So, thank you. 

Mr. HUSOCK. I appreciate that. I worry about the affordable 

housing goals, and I worried about them at the time, not because 

I did not think home ownership is a valuable asset for communities. I worry that if lenders are encouraged to make loans to noncredit-worthy individuals that their neighbors, their struggling 

neighbors who are making the payments on their own houses are 

going to see their values collapse when foreclosure strikes in their 

neighborhood. 

And we have seen in the wake of the financial crisis that is exactly what happened, and that poor and working-class neighborhoods were the most adversely affected by the affordable housing 

goals that have always been advanced in their name. That is my 

concern. 

And so, I think we would be remiss in continuing those affordable housing goals and in directing more funds to similar purposes. 

Mr. ROYCE. Thank you. 

Again, I thank these witnesses. 

And Mr. Chairman, thank you for this hearing. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentlelady from Utah, Mrs. Love. 

Mrs. LOVE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you all for being here today. 

I am actually encouraged by what I have been hearing from the 

panel. And I hope that we wouldn’t take these hearings for granted, that we can come out of this hearing with some good ideas on 

how we are going to help our fellow Americans. 

First of all, what I would like to focus on today is the bigger picture, and how HUD can play a part in ending inter-generational 

poverty. 

I have heard a lot today about how certain well-intentioned policies and programs to combat poverty, to the defense of HUD, there 

are some places where it has helped. But I also believe that it has 

resulted in the creation of a bureaucratic and complex web of HUD 

programs that eventually, I think, entrench poverty and act as a 

barrier to upward mobility. 

So just very quickly, have any of you ever been to the State of 

Utah? Yes? Okay, it is a great State, right? Okay. My home State 

of Utah is actually unique in having adopted and focused specifically on inter-generational poverty. In fact, in 2012 the Utah State 

legislature adopted the Inter-Generational Poverty Mitigations Act. 

And it is to help identify the barriers that trap families in intergenerational poverty and really find solutions to help families 

break out of those barriers and achieve a life of dignity and selfreliance. 

But it is also very important to note that before that Act—the 

Act is actually dealing with a broader perspective, and housing is 

a portion of that, and before that we realized that when we were 

47 

working on housing stability and having people get into homes that 

it was necessary and important, but it was far from enough to actually end the cycle of inter-generational poverty. 

Which one of the concerns that we have are people coming in, 

again, going into the same programs, instead of getting people completely out of these programs. 

So with that being said, one of the questions I have for you, Ms. 

Glover, is you actually mentioned that local governments have to 

have the flexibility to do what they need to in terms of helping out 

with housing. What are your thoughts about giving local government or what do you think we can do to give them more flexibility 

to deal with these problems on a local level? 

Ms. GLOVER. Thank you very much for the question. I think that 

is why there has been so much discussion about Moving to Work. 

It is an unfortunate name for a program that really is about eliminating the overregulation, if you will, of providing housing in a locality. 

Mrs. LOVE. Yes. 

Ms. GLOVER. And what it seeks to do is that it allows the local 

authority working with local players, local service providers, local 

foundations to solve the problem in that jurisdiction. Utah is very 

different than Georgia, California, and so on and so forth. 

Mrs. LOVE. That is right. 

Ms. GLOVER. And so I think in a responsible way, and if there 

are articulated and agreed outcomes and performance metrics, you 

can take the same dollars that are being allocated and put it into 

a pool, come up with a strategic plan, and then implement the 

things that are solving problems in that locality, be it homelessness, be it supportive housing needs, be it elderly housing. It also 

incents other players to come and participate because it also creates certainty. 

And I think one of the things that Mr. Cabrera talked about is 

investors want to know, well, what is the playing field going to be 

so that they aren’t constantly reacting to changing— 

Mrs. LOVE. Thank you. I have two more questions I have to get 

to, in seconds. 

The other thing I wanted to say is, do you believe that HUD 

needs to interface with some other interventions to help break the 

cycle? I feel as if we are being a little too micro instead of macro, 

instead of looking at all the other pictures to try and see what we 

can do to make sure that poverty is something that we actually 

break, inter-generational poverty. I think it can be done. 

Mr. CABRERA. Like many Federal agencies, HUD handles data 

very haphazardly. And it is not because of HUD; it is because of 

their tools. I think given where we are, some serious thought has 

to be given to how you track certain outcomes that you want using 

data. And I think that goes toward, for example, the InterGenerational Poverty Act. 

Mrs. LOVE. Yes. I would just like to mention that all of those programs are outcome-based also. And that is why Utah has done so 

well. 

Thank you. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentlelady has expired. 

48 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Arkansas, Mr. 

Hill. 

Mr. HILL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I thank you and the ranking member for convening this hearing. 

And I thank the panel for their patience, and for staying for such 

a long period of time. 

I want to thank Chairman Luetkemeyer for joining me in Little 

Rock and visiting our public housing authority and taking a tour 

of both elderly facilities as well as both old and new as well as 

hearing plans for some new RAD projects in Little Rock that I 

think will be quite, quite interesting and quite beneficial to the 

community. 

Also, in listening to the conversation this morning, I really do 

think we need to defend helping people and not defend the agency, 

not confuse the defense of 50 years of HUD versus the programs 

and ideas and concepts of helping people better their lives and getting out of poverty. So I want to associate myself with the gentleman from Arizona’s comments in that regard. 

And also, just speaking to the ranking member’s opening statement, I think about 16 percent of HUD residents are over 62, was 

one of the things that she raised. And about 46 percent are actually 

working age. 

So I really do think this idea of getting our communities to work 

well to get people in public housing off with solutions for child care, 

transportation, getting to work is so very, very important, since 46 

percent of people in public housing are of working age, not retired. 

I want to leave that concept here, floating around the room. 

Mr. Cabrera, my first question for you is, since 80 percent of 

HUD’s budget is really distributed either through the formulas 

that go out to the public housing agencies or into the Section 8 program, if we got the technology investment you wanted, could we 

have fewer than 7,800 people working at HUD, do you think? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think you are going to have fewer than 7,800 

people working at HUD no matter what, over time. 

Mr. HILL. How would you see technology? At the public housing 

authority in Little Rock, one of their biggest complaints, and Ms. 

Glover may have a view on this as well, was just terrible back-office IT support for their mission. 

Mr. CABRERA. I think that is right. I think one of the problems 

is, look, whatever data HUD collects, it essentially is used to report 

to you and to the American people. That data is extremely uneven; 

sometimes, it is very, very good. So one that comes to mind, one 

data point that comes to mind that is very good is VMS data. 

Mr. HILL. What does that mean? 

Mr. CABRERA. VMS is voucher management system data. It gives 

you a very good picture month to month about utilization once the 

data is scrubbed. Why is that? Well, it is because over time we 

have put in tools in order to minimize the misuse, the fraudulent 

use of Section 8. 

So we have become very, very good at looking at VMS data to 

report back to Congress how that is going, mostly because Section 

8 is the biggest pot, if you think about $19.7 billion and add another $9 billion, that is a lot of money. 

49 

But at the end of the day, what it really means is that a lot of 

the other tools are left by the wayside. And one of the things, just 

as someone who developed and as someone who was in other parts 

of housing, that I think would be a worthwhile endeavor would be, 

what are the things that we want to know that housing is being 

used for positively across subsidy pools. 

So if I am thinking about someone who is elderly, there are 

points of contact. How are kids being educated? 

Mr. HILL. Those are very good examples. 

Ms. Glover, I appreciated the comment, and Mr. Briggs, too, on 

rents. All of you have addressed rents. Mr. Husock, as well. I think 

you all had good points, good comments. 

What about the individual savings accounts that are a part of 

HUD’s program? Did you use those in Atlanta to help people have 

that fixed rent, qualify for the fixed rent, and then put money in 

savings so they are saving money for down payment assistance? 

That is part of the HUD program, I wondered if you took advantage of it? 

Ms. GLOVER. We did. And we were able to do it more powerfully 

with the Moving to Work deregulation because we were then able 

to partner with foundations and other organizations. And so, we 

didn’t have to use the program that was prescribed by HUD; we 

were able to design it so that it worked with the people who had 

deep experience in working with those types of accounts. 

Mr. HILL. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, my time has expired. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The gentleman yields back. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. 

Rothfus. 

Mr. ROTHFUS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I thank the panel for joining us this afternoon, and for being 

here for a few hours to talk about the 50th anniversary of HUD. 

It is good to see you again, Mr. Cabrera. 

I would like to tell you a little bit about an organization in my 

district and get some feedback. This organization is called Hearth. 

It provides transitional housing services to victims of domestic violence, under the continuum of care program. It is a great organization that is truly saving lives in western Pennsylvania. In accordance with its mission, Hearth houses women seeking shelter from 

abusive relationships. 

Earlier this year, they were told by Allegheny County that by 

serving only women, they were in violation of HUD guidelines and 

would lose funding. In a subsequent conference call, HUD indicated 

that Hearth could continue serving women if the county agreed. 

Unfortunately, Hearth has found itself at an impasse and its funding for the 2016 Fiscal Year lapsed without a resolution. 

Based on your experience, is it that your sense that HUD rules 

allow agencies such as Hearth to serve sub-populations, including 

domestic violence victims? 

Mr. CABRERA. I think I am speechless. HUD has adopted all the 

concepts in VAWA for now a decade-plus, right, with reauthorization. Women are a special classification constitutionally. I am 

struggling to understand how that would be the determination on 

the one hand. 

50 

On the other hand, as you well know, I am not terribly surprised. 

And I think that you are highlighting one of the problems, and that 

is there is a rigidity to policy decision-making that causes those 

kinds of results, that really has to be revisited. 

Mr. ROTHFUS. Does it seem fair that Hearth would lose funding 

just for helping women? 

Mr. CABRERA. Unequivocally, no. But not knowing the greater 

facts, not knowing if there is something else, some other dynamic 

that I am unaware of, just on the facts that you have portrayed to 

me, I am struggling with that one. 

Mr. ROTHFUS. Thank you. In your testimony you argue that 

housing policy services and value to the taxpayer would improve if 

HUD encouraged more competition, not less. 

Can you give some examples of ways that the Federal Government can increase competition in the affordable housing sector? 

Mr. CABRERA. The best example I know is the one I just was involved with. So in the case, for example, of performance-based contract administration, that is a very large contract, it roughly can 

be as high, on occasion, as an $845 million contract. HUD went out 

and undertook a NOFA. And in that NOFA, HUD added rules that 

are not supported in law and that killed the competition from one 

of the competitors most naturally to be a competitor, public housing 

authorities. 

And essentially, it culminated in a lawsuit. That lawsuit has 

been resolved. The plaintiffs, the public housing authorities and 

their instrumentalities, won that lawsuit. Thankfully, I was part of 

that team. And it is a great example of what HUD should not do. 

I think what happens is that there is this press to make a lot 

of people happy and HUD, in so doing, makes no one happy. And 

I think that one of the things that HUD needs to do better, I think 

it is also in my testimony, is it needs to listen better in terms of 

what it is trying to accomplish and who can take them there within 

the context of the Acts that govern HUD, in this case the Housing 

Act of 1937, FDCAA, and CICA. 

Mr. ROTHFUS. Mr. Husock, you have written extensively about 

the inherent flaws of HUD. In your testimony, you argue that at 

its core HUD was predicated on a deeply pessimistic view about 

American society that the new urban poor of the 1960s, the minority poor, would not be able to advance up the socioeconomic ladder 

as had their predecessors in poor city neighborhoods. 

As we look towards reforming HUD and improving the prospects 

of Americans who receive housing assistance, what are some of the 

programs or practices that follow from HUD’s flawed pessimistic 

foundation? How can we put HUD on a more optimistic footing? 

Mr. HUSOCK. Yes, and that is why I have been trying to be constructive in my testimony, whatever doubts I may have had about 

the original wisdom. 

I think that incentivizing work and self-improvement for those 

who are able-bodied and able to work or within HUD housing lies 

at the core. It would align our housing policy with our social policy 

as embodied by the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families program and the Welfare Reform Act of 1995. 

I think incentivizing work and making sure that people have the 

support they need, as Xavier Briggs and everybody on this panel 

51 

have said, work incentives must be provided along with work supports. But incentivizing work and self-improvement, I think that 

would be the biggest change. 

Mr. ROTHFUS. I yield back. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Maine, Mr. 

Poliquin. 

Mr. POLIQUIN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

I appreciate you scheduling this terrific and very important hearing. 

I thank all of the folks who are here to testify today. 

It is my opinion as a Member of Congress that there are a handful of really important things that we do in the Federal Government, one of which is to protect our country and protect our citizens. National security is of paramount importance. 

Then, we need to make sure we create the building blocks, the 

cornerstones for a stronger economy, one that grows, let the private 

sector grow, create jobs as you go along that path such that folks 

have more opportunities to life with paychecks and more freedom. 

I also think our Federal Government is in the business of compassion. We need to make sure that those who are unable to help 

themselves or those who need a hand up, that we help them. 

Now, I needn’t remind everybody in this room, because we talk 

about this on a regular basis, that we have already paid our bills 

and we are $18 trillion in debt as a nation: $18 trillion. And the 

annual debt service payments, the interest payments today on that 

debt is about $230 billion a year, about twice what we spend in veterans’ benefits. So we are in one heck of a hole. 

Now, what that means to me as a Member of Congress, and I am 

sure to all of us public officials, is that we need to stretch every 

dollar as thin as we can because it is a limited resource and we 

are fiduciaries of taxpayer money. 

When I was State treasurer up in Maine, I sat on our public 

housing authority board. They have been doing stuff the same way 

forever. And I asked them a couple of questions at a board meeting 

that seemed to stump them, very simple questions. Number one, do 

we have a waiting list for families trying to come out of the cold? 

Now, Maine has long winters, and we have the oldest housing infrastructure in the country. Do we have a waiting list? And there 

was no good answer, but we pieced it together the best we could. 

There are about 6,000 families in the State of Maine looking to get 

out of the cold. 

And I asked them another question, what does it cost? What does 

it cost to build these affordable apartments, the subsidized apartments? And you would have thought that I mentioned that the 

world was flat; they just didn’t have an answer. The board didn’t 

know. The folks in the front office sort of knew, but never told the 

board. 

The bottom line is, we are spending about $300,000 for one-bedroom apartments in Maine when the average price of a single-family home on a quarter acre with three bedrooms, two baths, and a 

garage was half that price. 

Now, where is the compassion? We are in the business of helping 

people? How in the dickens can you help people come out of the 

52 

cold, put a warm roof above their heads so they can raise their 

families, or elderly folks coming out of the cold? We are spending 

twice what we should be, I would argue 2 or 3 times what you 

should do on public housing. Let us make that dollar stretch. 

Now, we changed the rules up in Maine. We gave developers incentives to drive down the costs of those units instead of just artificially and continuously approving cost overruns. We said, you don’t 

need solar panels on the roof that never have a payback. And we 

drove down the cost of these units by about 35 percent. By the time 

I left, it was still going down, and we helped hundreds more people. 

That is the compassion that we need to do with limited resources 

in this country. 

So my question to you, Mr. Cabrera is, as you have been in the 

development space, HUD is a big organization with a lot of moving 

parts. Do we have room at HUD within this bureaucracy to drive 

down the cost of public housing so we can help more people? 

Mr. CABRERA. HUD doesn’t build public housing. 

Mr. POLIQUIN. But do we have incentives for those that do, that 

we can use to help stretch that dollar? 

Mr. CABRERA. You would be stunned at what has been done thus 

far. That is what asset management was for; it was to basically 

drive down the cost centers at public housing authorities. 

If I had to guess, the housing authority that you were on the 

board of was probably using the low-income housing tax credit. 

Mr. POLIQUIN. Somewhat, yes, but still a Section 8. 

Mr. CABRERA. So if that is the case, that is less a public housing 

issue and it is more a development issue. 

Mr. POLIQUIN. Do we have the data, Mr. Cabrera, to know what 

these units are costing us? Do we even have that data? 

Mr. CABRERA. Yes, there is data, it is just not from the Federal 

Government. It depends upon where you are. You can wind up in 

places where the per-unit cost is considerably less than $300,000. 

You can wind up in places where the per-unit cost is more. But 

keep in mind that those units generally serve people for 50 to 55 

years. 

Mr. POLIQUIN. Let us all be mindful that we have to stretch 

these dollars and to help as many people as we can. 

Thank you all very much. 

Chairman HENSARLING. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

There being no other Members in the queue, I would like to 

thank our witnesses for their testimony today. Thank you for your 

patience as well. 

The Chair notes that some Members may have additional questions for this panel, which they may wish to submit in writing. 

Without objection, the hearing record will remain open for 5 legislative days for Members to submit written questions to these witnesses and to place their responses in the record. Also, without objection, Members will have 5 legislative days to submit extraneous 

materials to the Chair for inclusion in the record. 

This hearing stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:57 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.] 

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