Housing Inspections Accountability Act

To require the Secretaries of Housing and Urban Development and Agriculture to submit annual reports to the Congress regarding dwelling units in assisted housing that fail property inspections, and for other purposes. 1. Short title This Act may be cited as the Housing Inspections Accountability Act 2. Annual reports and database regarding failed inspections (a) Reports (1) Contents Not later than the expiration of the 12-month period beginning on the date of the enactment of this Act and annually thereafter, the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and the Secretary of Agriculture shall jointly submit to the Committee on Financial Services of the House of Representatives and the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs of the Senate a report— (A) identifying— (i) all inspections of covered properties conducted during the preceding 12 months that resulted in a failing or unsatisfactory score for the property; (ii) the program under which such property was assisted at the time of the inspection; (iii) the defects and violations identified by the inspection and the status of remediation with respect to such defects and violations; (iv) the number of households in such properties on waiting lists to be moved to a different unit, the reasons they need a different unit, the duration that they have been on such a waiting list, and the typical duration before a household on such a waiting list is moved to a different unit or property; and (v) the number of covered properties with a failing score that have requested an appeal and the share of covered properties that were granted an appeal; and (B) including such other information that either such Secretary considers relevant. (2) Requirements Each Secretary identified in paragraph (1) shall make the reports submitted pursuant to such paragraph publicly available online and shall ensure that the reports do not include any personally identifiable information. (3) Covered property For purposes of this subsection, the term covered property (b) Database (1) In general Not later than the expiration of the 12-month period beginning on the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretaries identified in subsection (a)(1) shall jointly develop, and make publicly available online, a searchable database that enables the public to search, find, and download data regarding the inspection status and scores of individual housing projects provided rental assistance under a rental assistance program administered by either such Secretary, information regarding defects identified in individual housing projects, and information regarding whether such defects have been resolved. (2) Updating The Secretaries identified in subsection (a)(1) shall— (A) update the information in the database developed pursuant to paragraph (1) regularly to reflect current information regarding the status and inspection scores for individual housing projects; and (B) ensure that the database is updated with any newly determined score for a project not later than 30 days after such score is determined. (3) Privacy protection The database developed pursuant to paragraph (1) shall not make available any personally identifiable information.

Summary: Housing Inspections Accountability Act This bill requires the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to jointly report on failed property inspections of housing projects that receive rental assistance through programs administered by HUD or USDA. HUD and USDA must also make information about failed housing inspections available through a public database.