Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

Housing

Reforming HUD’s “Section 3” Requirements Can Leverage Federal Investments in Housing To Expand Economic Opportunity

With unemployment rising and the federal government making new investments in affordable housing, it is an important time to reform “Section 3,” the federal requirement that HUD-funded projects meet goals for contracting, hiring, and providing job training to low-income people to work on these projects. Doing so would help low-income people make the transition to permanent, decent-paying jobs in the private sector and thereby to reduce poverty. Read more

Testimony: Will Fischer on the Section Eight Voucher Reform Act

Before the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity

The Section 8 Voucher Reform Act (SEVRA) would take a series of important, timely steps to strengthen the voucher program, the nation's most widely-used low-income housing program. At a time when poverty and homelessness are rising, this bill would make housing affordable to more needy families, and provide more flexible and effective assistance. Read more

Podcast: Will Fischer Discusses His Testimony

Topics

Basics

Policy Basics: The Housing Voucher Choice Program:
The Housing Choice Voucher Program, (“Section 8”), the nation’s largest federal low-income housing program, provides roughly 2 million low-income families with vouchers they can use to rent housing of their choice in the private market.

Policy Basics: Introduction to Public Housing:
The nation’s 14,000 public housing developments, generally owned and operated by local agencies, provide homes to more than 2 million low-income Americans, most of whom are elderly or have a disability.

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Will Fischer

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Douglas Rice

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Barbara Sard

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The Center works with state and local housing agencies and advocates to improve the effectiveness of federal low-income housing programs — particularly the Housing Choice Voucher Program. We also examine the role that well-designed housing assistance programs can play in advancing goals such as reducing the concentration of poverty.