National Housing Law Project Housing Law Bulletin

An important programmatic change would fold the Section 202 Elderly Housing and Section 811 Disabled Housing programs into the HOME program, with "fenced-off" funding. This is in addition to the proposed HOME funding level. State and local jurisdictions could leverage capital funding for these programs through a newly created HOME loan guarantee program.

The Budget proposes increasing FHA loan limits, abandoning the 250 separate loan limits that currently exist for a single nationwide limit. HUD projects that 600,000 more families can become homeowners through such a move.

The budget authority for some HUD programs are outlined in the chart below. More details will follow in the next Bulletin.

1. HUD, Closing the Opportunity Gap: Fiscal Year 1999 Budget Summary (Feb. 1998).
2. OMB, FY 1999 Passback, Department of Housing and Urban Development (Nov. 25, 1997) (hereafter Passback). The "passback" refers to both the document and the process embodied in it which lays out the Administration’s position on budget year program operations needs for each department.
3. Figures in brackets are included in larger category.
4. The Department proposes a new name for this program: Resident Opportunity and Supportive Services, comprised of the formerly discrete programs, Economic Development and Supportive Services (EDSS) and Tenant Opportunity Program (TOP), Passback, supra note 2, at 22.
5. Proposed as a mandatory expenditure under Title XX of the Social Security Act.
6. The Brownfields initiative refers to requested funding to clean up and revitalize environmentally compromised sites.