National Housing Law Project Urges HUD to Preserve Crucial Flood Protections

WASHINGTON D.C.—The National Housing Law Project (NHLP) today submitted a comment to Trump’s U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) opposing its proposal to eliminate critical flood protections for families living in HUD housing. The proposal puts poor and working families that rely on HUD assistance at greater risk of danger, displacement, and homelessness by reducing notification and mitigation requirements for homes that are vulnerable to flooding. HUD’s proposal is part of the Trump administration’s attempt to dismantle the government programs that keep people housed, safe, and healthy. 

“Flooding events have become more frequent and widespread, and put the health, safety, and livelihood of low-income families at risk. Tenants displaced from federally subsidized housing face an even more acute crisis, because they often endure temporary or permanent loss of their housing assistance,” wrote the National Housing Law Project in a comment to HUD. “Due to the personal and societal harm of extreme flooding events, HUD should work toward increasing the resilience of HUD-assisted properties. This proposed rule does the opposite.”

The proposal dramatically rolls back a 2024 final rule designed to protect HUD’s investments, preserve affordable housing, and shield poor and working tenants and homeowners from the financial and physical harms of flooding. The 2024 final rule implemented a new standard for evaluating flood risk based on climate-informed science, and requires that HUD-assisted owners and developers take steps to increase climate resilience and ensure resident safety. It also required consideration of environmental justice concerns.

The Trump administration’s roll back of the rule will cause severe economic and physical harm to tenants and homeowners living in flood-prone areas, as well as further decrease the country’s stock of already scarce affordable housing. Federally assisted homes are more likely to be located in census tracts with the greatest risk of losses from coastal and river flooding, and are especially vulnerable to flood damage. As climate change fuels more frequent and dangerous disasters, the risk to families living in HUD housing will only increase.

In a comment, NHLP urged HUD to rethink its wholesale rescission of the 2024 protections for the following reasons:

• HUD is reversing its own findings around the costs and financial benefits of the rule it aims to rescind without introducing any new evidence or data. HUD’s justification for reversing course is unsupported and insufficient.
• Due to climate change, building to avoid impacts from a 100-year (1% annual chance) flood is no longer adequate to protect HUD-assisted families and HUD’s investments from catastrophic flooding.
• HUD can and should extend additional flexibility to HUD-assisted multifamily properties undergoing capital improvements when it comes to elevation and floodproofing requirements in order to protect tenants from displacement.
• HUD’s proposed rule removes the requirement that people living in HUD-assisted housing be notified of flood risk, escape routes, and evacuation plans so that they can make informed choices for their families’ safety.
• Historic and contemporary public policy decisions have resulted in the disproportionate concentration of flood risk in minority communities. Environmental justice remains a critical consideration that should be preserved so as to avoid disproportionate adverse impacts on communities with histories of discriminatory treatment and disinvestment, especially Black communities and other communities of color.

Read NHLP’s full comment to HUD here.