Sara Jacobs’ Plan to Address Housing Crisis Through Economic Stimulus
With expanded unemployment insurance and pandemic unemployment assistance from the CARES Act expiring months ago, families across the country, and here in San Diego, are facing a crisis. Researchers at Columbia University estimate that this year alone, the number of people experiencing homelessness could increase by between 40 and 45 percent. Even before COVID-19 and the economic conditions it created, housing in San Diego was simply unaffordable for too many families. Sara Jacobs believes that everyone should have a home to sleep in. We know that having a home is the first step in accessing other needs — like safety, better health, work, and education. That’s why Sara is putting out a plan to get San Diegans the assistance they need to stay in their homes through this emergency, and to ensure that any economic recovery addresses our housing needs.
Immediate Assistance
Families are struggling right now, and Congress needs to immediately pass legislation that provides relief. This should include a 12-month nationwide eviction and foreclosure moratorium that is in the HEROES Act. And we know that an eviction moratorium without support to renters and homeowners is just kicking the can down the road, so it must also include at least $100 billion in emergency rental assistance, and a $75 billion relief fund for homeowners so that families can be assured that they can stay in their homes even as these moratoriums run out and they are faced with months of accrued back-pay. And Congress should fund at least 750,000 Emergency Housing Vouchers targeted to the most vulnerable families. We must ensure that both renters, and small landlords who have invested their savings into homeownership, are able to make it through this crisis.
And we know that it is both more cost-effective, and better for families, to prevent eviction in the first place. So we need programs like those in the Housing Emergencies Lifeline Program (HELP) Act, which focus on preventing evictions by providing federal funding for legal counsel and emergency assistance in eviction courts, and limiting their effect on future credit scores. And we need to provide resources to homelessness service systems to rapidly rehouse those that have been evicted, and to provide safe non-congregate shelter alternatives.
The stimulus checks and additional $600 in expanded unemployment benefits in the CARES Act were able to prevent the worst effects of the economic crisis on families. Congress must extend the expanded unemployment benefits and the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA). And Congress should send out monthly stimulus checks to families, similar to the one-time payment that was in the CARES Act but with increased benefits for minor dependents. And this assistance should be extended until the unemployment rate reaches a certain level, instead of creating arbitrary political deadlines that have no correlation to our economic needs.
Addressing our underlying housing affordability crisis
Creating a more robust housing safety net. We need to make Section 8 housing vouchers universal housing vouchers, so that anyone who is eligible for housing assistance receives it — instead of only 1 in 8 applicants, as is the case right now. And we need to expand the use of small-area fair market rents to ensure that the vouchers are able to be utilized in the high-cost areas where they are most needed.
In Congress, Sara will co-sponsor the Rent Relief Act — which creates a refundable rental housing tax credit that would help individuals who live in rental housing and pay more than 30 percent of their income on rent. And she would go even further and allow this tax credit to be directed to a tax-exempt savings account that can be used for a down payment to buy a home.
And Sara supports the bipartisan Eviction Crisis Act which creates a new housing Emergency Assistance Fund and a national database and study on evictions.
Building more housing that is affordable. In Congress, Sara will support and co-sponsor the American Housing and Economic Mobility Act, which leverages federal funding to build new housing units for low- and middle-income families by investing in a Housing Trust Fund, a Capital Magnet Fund to leverage private dollars, and a Middle-Class Housing Emergency Fund. Sara believes that we need to invest at least $45 billion in the Housing Trust Fund. And we need to strengthen the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit, and restore its value since the Republican tax bill gutted it.
Sara supports new federal grants that require localities to reform land-use rules to be eligible, which can be used to build infrastructure, parks, roads, or schools. She also supports inclusive zoning as a criteria for determining prioritization of any new Community Development Block Grants (CDBG).
We should fund the Neighborhood Stabilization Program (NSP) that was created during the Great Recession which uses federal funds to reclaim and reutilize vacant properties. And we should ensure that all new housing built with federal subsidies is carbon neutral. We should also invest in green housing retrofits, like insulating buildings to make them more energy efficient and installing rooftop solar.
Lastly, with unemployment rates reaching record levels and still climbing, we have a unique opportunity to use federal funding to provide or subsidize jobs, and to help build (or retrofit) the housing that we so desperately need. During the Great Depression, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) employed almost half of all unemployed Americans. It built iconic buildings across the country, including the County Administration Building and Del Mar Fairground here in San Diego. Creating a modern WPA that employs out of work Americans to build housing, with protections in place so that it scales existing capacity rather than displacing jobs, would address both the high unemployment, and the need for more housing.
