U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Battle Ground, co-sponsored a bill introduced to the House floor last week that would establish a congressional task force on affordable housing.
H.R. 3211, or the Task Force on the Impact of the Affordable Housing Crisis Act, would create an 18-member body of experts to study the impact of a dearth of affordable housing nationwide.
The members would be appointed by the majority and minority leaders of the House and Senate — four from each party of both chambers, and two additional co-chairs appointed jointly.
Affordable housing is a living situation that doesn’t cost more than 30 percent of the resident’s income, including utilities. The affordability umbrella also includes homes that exceed that 30 percent mark but are subsidized by a local or federal housing program, according to the text of the bill.
In Clark County, the 2017 American Community Survey (the most recent data available) reports that 29.1 percent of homeowners pay more than 30 percent of their monthly income into their mortgage.
For renters, data show the cost of living as a portion of income is even higher — 48.9 percent spend more than 30 percent of their monthly income on rent.
It’s indicative of a nationwide problem. The portion of people exceeding the affordability threshold in Clark County is within a couple percentage points of the national average, for both homeowners and renters.
“When the majority of your monthly income goes toward paying rent or a mortgage, there is little money left over to pay bills, buy groceries and cover emergencies,” Herrera Beutler said in a media release. “I continue to speak with residents here who are struggling to balance the high cost of housing with saving for the future.”
The task force would have three objectives: studying the impact that a lack of affordable housing has on other areas of life, quantifying the costs incurred by other public programs due to a lack of affordable housing and making recommendations to Congress on how to use this information.
It’s a large-scale version of a proposal that already operates in Vancouver, where city leadership designated a temporary Affordable Housing Task Force in 2015. That group turned its attention toward stronger tenant protections, requiring longer notice periods for evictions, and prohibiting landlords from discriminating against tenants receiving state or federal rent subsidies, such as Social Security.
The new House resolution was introduced June 11 by Rep. Scott Peters, D-Calif. It’s co-sponsored by fellow California Democrat Rep. Ro Khanna and Herrera Beutler.
“My colleague Congressman Scott Peters and I are leading this bipartisan effort to address the affordable housing crisis and bring real solutions to Southwest Washington and communities across the country,” Herrera Beutler said in the media release.
The bill is identical to S. 3231, last year’s Senate bill of the same name, which died in committee after being introduced in July 2018 by Sen. Todd Young, R-Ind.
