DC Mayor Muriel Bowser said in a release that the city is planning to invest an additional $400 million into affordable housing through the Housing Production Trust Fund in the next two years.
The investment comes as part of the mayor’s supplemental budget for Fiscal Year 2021 — $150 million — and her proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2022 — $250 million — in a record-setting annual amount allocated by the District to affordable housing.
With the program, Bowser is planning to deliver a total of 2,700 units of affordable housing over the next two to three years, with up to 1,100 of those units deeply affordable.
The city will also boost its Local Rent Supplement Program (LRSP) for households earning at or below 30 percent of the area’s median family income, or around $38,700 yearly for a family of four.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has shown how fragile our housing ecosystem is and how much our residents depend on us to add more safe and stable affordable housing,” Bowser said in her release. “With today’s announcement, we are doubling down on six years of work to preserve and create affordable housing and expediting progress toward our 12,000 affordable housing unit goal. Our residents cannot wait for housing affordability so we are pushing forward right now.”
Fueled by a new $400M commitment, @MayorBowser has now invested $1Billion into our most powerful tool to build/preserve #AffordableHousing: the Housing Production Trust Fund
The Mayor made DC the 1st in the nation to set #affordablehousing goals by neighborhood. #36000by2025 pic.twitter.com/PmV7kh6sRx
— John J. Falcicchio (@falcicchio) May 25, 2021
The mayor’s investment into the Housing Production Trust Fund during her time in office — through a commitment of at least $100 million every year since 2015 — has reached $1 billion with the latest proposals. They are expected to pass the DC Council in the coming weeks.
Approximately $93 million of the $400 million investment will go towards building 462 net new affordable units and preserving another 175 affordable units as part of eight projects, impacting 637 affordable units.
“The Housing Production Trust Fund has proved to be our highest impact affordable housing tool, successfully impacting more than 10,000 homes since 2015,” said Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development John Falcicchio. “With this investment and hard work by our housing partners, our ambitious goal to equitably distribute affordable housing across the city is getting closer to fruition than ever before”.
Founded by the Housing Production Trust Fund Act of 1988, the Housing Production Trust Fund is a special revenue fund and serves as the District’s major tool to produce and preserve affordable housing. It is administered by the Department of Housing and Community Development.