Appearing at the National Low Income Housing Coalition’s conference in Washington, D.C., Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Ben Carson stated that the Trump administration will seek to include housing funding in its infrastructure bill.
Under the administration’s fiscal year 2018 budget blueprint, more than $6 billion will be cut from HUD’s budget.
“The part that people are not hearing, even though I’ve said it several times, is that this administration considers housing a significant part of infrastructure in our country,” Carson said. “And as such, the infrastructure bill that’s being worked on has a significant inclusion of housing in it.”
Carson also tried to reassure conference attendees that “nobody’s going to be thrown out on the street.” Carson addressed concerns regarding HUD’s Section 202 and Section 811 programs.
Section 202 provides housing for the elderly; the budget blueprint calls for a budget cut of $42 million to that program. Section 811 provides housing for people with disabilities and faces a proposed cut of $29 million under the proposal.
“There is no one — Section 811, 202 — no one is going to be thrown out on the street,” he said. “What would that accomplish? That doesn’t make any sense and is certainly not going to happen while I’m around. We do have a responsibility.”
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