I have been spending some time this week trying to understand the way the FEMA temporary housing assistance programs have been working for the victims of Hurricane Ike. Even as a person who has spent considerable time reading and studying the FEMA programs and guidelines I have found it difficult to comprehend what is going [...]
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Archive | October, 2008
Confusion and delays plague temporary housing programs for Hurricane Ike survivors
October 30, 2008
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New report profiles loan delinquencies and foreclosures in Texas cities
October 29, 2008
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A collaboration between LISC and the Urban Institute has produced a data set with “foreclosure needs scores” within Community Development Block Grant jurisdictions within each state. These scores incorporate measures of subprime lending, foreclosures, delinquency, and vacancies to help state and local officials quickly assess the relative needs of different jurisdictions for neighborhood stabilization funding. [...]
Read moreBo McCarver’s weekly housing news compilation – 10/29/2008
October 29, 2008
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Administration of the $700 billion bailout has already taken new and questionable turns. While the “Main Street versus Wall Street” argument reverberates along campaign trails, foreclosure rates continue to rise and new home prices plunge as the recession hardens and becomes a general depression. Meanwhile, Texas lawmakers have blasted FEMA for being callous and ineffective [...]
Read moreWe endorse Texas Attorney General Abbott’s call for mortgage deferment legislation to help struggling homeowners
October 24, 2008
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The Texas Low Income Housing Information Service (TxLIHIS) applauds and endorses Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott’s proposal today for a legislative initiative aimed at improving the state’s foreclosure process and helping Texas homeowners stay in their homes. The attorney general asked the Texas Legislature to enact the Texas Foreclosure Deferment Act. Under the proposed Act, [...]
Read moreBrooke Boston, state housing deputy director, is stepping down
October 23, 2008
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Brooke Boston, who has served as Deputy Director for Programs at the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs for more than eight years, is stepping down to take a position as Deputy Director for the City of Austin’s Neighborhood Housing and Community Development Office. Brooke is a remarkably competent, dedicated and highly effective government housing [...]
Read moreA public housing advocate senses tide turning against Galvestion public housing rebuilding
October 23, 2008
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Lenwood Johnson, Texas’ foremost public housing advocate, sent me an email this afternoon about the prospects for rebuilding public housing in Galveston. Lenwood fought a long fight to save Allen Parkway Village public housing development in Houston and he can sense the political considerations mounting for not rebuilding the public housing in Galveston. Here is [...]
Read moreBo McCarver’s weekly housing news compliation – 10/22/2008
October 22, 2008
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This week we learned how Freddie Mac administrators thwarted a bill that would have provided the oversight to possibly avoid the present mortgage mess. Republican senators and other party leaders were able to derail the corrective legislation. Meanwhile, FEMA continues to putter and fumble in the wake of Hurricane Ike. Coastal residents are still camping [...]
Read moreIke housing damages said to be $8.5 billion in Harris County; more than 1/2 of Houston apartments damaged
October 21, 2008
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Two stories in today’s Houston Chronicle point to the staggering cost of housing damages. We are still waiting for the FEMA damage estimates to be completed. But for now, consider these estimates. Ike toll on county homes $8.5 billion by Mike Snyder… Less than two weeks after Ike made landfall Sept. 13, the housing authority [...]
Read moreIt should be about more than just helping the middle class
October 20, 2008
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Let’s remember there once was a time when a US President enjoyed popularity for rallying our country to end poverty.
Read moreNearly 306,000 Ike damaged properties in Texas have been reviewed by FEMA inspectors
October 19, 2008
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Five weeks after Hurricane Ike made landfall, state and federal financial assistance to help Texas homeowners, renters and businesses recover from uninsured and under insured losses exceeds $316 million according to a FEMA press release this week. As of Thursday, Oct. 16 the Texas statistics are: $261 million approved in grants for individuals. Of that, [...]
Read moreHomeowners rebuilding from Hurricane Ike have basically no consumer protection in Texas
October 18, 2008
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Houston Mayor Bill White threw in the towel this week, ending his modest effort to provide rudimentary consumer protections to Houston homeowners who must hire contractors to repair their homes damaged by Hurricane Ike. White proposed an ordnance that would have required all contractors doing work in Houston to register with the city. The proposal [...]
Read moreSoutheast Texas elected leaders demand temporary FEMA trailers despite health risks
October 17, 2008
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Some local elected officials are downright furious with FEMA because FEMA will not put travel trailers on the property of homeowners who can’t live in their houses because of damage from Hurricane Ike. The inability to get temporary housing back into cities in Orange County has caused great hardships for the families and headaches for [...]
Read moreGov. Perry picks Eckels, Newby to lead Hurricane Ike recovery and coordination effort
October 16, 2008
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Governor Perry has designated a former Harris County Judge and the Governor’s current chief of staff to “co-lead an effort involving residents, business leaders, and local and federal officials focused on ensuring Texas communities devastated by Hurricane Ike get the resources necessary to rebuild.” This move probably reflects the governor’s appreciation for the magnitude of [...]
Read moreBo McCarver’s weekly housing news compliation – 10/15/2008
October 15, 2008
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For a pdf version of the full stories and other contextual articles in social, economic and political areas, contact Bo McCarver at bmccarver@austin.rr.com White House Overhauling Rescue Plan By Edmund Andrews and Mark Landier New York Times October 12, 200 Washington – As international leaders gathered here on Saturday to grapple with the global financial [...]
Read moreCity Council to vote (finally) on East Austin Homestead Preservation District
October 14, 2008
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On Thursday October 16th the Austin City Council will take up the issue of creating the Homestead Preservation District. This will create a funding mechanism for the purpose of creating and maintaining affordable housing in East Austin. The Homestead Preservation Districts and Reinvestment Zones Statute provides tools to help ease the ill effects of gentrification, [...]
Read moreTexas farmworker housing problems impact state’s agriculture industry
October 13, 2008
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Motivation Education & Training, Inc (MET) the leading leading advocate and social service provider for Texas farmworkers. It was founded for the purpose of providing academic and vocational training to migrant and seasonal farm workers, with the objective of furthering economic self-sufficiency. MET has conducted programs to improve farmworkers’ housing situations since the 1970′s. Kathy [...]
Read moreAnalysis of HUD report on low scoring subsidized housing in Texas
October 12, 2008
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A total of 107 or 9.4 percent of HUD assisted housing apartment developments in Texas earned a very low score in the latest round of physical inspections. The HUD Real Estate Assessment Center (REAC) physical inspection scores measure, among other things, the condition of a property’s common areas, units, and utility systems. The developments with [...]
Read moreNational Housing Trust Fund becomes subject of political distortions
October 11, 2008
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Housing for the poor has been caught up in the partisan distortions of the political mudslinging season. This speaks poorly about those who spread these distortions. Let me me very clear. My organization does not endorse any political candidates. We exist to promote decent housing for low income Texans. Our work is more difficult when [...]
Read morePlease read this woman’s story and tell me how to address her housing problem
October 10, 2008
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One of the things that frustrates me the most is that I get a dozen or so emails each week from folks desperately looking for housing. Since I work on housing policy and programs and do not provide direct assistance there is little that I can can do to help other than refer them to [...]
Read moreMy recommendations for dealing with the low-income homeownership problems in Texas
October 9, 2008
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I was invited to testify today before the Texas Senate Intergovernmental Relations Committee on the status of state programs to provide owner-occupied housing for low income families. Here is my testimony. Testimony of John Henneberger, co-director before the Texas Senate Intergovernmental Relations Committee on the committee interim housing charges October 8, 2008 On the behalf [...]
Read moreBo McCarver’s weekly housing news compliation – 10/7/2008
October 8, 2008
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An autopsy of Fannie Mae is offered this week by the New York Times, which asserts conflicting pressures to back mortgages to low-income homeowners while turning profits generated much of the demise. As the Bush Administration begins to apply portions of the $700 Billion Bailout, CountryWide will address 30,000 troubled mortgages in Texas. Meanwhile, the [...]
Read moreAnother voice against the attack on the Community Reinvestment Act
October 7, 2008
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On October 3 Bill Moyers interviewed Emma Coleman Jordan about the mortgage meltdown and the latest cries that the Community Reinvestment Act is to blame. Coleman adds her voice to those of us who reject this nonsense. Coleman teaches commercial law and economic justice at Georgetown University. She’s a former White House Fellow and assistant [...]
Read moreThe big lie about the role of affordable lending goals in the collapse of Fannie Mae
October 6, 2008
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The Big Lie: Fannie Mae collapsed because of Congressional affordable housing goals and this, in turn, was the cause of the Wall Street collapse that resulted in the $700 billion federal bailout. The Big Lie has been spreading very rapidly through several sources: an oversimplification of the story by the mainstream media (see, for example, [...]
Read moreLBJ speech recalls struggle to bring low-income housing to Austin
October 5, 2008
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In 1968, at the end of his political career, with barely one month left in his term as president, LBJ came home to Austin. A small affordable housing project was being dedicated and the sponsors asked the president to make a few remarks. In his speech the president looked back and looked forward to the [...]
Read moreLBJ’s struggle to get Austin to accept public housing offers lessons for today
October 4, 2008
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Seventy years ago here, in Austin Texas, Lyndon Johnson a young, first-term congressman took up the cause of housing the poor as one of his first initiatives. His proposal that Austin house its poor sparked then as it does today great controversy. It stirred up issues of class and race and questions about the role [...]
Read moreBill O’Reilly vs Barney Frank shoutdown over Fannie Mae
October 3, 2008
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This video perfectly illustrates the deterioration in the quality of the policy discussion in the country today. Issues surrounding the government’s role in housing finance are serious and hugely important in people’s lives. The name calling and shouting illustrated in this video drowns out the attempt to have the necessary thoughtful discussion. Come on people! [...]
Read moreShifting the blame from subprime lenders and Wall Street to the victims
October 3, 2008
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It’s to be expected. Anti-government pundits and apologists for predatory lenders are spinning hard, trying to shift the blame for the mortgage crisis from bad lending policies brought about by Wall Street in cahoots with predatory lenders and onto the modest attempts by the government to deal with discriminatory home loan practices. This argument was [...]
Read moreBo McCarver’s weekly housing news compliation – 9/30/2008
October 2, 2008
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Tent cities continue to sprout across the nation as foreclosures soar and jobs disappear. The financial institutions that might generate funds for relief are busy realigning, merging or folding as the few solvent giants pick through the bones of the fallen. Recovery that would free capital for local rebuilding is years away, if then. The [...]
Read moreThanks for supporting our 20th anniversary
October 2, 2008
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On the behalf of the board and staff of the Texas Low Income Housing Information we want to thank the more than 200 people who turned out for your 20th anniversary celebration last night. We looked back at the accomplishments that have been made in affordable, low-income housing in Texas in the past twenty years. [...]
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- Mitt Romney at private fundraiser: I might eliminate HUD – The Washington Post
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Bo’s housing news clips: Study finds zoning segregates lower-income students in lower-scoring schools.
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Texas LIHTC housing program rocked by second earthquake in two months
- Low-Income Housing Program Compels Building in Poor Texas Areas – NYTimes.com
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Bo’s housing news clips: National home foreclosures and Galveston housing woes are top stories in recent weeks
