House Committee Begins Consideration of Housing Voucher Bill

This week, the House Financial Services Committee began consideration of the Section 8 Voucher Reform Act (H.R. 3045), sponsored by Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA).

The Section 8 voucher program provides monetary vouchers for low-income families to obtain privately owned rental housing. Section 8 is the largest federal program designed to provide affordable housing to low-income families, serving more than two million households.

The measure would authorize “such sums as necessary” for FY2010 through FY2014 to renew all expiring annual contributions contracts contracts between the Department of Housing and Urban Development and public housing authorities for tenant-based assistance and provide tenant-based emergency voucher assistance for the protection of victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, or stalking, among other provisions.

The legislation also would exclude child care expenses from the calculation of alternative rent by public housing authorities.

During consideration of H.R. 3045, the committee adopted:

• an amendment by Rep. Gary Miller (R-CA) to authorize funding for family self-sufficiency activities for low-income families under the Moving to Work program, which provides incentives to get Section 8 recipients into jobs and eventually off voucher assistance, by voice vote; and
• an amendment by Rep. Judy Biggert (R-IL) to allow housing authorities to deny housing assistance to a person convicted of a misdemeanor offense against a child, or the commission of a sexual assault; assault; and behavior that is violent, illegal, or “disruptive,” by voice vote. The committee also adopted, by voice vote, an amendment by Chair Barney Frank (D-MA) to clarify that the secretary of Housing and Urban Development would define the word “disruptive.”

The committee rejected:

• an amendment by Rep. Miller to limit the amount of time families may receive Section 8 assistance to seven years, by voice vote; and
• an amendment by Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) to reduce the number of new vouchers authorized in FY2010 from 150,000 to 20,000, 25-39.

The committee is scheduled to continue consideration of H.R. 3045 next week.