Household Affordability
The Develop and Maintain Household Affordability Throughout Austin Priority Program takes a comprehensive approach to defining and providing household affordability for Austinites. This priority program considers not only household costs such as mortgage, rent, and utilities but also transportation and access to daily and weekly needs as essential and interrelated components of holistic affordability.
Progress
Program Champion:
Sam Tedford
Departments: Neighborhood Housing and Community Development, Planning and Zoning, Economic Development, Austin Public Health, Austin Code, Development Services, Austin Transportation, Austin Energy, Austin Water, Office of Innovation, and Office of Equity
(Photo courtesy of KXAN)
COVID-19 Pandemic Response
The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting economic tumult has exacerbated housing instability for many households in Austin. In May 2020, the City of Austin collaborated with the Housing Authority of the City of Austin (HACA) to distribute $1.2 million in emergency rental assistance to more than 1,600 households. The majority of recipients reported annual incomes below 30% of the Median Family Income (MFI), or $29,300 for a family of four. The City is preparing for a second phase of distributing rental assistance as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act for emergency rental assistance, homelessness assistance, childcare workers, and more. This program supplements other measures the City has instituted, such as the temporary moratorium on housing evictions and local Relief in a State of Emergency (RISE) funding to help keep Austinites safe, healthy, and housed during the pandemic.
Preventing Households from Being Priced Out of Austin
Displacement Prevention
After analyzing hundreds of recommendations from numerous community and government reports, the City of Austin is moving forward with a multi-faceted Displacement Prevention Strategy. As part of the strategy, the Austin Housing Finance Corporation (AHFC) provided capacity building grants to 13 community organizations to create neighborhood-centered approaches to prevent displacement and increase the availability of affordable housing in Austin. Although the City of Austin and AHFC were in the process of providing tenant stabilization services through local nonprofits prior to COVID-19, the health pandemic exposed the true depth of need. With CARES Act and local funds, AHFC is partnering with local nonprofits to provide direct rental assistance and tenant stabilization services such as advocacy and legal representation for eviction prevention and tenant relocation services for those who are forced to relocate. CARES Act funds have allowed AHFC to launch tenant stabilization services as a pilot program with the goal to continue providing these services beyond COVID-19, however, on a smaller scale as more households are able to return to work.
To continue to encourage and support innovation in this field, the City of Austin’s Office of Innovation hosted a Displacement Mitigation Action Accelerator in December 2019. This event catalyzed action around community-generated concepts to fight displacement by offering a space for organizations or individuals to develop concepts, collaborate with others, and receive up to $50,000 in seed money to further build out their work.
Shared Equity Ownership
After years of increases in rental costs and conflicts with property management, the residents of the North Lamar Mobile Home Park (Asociación de Residentes de North Lamar or ARNL) purchased the land under their homes in May 2020. With assistance and funding from several sources including $2.5 million in 2018 General Obligation Bond dollars from the City of Austin, the new mobile home park cooperative will be able to make the necessary improvements for the health and safety of its residents. The purchase of the 69-lot community comes after nearly five years of residents’ protests and a lawsuit against the property owner, RV Horizons. With the help of the community organization Building and Strengthening Tenant Action (BASTA), the tenants - now owners - will be able to stay in their community and benefit from a sustainable and equitable housing cooperative.
AHFC is expanding its Community Land Trust (CLT) Program by purchasing 20 homes across the city from the Housing Authority of the City of Austin (HACA). These homes will be rehabbed and then sold to qualifying low- or moderate-income households. CLTs are an alternate option to traditional homeownership that takes the highly variable and increasingly expensive cost of land out of housing costs. The City of Austin CLT program allows eligible homebuyers to purchase a home and lease the land beneath it for a small monthly fee. This method of buying a home creates more affordable homes than in the open real estate market. Benefits of the CLT program include long-term affordability, purchasing an affordable home in desirable neighborhoods, potential eligibility for down payment assistance, and affordable monthly mortgage payments.
(Photos courtesy of Texas Observer)
Fostering Equitable, Integrated, and Diverse Communities
Fair Housing Assessment
The City and its regional partners established a Central Texas Regional Fair Housing working group designed to transcend jurisdictional boundaries to address affordable housing barriers on a regional scale and work collaboratively to affirmatively further fair housing. The regional working group is composed of staff from each of the ten entities represented in the 2019 Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice (AI). The following list summarizes the impediments identified in the AI at the regional and jurisdictional level,
1. City and county capacity for addressing fair housing challenges is limited.
2. The harm caused by segregation is manifested in disproportionate housing needs and differences in economic opportunity.
3. Affordable rental options in the region are increasingly limited.
4. Stricter rental policies further limit options.
5. Disparities in the ability to access homeownership.
6. State regulations and zoning and land use limit housing choice.
7. Educational inequities persist in the region. African American children are significantly overrepresented in failing high schools, and Hispanic children have the largest disparities in school quality across K-12 schools.
8. Public transportation access has not kept up with growth.
Land Banking and Utilizing Public Land for Affordable Housing
AHFC is working to acquire land in alignment with the Austin Strategic Housing Blueprint goals. This year AHFC purchased 8.95 acres in south Austin along West Slaughter Lane, and 3.94 acres adjacent to Lakeline Mall. The locations of these properties address multiple Blueprint goals, including being located near Imagine Austin Centers and Corridors with immediate access to public transit, public schools, parks, and grocery stores.
The City of Austin is also working to utilize public land to create affordable housing in areas most vulnerable to displacement through gentrification. AHFC released two solicitations this summer requesting proposals for the development of two AHFC-owned properties, one at 900 Gardner Road and another at 1127 Tillery Street. AHFC anticipates finalizing agreements for the selected proposals to develop the properties before the end of 2020. To learn more about these two projects, visit their Speak Up Austin project websites: Gardner Road and Tillery Street. For future updates regarding these developments, subscribe to the newsletter in the fields below:
Invest in housing for those most in need
In 2018, Austin voters approved $250 million in general obligation bonds for affordable housing for low income and moderate income persons and families. In the past year, several new projects have made progress towards creating and expanding affordable housing choices for Austinites in all parts of town.
Housing Development Assistance
The AHFC recently partnered with Saigebrook Development and O-SDA Industries on two major affordable housing developments for a total of 240 new homes. The first, Aria Grand, opened in early 2020 and is located in the Travis Heights neighborhood. Aria Grand provides housing to low and very low income households as well as Permanent Supportive Housing to individuals experiencing homelessness or experiencing a disability. The second, Vi Collina is scheduled to open in 2021 and will provide 170 affordable housing units for low and moderate income families in the East Riverside/Oltorf neighborhood
Images: Vi Collina rendering and logo
In mid-2019, Austin City Council approved funding for eight new affordable housing developments across Austin that will result in more than 300 income-restricted rental and ownership units. 296 of the units will serve households making less than 50% of the Median Family Income (MFI), or an annual income of $47,300 for a family of four. 50 of those units will serve households below 30% of MFI, or an annual income of $28,400 for a family of four.
The City of Austin also provided federal HOME Investment Partnerships Program funding to the Guadalupe Neighborhood Development Corporation (GNDC) to rehabilitate, remodel, and construct a variety of infill projects for affordable housing in Central East Austin. As a local nonprofit housing development organization, GNDC will create three 3-bedroom homes and three 2-bedroom Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs). These new homes will be affordable to low-income households as well as qualifying first-time home buyers.
Preventing and Ending Homelessness
The City of Austin created a Hotel Conversion Strategy to create housing for chronically homeless individuals. Using Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds to acquire and rehabilitate the Rodeway Inn as the first hotel conversion to create Permanent Supportive Housing (PSH) units. Onsite services available to residents will include mental and physical health care, education, job training, housing assistance, substance abuse treatment, 24-hour security, property management, and overall case management.
In January 2020, LifeWorks celebrated the grand opening of The Works II, which was funded in part by the AHFC. The 29-unit affordable housing community is designed for youth and young families exiting from homelessness. Located in East Austin, The Works II offers a path to self-sufficiency for young parents, youth experiencing homelessness, or youth who are aging out of the foster care system, including an extensive array of supportive services available through the LifeWorks’ Sooch East Austin Youth & Family Resource Center.
Create new and affordable housing choices for all Austinites in all parts of Austin
In response to an April 2020 Council Resolution, an interdepartmental team is working to further improve the process for low and moderate income homeowners to build Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs). ADUs can be a tool to help homeowners stay in place as their families grow and change overtime, or as property tax increases outpace household incomes. The City of Austin is working closely with community stakeholders including Community Powered Workshop and their Alley Flat Initiative to explore and improve financing mechanisms for low- and moderate-income homeowners to build ADUs while also developing potential cost-saving strategies throughout the permitting and review process. These efforts may help to further unlock the benefits of diverse housing types and infill options to provide more housing choice and increased household affordability.
Challenges
COVID-19 Pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic presented new challenges to accomplishing the goals of the Housing Affordability Priority Program. The economic consequences of the pandemic have resulted in lost or reduced income and exacerbated affordability concerns for many Austinites. Even though NHCD has adjusted its programs to meet shifting public needs and created an emergency rental assistance program for those at risk of eviction, there are growing concerns that the ongoing effects of the COVID-19 pandemic will accelerate the displacement of our most vulnerable communities.
The precarious state of the economy and real estate market will also likely have negative effects on voluntary, incentive-based affordable housing programs like density bonuses. The Texas state legislation prohibits many tools for the creation of affordable housing leaving market-based solutions as one of the few ways to generate non-subsidized, long-term affordable housing. This weakness is particularly heightened when an economic downturn affects the ability of the private market to provide housing, while the need for affordable housing persists if not increases
Racial Justice and Equity
The Household Affordability team acknowledges that systemic racism and white supremacy is deeply rooted in our country, our city, and our institutions and mourns the loss of life that it begets. Austin is still dealing with the impacts of our long legacy of racism as made evident by the glaring inequities present in housing, health, and economic outcomes. The City of Austin commits to acting in solidarity and healing with communities of color by pursuing anti-racist education and policies. We strive to address impediments to fair housing that so often fall along racial and ethnic lines. We are working to create robust anti-displacement programs that ensure that people of color have a choice in their ability to stay in the communities that they built despite all the barriers put in their way. We push to preserve and create safe and affordable housing in all parts of Austin. We aim to build relationships and trust with the communities who are most directly impacted by our policies. We continue to imagine an Austin where the necessities of life are affordable and accessible to all – not just the few. We believe in an Austin that values and respects all life, and we are committed to making Austin more livable because Black Lives Matter.