Around the nation and in Oregon, millions of renters are struggling to keep up with skyrocketing rents, soaring inflation, and stagnant incomes, and with them, growing hunger. For decades, Congress has underinvested in proven housing solutions, but this year, Oregon Senator Ron Wyden and other members of Congress have a real opportunity to provide our state with the resources and tools we need to help address homelessness and hunger.
The underlying cause of our nation’s housing crisis is a severe shortage of homes affordable to people with the lowest incomes, including seniors, people with disabilities, and low-wage workers. According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, there is a shortage of 7 million homes affordable and available to extremely low-income renters.
This isn’t just a problem in Oregon, where there are fewer than 3 homes for every 10 extremely low-income households: no state has enough housing for those with the greatest needs.
Despite the incredible need, Congress has not invested in housing solutions at the scale needed. Only a quarter of those who are eligible for housing assistance gets any help. Any federal investments needed to build affordable homes hasn’t kept pace.
Renters with extremely low incomes are often forced to prioritize shelter over other needs, with the lowest-income, most severely cost-burdened renters spending 38% less on food and 70% less on healthcare than their peers without cost burdens in 2020. Poverty and food insecurity are associated with some of the most serious and costly health problems in the United States, and a growing body of research finds that food insecurity negatively impacts children’s physical, social, cognitive, and behavioral development.
Fortunately, Congress has the opportunity to expand and reform America’s largest source of financing for affordable housing — the Low Income Housing Tax Credit — so that it can reach those most in need of housing and, in doing so, help alleviate hunger.
The tax credit is an important resource for building more affordable homes, but it too often does not serve our lowest-income and most marginalized neighbors — housed or unhoused. Later this year, as Congress — led by Senator Wyden as chair of the tax committee — works to pass tax legislation known as “tax extenders,” it is critical that policymakers use the opportunity to expand the housing tax credit and reform it to create new incentives and tools to help those experiencing or at risk of homelessness in Oregon and across the country. They should also reform the tax credit so that it better serves rural and tribal communities.
Affordable housing can close the education gap because children learn better and are more likely to graduate when they live in stable, affordable homes. Affordable housing has been linked to prevention of long-term health problems and promotes healthy, productive lives, and it supports economic mobility, allowing low-income people to climb the income ladder and achieve financial stability.
Reforming the tax credit is an important first step in the right direction, but we must do more to truly solve America’s housing and homelessness crisis, a root cause of hunger in America. We must also expand rental assistance to help every eligible household bridge the gap between wages and housing costs, as called for in the Biden administration’s National Strategy on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health. Other solutions include preserving and building more homes affordable to extremely low-income households through proven solutions like the national Housing Trust Fund and public housing, stabilizing households before they face evictions and homelessness, and strengthening and enforcing renter protections.
We know what is needed. We just need the political will to do what’s needed.
Brian Hoop is the executive director of Housing Oregon.