In the News

EASTHAMPTON — After a year of stressful negotiating in Congress for federal money, housing officials came together Monday to discuss the effects of a recent increase in funding for affordable housing.

About 20 housing officials from across the state participated in a roundtable discussion at the Treehouse at Easthampton Meadow with U.S. Rep. Richard Neal, D-Springfield, state Rep. John Scibak, D-South Hadley, Massachusetts Secretary of Housing and Economic Development Jay Ash, and Easthampton Mayor Nicole LaChapelle.

During the roundtable, participants discussed the impacts and challenges faced in Massachusetts in the wake of an increase in funding of 12.5 percent over four years for the federal Low Income Housing Tax Credit. The tax credit is designed to encourage developers to invest in creating housing that can be rented at below market rate for low-income people.

“There are very few issues that are more difficult than how you use the tax code to generate what we call substantive economic activity,” Neal said. “I’ve been on the Ways and Means Committee for 26 years and I’ve paid a lot of attention to these issues.”

Neal was praised by many in the room for his involvement in increasing the level of funding for the tax credit in the 2018 spending bill.

Ash said his inspiration for public service in both municipal and state government came through many years of watching and learning from Neal and his leadership.

Along with the tax credit being kept in the 2018 spending bill, Ash said he has seen improvement in affordable housing measures coming from the state this year. In January, the Massachusetts House passed a $1.3 billion housing bond bill for low- and moderate-income people.

“We know how important it is to put up our resources to help support many of you in the room who are doing many great projects on the local level,” Ash said.

Tax issues
The discussion then opened up for participants to discuss both the opportunities and challenges in the federal spending bill, moderated by Rachel Heller, CEO of the Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association, which organized the roundtable.

One participant asked Neal if there were any other tax issues on the docket in Congress, specifically mentioning project-based certificates, a program where a landlord would contract with a state or local housing agency to rent units to low-income families.

Neal said a local municipality would be better suited to help specifically with those certificates, but did talk about the process Congress went through when writing the most recent tax bill.

He blasted the Republican majority for its closed-door process.

“You can’t write the tax bill in five weeks without any public hearing and without any witnesses,” Neal said.

He added later that he foresaw no big tax measures going forward for the rest of the year.

Participants expressed challenges they find when working in the industry, with a few saying that they see a large need for affordable low-income and workforce housing in towns adjacent to cities and the issue of preserving community development block grants (CDBG).

“Once these policies are there, they’re there. When you look at CDBG, there’s not a Republican mayor in America who doesn’t like CDBG. There’s not a Democratic mayor in America who doesn’t like CDBG, because it gives you flexibility,” Neal said, speaking of how compromise can be found on issues in Congress.

‘Opportunity zones’
Other challenges brought up to the discussion were the potential codification of “opportunity zones” in tax law that would encourage developers to invest in low-income areas in an attempt to revitalize those communities.

“We’ve had a robust number of applications coming for opportunity zones and received an extension on the deadline to apply for opportunity zones,” Ash said. “We’re excited about the opportunities.”

He noted that there is a potential downside, however.

“We have to make sure this doesn’t accelerate gentrification in places and that we know it will help low-income individuals, that it will help small businesses and that it won’t just be a tax scam for those who have some money,” Ash said.

After the event, Neal took a tour of the Treehouse community, which is a planned intergenerational community. The neighborhood provides an environment for children in foster care, helping them find families and lead successful lives.

Senior citizens who come to the community are expected to spend six hours a week, as part of their residential agreement, with families and people who are involved with foster care as part of community service, said Beth Spong, chief operating officer of the Treehouse Foundation.

“It was superb,” Neal said, speaking of the event. “I think it’s a reminder of how the tax code can be used for good investment purposes ... to generate initiatives that would not happen but for the tax advantages of it.”