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House Budget 2.0

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Michele Thomas, Director of Policy and Advocacy

As you may have heard, on Wednesday, House Democrats released a new budget that they call a compromise with the Republican-controlled Senate. They are willing to give up approximately 78 percent of their new tax revenue from their original budget. But how will this affect our housing and homelessness programs?

The new House Operating Budget SHB 1057 continues their commitment to funding homelessness and affordable housing programs. It's a far cry from the Senate’s Operating Budget, which proposed cuts of over 50% to programs that prevent and end homelessness. If the Senate’s budget were passed, over 20,000 people would have to be turned away from shelters, emergency rent assistance programs, and more. We applaud the House for standing firm in their commitment to protect the safety net and to enact the revenue needed to make that happen.

Here are some standouts from the new proposal:

  • Funding for the Consolidated Homeless Grant is totally preserved. This means that domestic violence, youth and emergency shelters will continue to be funded, as will emergency rental assistance programs and other programs that prevent and end homelessness. The Senate budget cuts this grant by 50%.
  • Housing and Essential Needs (HEN) program funding takes a modest cut of $15 million, but keeps the program funded enough to continue current spending levels and even allows room for growth. The Senate budget cuts this grant by 57%.
  • The Aged, Blind and Disabled program and SSI facilitation services are preserved. The Senate budget eliminates these programs.
  • The private/public partnership Washington Families Fund is funded at $2 million (As opposed to a $5 + million investment by the senate, but which was funded out of existing homelessness funds.)
  • The governor’s new rapid rehousing initiative called “Ending Family Homelessness” is funded at $5 million with Department of Commerce funds (out of their Home Security Account), no TANF (Temporary Assistance to Needy Families) funds are allocated to it. The Senate budget makes no investments to these programs.
  • TANF is cut by $126 million, but more resources are invested in Working Connections Childcare, which helps families with low incomes pay for child care while they work or meet WorkFirst participation requirements. The Senate budget cuts $143 million from these programs.
  • At their press conference, the House budget leaders announced that they swept some Capital Budget funds to help fund this Operating Budget proposal. We have no information to indicate that we should expect a reduction to the Housing Trust Fund (HTF) allocation, but we need to keep the calls going about the importance of the HTF.
  • HB 2069, the new Housing and Essential Needs/Aged, Blind and Disabled bill was introduced recently and passed out of the House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday, June 5. This bill is needed in order to align the programs with Medicaid expansion. Please make sure to include messages of support for this bill when contacting elected officials. Also ask them to make ADATSA participants eligible.

*Friday, June 7 Update*
HB 2069 passed the House with substantial bipartisan support on Thursday evening, June 6.

 Though the recently released House budget nixes much of the new revenue from their original budget, a few major revenue options still appear to be on the negotiating table. This includes seven tax loophole closures contained in HB 2034, the Bracken Estate Tax Fix (HB 2064), and the Telecommunications Parity Fix (HB 1971).

The House Democrats put out a brief handout that explains each of the seven tax loopholes they plan to include (totaling $255 million over the two-year biennium), which you can read here.

You can read more about the Bracken Estate Tax Fix and the background on that issue over at the Budget and Policy Center's blog, the Schmudget.

You can read more about the Telecommunications Parity Fix over at the Washington State Wire.

Then after you are done getting caught up on the latest budget developments in Olympia, please take action and tell your legislators that we must pass a budget protecting our already frayed safety net and fully funding the state Housing Trust Fund.

 

 

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