Spring Greetings from SDHDA

The winter to spring transition presents an opportune time to inventory resources, accomplishments, and needs.

There has never been a time in history when such a plethora of homeownership mortgage lending, down payment, and homebuyer education products and providers existed in the market.  The escalating land and building materials costs, however, still provide a challenge to affordable homeownership.  Absent our ability to directly control land and building costs, we examine whether there are public policies at the state and local level that present unnecessary barriers to development of businesses and affordable, modest housing for the families our communities work so hard to attract.

The good news for very low-income renters is that, in every corner of the state, there are vacancies in subsidized housing, where families and individuals need pay only 30% of their income toward rent and utilities.  The bad news is that some public housing authorities have waiting lists that present 12 and 18-month waits for housing vouchers.  SDHDA and local housing directors are planning to meet to address this phenomenon.

In addition, we are working to influence federal public policy  which will enable SDHDA to work more closely with private owners of multi-family properties to secure local loans using HOME and Housing Tax Credit enhancements. This will help ensure that these older, subsidized properties are maintained or moved to areas of need.

Chairman Rothstein, Commissioners Barker and Word, and I recently visited South Dakota’s Congressional delegation to ask them to support:

·  tax law changes to enable rental property owners, many of whom have held these properties for 20+ years, to sell to new owners without enduring substantial “recapture” tax penalties,

·  HOME Program funding, with no national set-asides, to ensure that South Dakota’s entire share of this valuable housing block grant is available to meet our needs,

·  legislation to enact an FHA Zero Percent Down Payment Mortgage Program

·  consolidation and formula allocation, or block granting, of Homeless Assistance Programs to enable states to better tailor our efforts to address homelessness, and

·  support Homeownership Tax Credit legislation which will provide credits for developers who build or substantially rehabilitate homes for sale to low-income buyers in distressed areas.

SDHDA’s requests clearly support the national agenda to 1) increase homeownership; 2) end homelessness in ten years; 3) preserve valuable, subsidized housing that was created under a program that is no longer available to create new housing; 4) address the critical needs on the State’s Indian Reservations and other areas of critical need; and 5) ensure that South Dakota has the federal resources to continue to leverage private capital in support of affordable housing.

You, our partners, hold the keys to influence public housing policy at the national level, at the state level, and certainly at the local level.  What an opportune time to evaluate how you might make an impact to help “Build a Better Quality of Life” for all South Dakotans.

Happy Spring! 

Dar Baum, Executive Director 

SDHDA