Dear Editor;

The Workforce Housing Ordinance adopted by the City in 2006 and supported by the voters in 2007, 2009 and 2011 has produced badly needed housing for Albuquerque’s hard working low paid families.

Embedded within the City Capital Program, now before the City Council, is an 83% reduction in funding for the Workforce Housing Trust Fund created by the Ordinance. This reduction affects all of us, but targets the 25% of Albuquerque’s population who most need affordable housing and adversely affects the contractors and workers who continue to suffer in our moribund economy. Coupled with a 40% reduction in federal funds for housing and other community development these proposed cuts in the 2013 GO Bond program will leave many in economic distress and will continue to fuel the hemorrhaging of jobs in Albuquerque.

The track record of the Workforce Housing Trust Fund is extraordinary. Based on the City’s economic analysis for the first $20 million allocated for projects: the Fund created 650 construction and 300 non-construction jobs; generated an additional $27 million in economic activity; attracted $82 million from other public and private sources in investment into the Albuquerque economy and added $5 million in additional GRT to local and state governments. This is in addition to the 500 affordable homes built and in process.

We request that the City Council increase funding for Workforce Housing in the 2013 GO Bond program to at least $5 million and insert a like amount for each bond cycle in the Decade Plan.

Here are nine reasons why:

The Workforce Housing program has demonstrated public support in three bond cycles, with each successive vote being a higher majority.

Housing affordable to working families is in desperate need. A recent City analysis shows 25,275 low-income households spending 50% or more of their income to keep a roof over their heads. HUD calls this “severely cost burdened”. These are families most in danger of becoming homeless.

Having decent affordable housing gives a family the security and stability that children need to go to school and learn and workers to hold down a job.

The Workforce Housing program is an economic stimulus creating jobs and economic activity. In a job’s crisis you don’t kill a proven job generator.

When federal cutbacks strike that’s the time to increase local effort to sustain programs needed by vulnerable populations, not reduce or eliminate effort.

Yes, the Bond Program has shrunk from $164 million in 2011 to $110 million in 2013. A comparable reduction in Workforce Housing would be funding at $6.7 million for 2013. The reduction to $1.75 million is an 83% reduction from the 2011 Bond program and the zero in subsequent years simply guts the program.

Workforce housing addresses a severe community deficiency and it does so with a public-private partnership thus generating private investment at a rate of over 4 private to 1 City while also relieving taxpayers of ongoing maintenance costs.

Built in to the Workforce Housing Ordinance are smart growth principles to locate projects near existing shopping, jobs and public transportation. This investment helps redeveloping neighborhoods like Downtown while it maximizes the use of existing infrastructure.

Financing available for quality workforce housing through the NM Mortgage Finance Authority is highly competitive. Points awarded for a “minimum municipal contribution of 10%” can be the difference between an award of tax credits or not. No tax credits, no financing! Therefore, millions of dollars of construction, jobs and needed housing will go elsewhere in NM.

Back in 2007 to 2010, we had the opportunity to work with the Supportive Housing Coalition on the multi-family project, Downtown@700-2nd. Built by Global Structures, a subsidiary of Jaynes Corp., designed by Dekker Perich Sabatini, and managed by Monarch Properties, all local businesses, the project is a model of mixed-income workforce housing and energy and water efficiency. This project and several others like it could not have been done without the City’s Workforce Housing GO Bond funding.

The Albuquerque City Council will discuss and act on the 2013 GO Bond program on Feb 7, 14 and 20th.

Sincerely;

Ken Balizer, Mark Allison and Dory Wegrzyn