Green New Deal for Public Housing

“Those who suffer the most are those it’s intended to help: low-income tenants.”

(Public Housing Becomes the Latest Progressive Fantasy- The Atlantic)


First things first! What is the bill?

S. 2876 was introduced by AOC and sponsored by Senator Sanders. Its subtitle is “to provide economic empowerment opportunities in the United States through the modernization of public housing, and for other purposes”. As someone interested in public housing and passionate about human rights as an interdisciplinary framework, it is no surprise that this bill caught my attention. I am interested in policy for this very reason- I believe that at its core, human rights are meant to be the table where we bring multiple stakeholders together while policy is the instrument we use to make sure that all of our notes are in harmony with one another. The goal of this particular post will be to highlight key portions of the bill. I will include segments of the bill itself in italics and provide my personal thoughts in bold.

Let’s dive in!

The purpose of the Act is to:

(1) to stimulate, gather, and develop the workforce capacity, tools, financing, and materials needed to rehabilitate, upgrade, modernize, and transition public housing;

(2) to rehabilitate public housing that is severely distressed and causing residents to be exposed to unhealthy and unsafe environments;

This is long overdue! When it comes to public housing especially, we might have gotten rid of highrises, but we still have an architectural problem. In fact, the impact of low-income housing and poor health has long been studied. An article from the National Community Reinvestment Coalition states that “dilapidated public housing can expose residents to toxins like lead, asbestos, and mold. Studies also show that poor housing conditions can harm mental health, which impacts quality of life and ability to provide.”

We can also thank a lot of the activism and groundwork on better public housing solutions and environments, and the relationship between housing and wellbeing to community activist Dorothy Gautreaux, who, along with the support of ACLU lawyers, sued the Chicago Housing Authority in federal court. Learn more from UAB Institute of Human Rights Blog.

Learn more here: Housing and Health: Time Again for Public Health Action, Dwelling Disparities: How Poor Housing Leads to Poor Health

(3) to upgrade and equip all public housing with cutting-edge materials, infrastructure, and all-electric appliances made in the United States in order to improve energy efficiency, water quality, and material living standards in public housing and to support United States manufacturing;

Happy to see this provision here. The UN-Habitat publication on The Right to Adequate Housing, clearly states that housing isn’t just about the four walls or a structure: “Availability of services, materials, facilities, and infrastructure: housing is not adequate if its occupants do not have safe drinking water, adequate sanitation, energy for cooking, heating, lighting, food storage or refuse disposal”. Supporting tenants and American businesses seem like an obvious symbiotic relationship.

(4) to modernize public housing laws in order to maximize tenant participation and management by low- and very low-income individuals in the rehabilitation, upgrade, and transition of public housing through education, training, and jobs; and

I am so surprised (not really) that we must include something like this- you’d think that services that are trying to serve tenant needs and wants would mean including tenants and community members in every step of the process seeing as how these changes impact them the most. Increasing the opportunities for tenants to sit on boards, having voting power, and autonomy should be an expectation and a norm.

(5) to transition the entire public housing stock of the United States, as swiftly and seamlessly as possible, into highly energy-efficient homes that produce on-site, or procure, enough carbon-free renewable energy to meet total energy consumption annually.

As we talk about sustainability, it is important that we are discussing this topic as an interrelated issue. As monitor our resource use to ensure that we are not going above our planetary boundaries, every facet of our lives must coincide with that envision- that includes housing!

You can learn a little bit about what HUD currently implements as apar of their Environment and Energy requirements.

This bill also makes amendments to existing policy. For example, compare and contrast the Declaration of Policy in the Green New Deal for Public Housing below with United States Housing Act original!

SEC. 5. DECLARATION OF POLICY.

Section 2(a) of the United States Housing Act of 1937 (42 U.S.C. 1437(a)) is amended to read as follows:

“(a) Declaration Of Policy.—It is the policy of the United States—

“(1) to modernize the intersections of Federal and local government by employing the funds and credit of the United States, as provided in this Act—

“(A) to guarantee the right to housing for every individual;

The fact that this wasn’t in the original is alarming!

“(B) to assist States and political subdivisions of States in ensuring that—

“(i) all housing in the United States is habitable, highly energy-efficient, and safe; and

“(ii) housing conditions lead to good health, security, and adequate protection from the economic fears relating to old age, disability, sickness, accident, and unemployment; and

“(C) to protect, maintain, preserve, and expand public housing as a sustainable safety net for all people;

“(2) that it is the responsibility of the Federal Government, in conjunction with public housing agencies, to incentivize, promote, and protect the independent, collaborative, and collective actions of public housing residents and other private citizens to develop housing in a manner that strengthens entire neighborhoods; and

“(3) that the Federal Government should act and build new public housing where there is a serious need that the free market cannot address or is not addressing responsibly.”.

I am happy to see this addition here. While it is not the legal obligation for governments by themselves to provide housing, it should step in with all of its resources to ensure that needs are being met when it is obvious that other stakeholders cannot provide it. Again I will turn to the UN-Habitat Publication that clarifies the role of governments and their duty to uphold the right to housing (the UN and I will agree to disagree on certain aspects of this provision but I digress):

“The right to adequate housing does NOT require the State to build housing for the entire population. One of the most common misconceptions associated with the right to adequate housing is that it requires the State to build housing for the entire population, and that people without housing can automatically demand a house from the Government. While most Governments are involved to some degree in housing construction, the right to adequate housing clearly does not oblige the Government to construct a nation’s entire housing stock.

Rather, the right to adequate housing covers measures that are needed to prevent homelessness, prohibit forced evictions, address discrimination, focus on the most vulnerable and marginalized groups, ensure security of tenure to all, and guarantee that everyone’s housing is adequate. These measures can require intervention from the Government at various levels: legislative, administrative, policy, or spending priorities.”

There are other cool aspects from this bill that are incredibly necessary, including:

While not the purpose of the bill I would love to see some action on the ethics of evictions and creating more frameworks to see its abolishment. I would also love to see healthy and equitable housing design as it relates to increasing human mobility— whether it’s climate refugees, short-term labor migration, etc.

Read the Bill yourself and let me know what you think! Happy reading!

https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/2876/text

https://ocasio-cortez.house.gov/gnd/public-housing

https://www.sanders.senate.gov/press-releases/sanders-and-ocasio-cortez-announce-the-green-new-deal-for-public-housing-act/







cover image by me

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