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Q&A
Council Member Brannan questions HPD officials on federal funding and budget concerns
0:18:09
·
5 min
Council Member Justin Brannan questions HPD officials about the agency's budget, particularly focusing on the extent of federal funding and potential impacts of federal budget cuts. The discussion reveals that 69% of HPD's expense budget comes from federal sources, raising concerns about the agency's vulnerability to federal funding changes.
- HPD officials clarify that while 69% of the expense budget is federally funded, the capital budget is primarily city-funded.
- The officials express cautious optimism about bipartisan support for key housing programs at the federal level.
- Brannan raises concerns about the overall HPD budget size in relation to the city's housing crisis, while HPD officials explain recent budget changes are mainly due to reductions in asylum seeker-related expenses.
Justin Brannan
0:18:09
Thank you Commissioner.
0:18:11
I want to dive right into it.
0:18:17
Am I correct federal funding makes up over half of HPD's projected FY twenty six budget in the executive plan?
0:18:26
Oh it's more than half.
0:18:33
So 69% of HPD's budget comes from the federal government?
0:18:39
And how does that break down between daily operations and the capital commitment?
0:18:54
I'm sorry, I couldn't hear.
0:18:58
Okay.
0:18:58
So 69% of HPD's expense budget is federal grants and federal subsidy, right?
0:19:24
And what about the capital commitment?
0:19:39
So how concerned are we about the impact to HPD's budget and the agency's overall mission considering the chaos and daily fresh hell coming from Washington?
0:20:55
Has the administration, city hall, OMB expressed concern or asked you to put together a contingency plan?
0:21:02
Have they offered any kind of contingency plan?
0:21:06
And do feel that this executive budget as it stands right now protects your agency for any to prepare for any potential reduction?
0:22:11
So I think I mean I think there's one thing that most New Yorkers agree on is that we've got an affordability crunch, an affordability crisis in the city.
0:22:20
And obviously access to housing is one of the key pillars of that affordability crisis.
0:22:25
And I think when the administration puts forward a proposed budget for HPD that's about $90,000,000 less than what they proposed a couple of months ago, dollars 1,600,000,000.0.
0:22:37
You know, I always say that you could tell me what you care about, but if I want to know what you care about, I want to know what you spend your money on, right?
0:22:43
So if city hall says they care about housing, a $1,600,000,000 budget for your agency does not scream housing crisis to me or to anybody.
0:22:53
Has that concern been relayed to City Hall?
Ahmed Tigani
0:18:24
I believe it makes about 62%.
0:18:38
Yes, sir.
0:18:38
Yes, sir.
0:19:51
I think right now and we were actually several of us were in D.
0:19:55
C.
0:19:55
Yesterday talking to members of the House and Senate about these appropriations.
0:20:00
We do feel like there's some strong bipartisan support on key programs that fund our work, particularly on rental assistance.
0:20:07
We are talking and educating people about the work that HOME does.
0:20:11
I think many folks are not familiar with how we use HOME to create senior housing or down payment assistance, which again in itself are bipartisan supported issues.
0:20:21
We are watching carefully and working to make sure people have these facts.
0:20:25
There's still some time left between reconciliation and when appropriations happen.
0:20:30
So right now we're on the ground working not alone, but we've worked with a coalition of other cities both in blue, red, and purple states.
0:20:39
Since this is not a New York problem, this would affect everyone.
0:20:42
So I think we're in a place of where we can get there a space to push and get action done, and we're not yet in a place where we feel like there is no opportunity to win on this front.
0:21:16
I think right now especially given the additional funds that we received through City of Yes, and again we thank the council and the mayor and the administration, plus the funds that we're we've just seen allocated through the state budget this recent year, we are in a strong place to meet our commitments in the near future, and we'll continue to manage that in the out years.
0:21:38
Mean you've just seen in the last couple of weeks our ability to commit and further specific areas like supportive housing.
0:21:46
We're still on target to meet strong new construction goals, preservation goals.
0:21:51
So we do feel like this budget does put us in a good place to meet our targets.
0:21:56
We'll continue to watch the federal situation, but again last in just over the last couple of days we do feel like there are bipartisan support for the things that really keep our work moving and we'll continue to work through that over the next couple of weeks.
0:23:35
I think it goes back to the November mod.
0:23:39
We saw additional lines in enforcement then and then up and through prelim and now we have seen a growth in our programs and staff positions.
Gardea Caphart
0:18:27
Oh sorry.
0:18:27
Yeah, 69%.
0:18:29
Nine % at this point.
0:18:29
How many?
0:18:31
69% of our budget.
0:18:47
So there are two pieces.
0:18:49
So for the expense side of things, this is 9% of our expense budget.
0:18:55
Sorry, the 69 percent is our expense budget.
0:19:04
Correct.
0:19:05
And so that adds up to about $850,000,000 of our budget.
0:19:09
And the biggest driver of that is Section eight, our for rental assistance, followed by community development block grants.
0:19:17
We support our co enforcement activity mostly, as well other activities.
0:19:21
So those are the primary drivers of our federal funding.
0:19:26
So on the capital commitment side, we are primarily city capital.
0:19:30
We only have a small portion that's federal and it's our home investment partners grant.
0:19:36
And that's about 40,000,000 a year.
0:22:57
I'll just clarify, Council Member, Mr.
0:23:00
Chair, for our budget, it's primarily driven by reduction in our asylum seeker budget.
0:23:07
So we had a huge amount in the budget for that.
0:23:09
But as you've seen, that population has been decreasing.
0:23:13
And as a result, all these contracts are ending.
0:23:15
And so we had to do a reforecast of the budget.
0:23:17
And so the reduction you're seeing for FY '20 '6 on the expense side is primarily driven by the reduction.
0:23:25
But as far as our agency operations and deal operations and all the agency programs, we did not have a cut in our budget.
0:23:32
Instead we had an addition to our budget for those items.