Obama pushes Democrats on housing
President Obama gave a full throated endorsement of zoning reform in his speech at the Democratic National Convention.
“She (VP Harris) knows for example that if we want to make it easier for young people to buy a home, we need to build more units—and clear away some of the outdated laws and regulations that made it harder to build homes for working people in this country. That is a priority, and she’s put out a bold new plan to do just that.”
President Obama actually has a long history of policies designed to generate more housing with the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH), promulgated as a HUD rule, it required all communities that received HUD grants to have active policies and plans to combat housing discrimination. This was intended to encompass zoning reform, but it was challenged in the courts, and rolled back by President Trump. It's since been restored, but sadly it's relatively toothless.
But I don't think Federal action on this front is a panacea, as there's a lot of push back. There's been nasty talk from Trump calling for an end to 'Biden’s War on the Suburbs'.
Tim Murphy
