January 7, 2016 | Politico
By: Matt Dixon
TALLAHASSEE — One of the state’s largest affordable housing advocates called on lawmakers Thursday to not use state funds earmarked for housing needs on other budget areas.
”More than 951,000 very low-income households in Florida — those below 50 percent of the median income — pay more than half their income on housing,” said Jaimie Ross, facilitator of the Sadowski Coalition, which is comprised of 30 groups business and advocacy groups.
Ross’ group held a news conference Thursday at the Tallahassee headquarters of the Florida Retail Federation.
Each year, the group pushes to ensure that funds from two state housing trust funds are not swept to pay for other areas of the budget. Lawmakers swept $81 million from the $256 million available when writing the current year budget.
The trust funds pay for things like homeownership assistance, affordable housing guarantee programs and homeless housing assistance grants.
The group says a full appropriation to the trust funds next year — more than $320 million — will create 32,000 jobs and more than $4.6 billion in economic impact.
“Florida has the best model for funding and producing affordable housing in the nation, and the Florida Legislature has the opportunity to make the most of that now by appropriating all state and local housing trust fund monies for housing,” Ross said.