By: Peter Schorsch | Florida Politics
3 Questions
Gov. DeSantis’ budget doesn’t recommend any sweeps to the state’s local and affordable housing funds, known collectively as the Sadowski Trust. But lawmakers have historically raided the pool, which pays for the State Apartment Incentive Loan Program (SAIL) and the State Housing Initiatives Partnership Program (SHIP). We caught up with Trey Price, executive director of the Florida Housing Finance Corporation, to talk about how the Sadowski dollars work and what to expect as budget writers consider the pool of money this Session.
Florida Politics: Do you think the idea of no Sadowski sweeps is idealistic?
Price: We were on a pretty good track last year for housing funding, and then the tragedy in Parkland happened. Lawmakers had to suddenly change priorities and look at making sure that schools were properly protected. [State Sen. Rob Bradley] has alluded to that. We were obviously elated with the Governor’s budget proposal and we look forward to working with the Senate and House on hopefully getting what the Governor’s requested — full funding this year. But it’s very exciting, seeing the Governor’s budget and seeing where we go from here.
FP: Can you describe the level of need this state has for affordable housing?
Price: We’ve got hurricanes to recover from, we’ve got to help rebuild the Keys and the Panhandle, and places in between from hurricanes. We also have a home affordability crisis just in general around the state. Let’s also not forget that Florida was impacted by a hurricane that didn’t even hit us: Hurricane Maria. We had a number of Puerto Rican and American Virgin Islanders move to Florida, primarily in the Central Florida area, but they’ve also migrated elsewhere. That has, really for the first time in anybody’s memory, made market and affordable housing very, very tough to find — almost impossible.
Florida continues to be a growing state. The economy is growing great. But affordable housing is one of those problems you have when the times are pretty good. But those are problems that can be addressed.
FP: How does the Florida Housing Finance Corporation interact with the Sadowski dollars?
Price: We administer SAIL. It’s competitively bid for among affordable housing developers and developers try to bring us the best deals to pull down that money. It’s a loan; it’s repaid with interest, usually low interest and usually, developers will pair that money along with federal tax credits that are not competitive and/or bonds. Florida is able to pull down more federal resources for affordable housing that way.
… The other side is the SHIP program, where we work with local governments — all 67 counties and entitled cities, usually your bigger cities — who have housing programs in their governments. A lot of that is down-payment assistance for first-time homebuyers or emergency repairs. Local governments have actual strategies, in their local housing assistance plans, on how they can use their SHIP dollars. … SHIP is very, very flexible, and local governments have survived by being flexible and coming up with creative ways to deal with affordable housing issues.
Article last accessed here on February 8, 2019. A print-ready version is available here.