[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 184 (Wednesday, October 20, 2021)]
[House]
[Page H5683]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     ALL AMERICANS DESERVE SAFE, CLEAN, STABLE, AFFORDABLE HOUSING

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
Washington (Ms. Strickland) for 5 minutes.
  Ms. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, all Americans, regardless of age, ZIP 
Code, or income, deserve to live in a safe, clean, and stable home they 
can afford. This is exactly what a healthy, just, and secure community 
relies on. It ensures that people are able to meet their basic needs. 
When over 145,000 Social Security beneficiaries in my district, the 
10th Congressional District of Washington State--representing nearly 21 
percent of the population--only have 100 to $200 to spare for 
groceries, utilities, and other basic expenses after paying their rent 
or mortgage, we know that prosperity is not being shared equally, nor 
equitably.
  When our servicemembers at Joint Base Lewis-McChord simply cannot 
find homes off post or on post for their families, due to lack of 
supply or the cost of housing, we must clearly improve our mission to 
support our Nation's heroes.
  These are just a few of the stories that thousands of Washington 
State residents and families are experiencing, just like millions of 
Americans across the country. And we know the driving factor behind 
this housing crisis is lack of supply. We don't have enough housing, 
and we aren't building it fast enough to meet the demand. And some of 
the housing that we do have is not fit for human habitation.
  According to Up for Growth, an organization that advocates for more 
housing, their report on housing underproduction from 2010 to 2017 in 
Washington State identifies some startling data points: For every one 
household that moved into my district, there were .64 housing units 
produced in Pierce County, .76 in Thurston County, and .62 housing 
units in Mason County.
  So this means that for every family that moved into our district, 
that we were producing two-thirds to three-quarters of the housing that 
we needed to accommodate them. This also means that for over 7 years 
the population increased and demand far outpaced supply, resulting in 
this crunch or lack of inventory that so many families are feeling 
right now.
  What's more, there remains a shortage of nearly 160,000 homes for 
extremely low-income renters, and nearly half a million renters in 
Washington State are rent-burdened, which means that they spend more 
than 30 percent of their income on housing alone.

  Now housing experts have told us that we need a once-in-a-generation 
solution to our housing supply shortage. That time is now. Now is our 
opportunity to build smarter, build better, and to do it inclusively.
  We have solutions on the table, and it is well past time to use them. 
We can build to higher-density inside transit corridors, leveraging 
existing infrastructure. That is why I was so proud to help introduce 
the bipartisan Build More Housing Near Transit Act with Representative 
Scott Peters to make sure that when we are investing $2.3 billion each 
year for large-scale transit projects, we are ensuring that local land 
use policies, which are often the biggest barrier to increasing housing 
supply, will encourage sensible development around these major 
infrastructure investments. For so long we have built housing 
infrastructure around automobiles and that is a relic of the past; now 
we must invest in transit to utilize good and smart land use policies.
  For our military servicemembers and their families, we can find 
solutions in our National Defense Authorization Act provisions, which 
passed out of the House in a bipartisan manner just weeks ago. I 
offered one provision, which will direct the Assistant Secretary of 
Defense for Energy, Installations, and Environment to answer one 
question: How long are wait times for housing located on military 
installations in competitive housing markets? And we want them to 
produce a strategy to address this demand for housing.
  It is simply unacceptable that servicemembers and their families must 
wait more than 6 months to be assigned housing on Joint Base Lewis-
McChord. I urge all of my colleagues to support this inclusion of 
several reports that will address the issue, including a report on how 
and the extent to which commanders of military installations are 
connecting military families with local nonprofit organizations and 
government entities that provide services to the military, including 
assistance with finding housing.
  And importantly, we must pass both our bipartisan infrastructure 
proposal and the Build Back Better Act and specifically deploy the 
Unlocking Possibilities Program.
  This competitive grant program through HUD will be used to support 
cities and towns to design and implement policies that eliminate 
exclusionary zoning and artificial barriers to adding more housing. I 
urge all of my colleagues to work to retain this important program in 
our build back better proposal.
  Being securely housed is a fundamental human right regardless of your 
political affiliation. The cost of continuing to ignore our lack of 
supply is far too great, especially when the tools we need are at our 
disposal. Let's use them, and let's show our constituents that we can 
and will build back better. To do otherwise is irresponsible.

                          ____________________