There was an interesting convergence of events this week as the National Low Income Housing Coalition released its annual report on the affordability of rental housing on Monday and our State Legislature passed its largest housing capital budget in two decades on Wednesday.

NLIHC’s Out of Reach report has become the gold standard for measuring the cost of rental housing relative to the buying power of low income households. The long and short of this year’s report is that rental housing has continued to become less affordable to low wage workers in most of the country. According to OOR, “there is still no metropolitan area or rural county in the U.S. where a full time minimum wage earner (40 hours per week/52 weeks a year) can afford the rent on a modest one-bedroom rental home at the Fair Market Rent (FMR)”.

For non-metro New York, Out of Reach finds that “In New York Non-Metro area, the Fair Market Rent (FMR) for a two-bedroom apartment is $705. In order to afford this level of rent and utilities, without paying more than 30% of income on housing, a household must earn NA monthly or $28,188 annually. Assuming a 40-hour work week, 52 weeks per year, this level of income translates into a Housing Wage of $13.55.”

As if to respond to the Out of Reach report, the New York State Legislature struck a deal with Governor Paterson this week to add $200 million the State’s existing housing capital programs for the State fiscal year that began on April 1. Combined with the $100 million contained in the Governor’s budget proposal, and with resources like the state and federal low income tax credits and federal HOME and CDBG block grant funds, state officials and affordable housing developers in our state will have more resources to work with than at anytime in our history.

This budget represents a huge win for New York’s affordable housing advocates and there are scores of people and organizations to thank for this outcome. New York State Rural Advocates is proud to have been a participant in the effort and we all look forward to a very busy year turning this finacial commitment into high quality affordable housing.

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