The CHAIRMAN. Our next witness is Mr. Robert Maffin. I apologize for the late hour and I would ask you, if you could, to abbreviate your statement as much as possible, and we will put the entire statement in the record in full. STATEMENT OF ROBERT W. MAFFIN, THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF HOUSING AND REDEVELOPMENT OFFICIALS, ACCOMPANIED BY MARY NENNO AND JOHN MAGUIRE Mr. MAFFIN. Senator, I am Robert Maffin. I have with me Mary Nenno and John Maguire of the NAHRO staff. I will submit my statement for the record at this time (see page 297). I want to talk briefly about a couple of items. You have a copy of our prepared statement, Senator. We have not had an opportunity to fully examine the legislative language proposed by the administration and we would like, as the Homebuilders indicated, to submit supplementary information at a later date. Senator PROXMIRE. Without objection, we will be delighted to have it. Mr. MAFFIN. As has been cited before, we feel that the President's message, and the accompanying legislation essentially abandons the goals of this country to provide adequate housing for its citizens. A part of that abandonment apparently rests on a sustained rhetoric of failures; citing selective examples of failure, in what have been monumental programs in our opinion developed over 40 years of legislative and operating experience. We do not see in that statement any effective alternatives to the programs that have been developed over the years since housing legislation was first initiated at the national level. Mention was made a moment ago about the operation of the trickledown theory. It is our judgment that, by and large, America operates on the "trickle-up" practices in housing. People in a mobile and aggressive society as ours have, as an aim, the improvement of their housing quality. The unfortunate part about the trickle-up practice is that what is left over, is supposed to be the housing for the low and the moderate income people. Generally, it is located in the abandoned and sometimes depressed rural areas of America and in the slums, ghettos, and deteriorating areas of the inner city, where the alternatives for housing are totally inadequate. This is precisely where we desperately need to focus some attention on the actual production of housing. An allowance check will not suffice. Policies of the kind articulated in the President's statement are policies that can do little more than exacerbate the very urgent urban problems that we have in this country. The message provides no solution to the immediate problem of seeing that people of low and moderate income are adequately housed. Let me talk specifically about two or three points in the President's message. First of all, the housing assistance allowance in our judgment is an imperfect vehicle when operating in a housing market, where the availability of housing is so enormously constrained by all of the environmental questions, the public service questions, the public improvement needs in many of these areas. The section 23 program, we believe, should not be altered, as proposed by the administration. This program has provided another step in the long link of steps that have been taken by our legislative history to bring the public and private sectors together. The public housing section 23 program has served to increase the use of the existing housing stock, as well as to encourage the development of new housing for low- and moderate-income people, particularly the lowest income people. We are encouraged by those portions of the President's message which relate to the modernization of the existing inventory of public housing. I testified before this committee before that we think it is very important to protect a $20 billion asset that we have in public housing through an effective program of modernization and that program needs to be enlarged. The 312 program, as you, yourself, pointed out a moment ago, has demonstrated, a capacity to at least start the job of rehabilitation of the existing housing stock. Rehabilitation and the fuller utilization of the existing housing stock, in our opinion, may be more than serving a housing goal. It may go to the goal of serving the economic and physical viability of the cities themselves. That housing stock, treated in absence of related public service improvement programs, does little to assure the long-term utilization of our inventory. To undertake rehabilitation without those companion efforts may do nothing more than to continue to downgrade many of the key areas in our central cities some of the smaller towns. In short, Mr. Chairman, our position is as follows: We are now in a long debate over housing policy in this country. That debate is likely to continue. We have found no hard evidence presented to demonstrate that 40 years of legislative history has produced nothing but failure, and it would be our position that the tools we now have both in the housing and urban development and rehabilitation fields be continued at levels approximating the 1972 levels authorized by this Congress until such time as this debate continues. Senator PROXMIRE. Thank you very much. Mr. Maffin, what do you think would be the reaction of the country if the President should close down cancer research, and heart research for 3 years or 2 years, while we look for another possible solution, a possible better way, which they may or may not adopt? Don't you think there would be such outrage, such a tremendous adverse reaction that the Congress and the country just would not stand for it? Mr. MAFFIN. That is so. Senator PROXMIRE. Isn't that just about what is being done in the housing construction field? Mr. MAFFIN. That is correct, sir. Senator PROXMIRE. Do you think housing allowances could work without a major construction program? Mr. MAFFIN. No, sir. Senator PROXMIRE. Why not? Mr. MAFFIN. As I tried to indicate a moment ago, if you operate on the trickle-down theory, which the housing allowance system does, much of the housing would become available in areas where there are inadequate public improvements and where the stock, although not necessarily of itself beyond repair, would be missing the necessary ingredients of a favorable environment. That housing would be unacceptable and I think properly so, and in fact may be very harmful to health both physical and in terms of psychological damage which so often occurs in many of these neighborhoods. I think that without programs to upgrade existing the housing stock or to produce new units, it will work. Senator PROXMIRE. Do you think 235 and 236 should be continued? Mr. MAFFIN. Yes. Senator PROXMIRE. Has your organization a policy position on section 23? Mr. MAFFIN. Yes. Our position is in opposition to the proposed amendment, simply because, as Mr. Martin said a moment ago, what we have constructed in 40 years is a fairly good working relationship between the public and private sector, to see that housing is not only produced but maintained, albeit at levels that are not adequate. We believe the section 23 housing program through the use of a local housing authority, working with private property owners, has proven to be a very effective instrument for expanding the supply and the availability of housing for the lowest income families, and we believe it ought to be continued along present lines. We see nothing in the proposed amendment which would enhance or improve either the initial availability of housing for those people, or more particularly, in terms of the maintenance. Senator BROOKE. Mr. Maffin, the members of your organization are on the frontline in the effort to make our public housing program work. You bear the major responsibility for producing and maintaining decent, safe, and sanitary public housing. It's not an easy job, particularly in light of what I believe is a failure by HUD to meet its obligation to make adequate operating subsidies available to local housing authorities. The administration, having failed to meet its responsibility to provide adequate operating subsidies, has now proposed several changes in public housing rent requirements without determining what effect these changes will have on public housing tenants. Don't you feel that we have an obligation to determine how changes in public housing rent requirements will affect public housing tenants, before enacting these changes into law? Mr. MAFFIN. NAHRO certainly agrees that the fullest information available should be assembled on the impact of any changes in public housing rent structure, affecting both tenants and local housing authorities. Some information has already been assembled on the impact of these changes, and any major gaps in this information. should be filled by the Department of HUD, which has the statistical capacity to assemble data on a national program basis. As previously stated in the NAHRO testimony before this committee on July 27, 1973: The Federal operating subsidy currently required to fund an adequate local housing operation in estimated at $500 million. In this context, the provisions of S. 2182 would provide a "balance of resources" to approach the estimated $500 million requirement: the $350 million in annual operating subsidies from the Federal Government (this should be made mandatory, not subject to impounding or reserving); and some $100 million in revenue generated from changes relative to rent payments. Important questions of national policy revolve around the acceptance or rejection of this "balance of resources" as currently set forth in S. 2182. Senator PROXMIRE. Thank you very much, Mr. Maffin. [Complete statement of Mr. Maffin, and additional material submitted for the record, follow:] |