Thank you, Chairman Collins. 

As challenging as I know this year will be, I am thankful to have you as a partner to work through funding decisions for fiscal year 2018. 

This is the fourth budget that we will develop together as Chair and Ranking Member of the T-HUD Subcommittee.  Our work has been effective because we share a vested interest in preventing homelessness, preserving affordable housing, and promoting economic development that benefits communities in Rhode Island, Maine, and across the nation. 

Your leadership and friendship have been invaluable to this process, and it continues to be a pleasure to work with you.

I want to welcome Secretary Carson to his first hearing before this Subcommittee.

Mr. Secretary, we had an opportunity to meet during your confirmation process, where I learned more about your interest in the intersection of health care and housing.  I agree that there are key synergies here.

With access to stable, affordable housing, that enables residents to better connect to services, we see improved health outcomes and reduced costs for mandatory health care programs.

I appreciate your commitment to addressing lead-based paint hazards in our nation’s housing. This problem is crippling the development of far too many children.  Senator Collins and I have worked on this issue for decades. 

We included a number of prevention initiatives in our fiscal year 2017 bill, and your diligence in seeing those reforms implemented will be essential moving forward.

Today, we are here to discuss the Administration’s fiscal year 2018 budget request for HUD.  In his proposal, the President calls for a 15% cut in the HUD budget -- $7.3 billion below fiscal year 2017.

In order to achieve these draconian funding levels, the budget proposes to totally eliminate HOME, CDBG, HUD-VASH, the Housing Trust Fund, Section 4, and the Self-Help Homeownership Opportunity Program – all highly popular, successful programs that drive affordable housing production and economic development. 

These initiatives help families reduce their rent burdens and invest in their futures and the future of their children. These drastic cuts will be devastating for communities across the country.

Within this very same budget, the Administration proposes to cut non-defense discretionary programs by $56.5 billion and includes $1.6 billion for border wall construction.

Despite the President’s commitment to the American people that funding for the wall would not come at the expense of critical federal programs that make the American dream possible, his budget proposal does just that.  And by the way, the Administration’s vision for the federal budget doesn’t end with the more than $56 billion in cuts it proposes for FY2018. 

Indeed, over the 10-year budget horizon, the President is calling for a total of $1.5 trillion in cuts to non-defense discretionary programs.   

Moreover, across this budget, there is a disconnect between rhetoric and reality.

While the budget claims to prioritize housing for low-income Americans, it would in fact cause them great harm.

The HUD budget proposal fails to sustain housing assistance for low- and extremely low-income Americans by eliminating renewals through attrition.

This budget also fails to provide resources for routine maintenance in our public housing stock by cutting the Public Housing Capital Fund to a record low.  This would put tenants at risk of living in poor quality conditions, making them more vulnerable to unsafe circumstances -- the same health hazards that you have so frequently expressed a desire to eradicate.

Additionally, this budget proposes a number of rent reforms that would impose significant rent burdens on low-income assisted households.

Nearly half of the 5 million HUD-assisted households are elderly or disabled and live on fixed incomes.

As a result of this Administration’s budget, nearly 2.5 million elderly or disabled households’ security and ability to live in affordable housing are being threatened.

This budget is indefensible.

I think it is more productive to engage where we can find common ground and where you have made commitments in your confirmation process that we expect you to uphold.

Mr. Secretary, you have stated publicly that you are committed to improving the economic mobility and conditions of residents, protecting residents from health hazards, including lead-based paint, and working on, not eliminating, the programs that leverage critical private investment.  I hope you will hold true to this.

Thank you again for coming before this Subcommittee, and I look forward to your testimony today.

Thank you, Chairman Collins.