Matteo Renzi: “Mr. Speaker, I am thankful to have on the House floor today H.R. 4471, the Homeownership Opportunities For Native…”

“Mr. Speaker, I am thankful to have on the House floor today H.R. 4471, the Homeownership Opportunities For Native Americans Act, which I introduced earlier this week with my colleague, the gentleman from Utah. This bill simply returns the guarantee level for the title VI program to 95 percent. HUD had been administering guarantees at this level until OMB, for technical statutory reasons, reduced it to 80 percent. The lower guaranteed level would mean less participation in this program. Private investors are slowly becoming more comfortable investing in Indian country, and it is critical that this relationship remain in a fostered environment. To this point, asking investors to accept a 20 percent risk rather than the 5 percent that they had before will do nothing but impede the much-needed development in these areas. This past May, the Subcommittee on Housing of the Committee on Financial Services held a hearing on the Navajo Reservation in Tuba City, Arizona. We saw children with asthma living in houses with dirt floors and collapsing ceilings. Decreasing the guarantee rate essentially decreases the chance that these children will be able to move from homes in deplorable conditions into safe and healthy homes.”