Political Quotes

“Mr. President, today I am pleased to be joining my colleague, Senator Collins, in introducing a bill to update the funding formula for the Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS, or HOPWA, program. HOPWA is a program within the Department of Housing and Urban Development, HUD, that provides state and local governments with resources to ensure that stable housing and supportive services are available for low-income individuals living with HIV/AIDS and their families. Stable and affordable housing is a critical component of treatment for HIV-positive individuals. More than half of this population will face homelessness or an unstable housing situation at some point during the course of their illness. Medication for treatment is extremely expensive, and the assistance offered by HOPWA results in better management of this illness, reduces the risk of HIV transmission, and ensures that better public health outcomes can be achieved. Our bipartisan legislation seeks to strengthen HOPWA by improving the accuracy of the formula used to distribute funding to housing programs that benefit people living with HIV/AIDS. This improved funding formula would take into account the number of persons currently living in a community with HIV/AIDS. HOPWA's current funding formula instead considers the cumulative number of individuals diagnosed with HIV in a community since 1981, and includes those individuals who have since passed away.…”