Biden has made only scant progress in expanding Section 8 housing vouchers

President Joe Biden proposed major expansions of housing vouchers for low-income families. So far, Congress hasn't come anywhere close to meeting that goal.

Biden campaigned on a promise to "provide Section 8 housing vouchers to every eligible family so that no one has to pay more than 30% of their income for rental housing."

Section 8 is the federal government's main program to make rent affordable for low-income families. Under the program, the family pays its portion of the rent for a private apartment or house — amounting to 30% of its household income — and the government covers the rest with a voucher. The government sets the rent and works with landlords who agree to participate.

​​In his fiscal year 2022 budget request, Biden asked Congress for an additional $5.4 billion for housing vouchers, enough to help an additional 200,000 households.

Instead, Congress approved $200 million for 25,000 new vouchers, said Jen Butler, a spokesperson for the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

The 25,000 vouchers are a step in the right direction, but it's small compared with the overall need, said Will Fischer, senior director of housing and research at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities. A Congressional Budget Office report in 2015 estimated that about 8 million additional households would be assisted if vouchers were made available to all who are eligible.

Biden made a similar multibillion-dollar request for vouchers for fiscal 2023, said Fischer. Although the House passed a bill in June with funding for 140,000 vouchers, the Senate hasn't acted on Housing and Urban Development appropriations for 2023. Senate Democrats introduced a bill with only enough to fund around 5,000 vouchers.

The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities found in 2021 that families typically wait years before receiving vouchers. That delay was credited to limited funding. About 1 in 4 households that need rental assistance get it.

Some families wait up to eight years for a voucher, the center found. And 48 of the 50 largest housing agencies had average wait times of more than a year. Only two reported families had made it off their wait lists in less than that.

"On average nationally, families that received vouchers had spent close to two and a half years on waitlists first, exposing many to homelessness, overcrowding, eviction, and other hardship while they wait," the center wrote. 

There is still time in Biden's tenure for Congress to go along with his promise for a major expansion of Section 8 vouchers, but so far Congress has only taken a small step toward this goal. We rate this promise Stalled. 

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