Language inserted into a federal bill aims to ensure that government-assistent tenants around the country get more protection from slumlords than Church Street South’s tenants did.
The language appears in the FY 2017 Transportation, Housing, and Urban Development (HUD), and Related Agencies Appropriations bill. The U.S. Senate’s Appropriations Committee passed the bill Thursday afternoon.
Connecticut U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy’s office announced passage of the bill — because Murphy had publicly pressed U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Julián Castro for that new language by citing the unsafe conditions that have led officials to scramble to find homes for 288 families living at the federally subsidized Church Street South apartment complex across from Union Station.
HUD kept sending the private landlord which owns the complex millions of dollars a year in Section 8 rental subsidies even as the buildings crumbled and mold and other conditions endangered tenants’ health. Somehow, HUD inspectors kept giving the complex passing scores.
Murphy argued that that was because the inspections did not take into account conditions like excessive mold, lead, bedbugs, and asbestos.
The bill that passed committee Thursday directs the HUD secretary to take steps to address “major threats to health and safety” including black mold, lead and asbestos, according to Murphy’s office. Report language passed by the committee gives the HUD secretary new tools to remedy problems if they persist after a landlord has failed to correct them more than 60 days after a final notice of default. The tools include the ability to impose penalties, nullify the Section 8 contract, “require immediate replacement of project management,” transfer Section 8 subsidies to a different landlord, and seeking “a judicial appointment of a receiver to manage the project.”
Some of the most immediate changes might be seen in house the inspections are scored. “The Committee is particularly disappointed that despite acknowledging that issues impacting the health of residents, including mold, do not trigger a sufficient subtraction of points to the inspection score, and the need to adjust the scoring system, those actions have not been identified by the working group as issues to address,” states the report accompanying the bill. “… [T]he Committee expects the Department to move swiftly to implement previously identified deficiencies in physical condition inspection protocols. The Committee further directs the Department to solicit comments from stakeholders, including tenants, to identify ways the Department can improve its inspection protocols and oversight. The Committee will continue to closely monitor the Department’s efforts and progress and directs the Department to submit to the House and Senate Committees on Appropriations within 60 days of enactment of this act a report identifying how HUD is improving the inspection process and related protocols, including quality assurance of inspections, identified actions yet to be implemented, the status of actions undertaken, and a timeline for completion of all actions.”