Minnesota House’s Move to Save $585,000 may cost Local Businesses $4.6 Million
I originally was going to title this “Missing Link Between Neanderthal Man’s Brain and Minnesota House Discovered.”
Seriously, did Jesse Ventura slide in the back door over Easter Weekend? Not since Minnesotans elected our former governor have we seen state politics go so dramatically opposite of the rest of the United States.
In a time when the Federal Government and local governments around the country are pumping billions of dollars into helping maintain the values of our home, the Minnesota House has decided to do the exact opposite (specifically, the Minnesota House Housing Policy and Finance and Public Health Finance Division). On Wednesday, April 15th, they adopted an amendment to the budget bill that would slash the key down payment assistance program by almost two-thirds (66%).
Do these people not realize the role of housing in the local economy? Instead of supporting one of the few programs that is actually successful in helping first time buyers buy up foreclosed homes, they are threatening to pick up the housing market and body slam it into the ground. (I would normally say this would make Jesse proud, but our former governor actually understood the importance of affordable housing and supported programs like the current House wants to slash).
The specific program they have cut from ($885,000 per year to $300,000) is the Minnesota Housing Homeownership Assistance Fund (HAF). HAF is an essential part of the core down payment assistance programs used across the state, including CASA, which I have often pointed both here, and on our radio show, is usually the single best option for first time buyers if they are eligible for the program.
We all need to pitch in and help stop this by contacting the members of the Minnesota House Housing Policy and Finance and Public Health Finance Division and ask for an immediate reinstatement of this appropriation to the House Budget. At the bottom of this article is the contact information for all the members. Please call and email them, telling them you support putting this money back in—especially if you live in one of the communities represented by a committee member.
Yes, Minnesota is facing the need for dramatic cut backs in its spending. But, investing money into the housing market is one of the things the state government does that actually creates more jobs and more tax revenue for the state. How? People buying homes creates jobs, countless studies show this, but this move will actually cause less people to be able to buy homes—and less new home owners will mean less jobs.
In this case we are talking about potentially 200 less first time home buyers this year being able to get down payment assistance. These same buyers would likely be eligible for the $8,000 Federal tax credit which, in most cases, they would then spend on their new homes. That’s $1.6 million taken out of local businesses. How does that help?
That doesn’t even begin to take into account all of the other money that gets injected into the economy from these buyers. In the last several months about $40 million in Federal funds have been put into Minnesota to help home buyers such as these buy and repair foreclosed homes. In many cases, these buyers would be able to get $15-20,000 each to fix up their new homes. That’s another $3+ million dollars of money that might not be spent fixing up homes—which means more jobs will be lost as the housing market continues to drop.
Call these people and tell them to hit the reset button—before it sucks millions of dollars out of our local businesses and cost us hundreds of more jobs. Pick up the phone and make that call—or click on their email link right now and tell them STOP!
Representative Email Address Phone Community
Karen Clark rep.karen.clark@house.mn 651 296-0294 Minneapolis
Carolyn Laine rep.carolyn.laine@house.mn 651 296-4331 Columbia Heights
John Benson rep.john.benson@house.mm 651 296-9934 Minnetonka
David Bly rep.david.bly@house.mn 651 296-7065 Northfield
Jeff Hayden rep.jeff.hayden@house.mn 651 296-7152 Minneapolis
Larry Howes rep.larry.howes@house.mn 651 296-2451 Walker
Thomas Huntley rep.thomas.huntlwy@house.mn 651 296-2228 Duluth
Carol McFarlane rep.carol.mcfarlane@house.mn 651 296-5363 White Bear Lake
Denny McNamara rep.denny.mcnamara@house.mn 651 296-3135 Hastings
Will Morgan rep.will.morgan@house.mn 651 296-4212 Burnsville
Paul Rosenthal rep.paul.rosenthal@house.mn 651 296-7803 Edina
Brita Sailer rep.brita.sailer@house.mn 651 296-4265 Park Rapids
Peggy Scott rep.peggy.scott@house.mn 651 2964231 Andover
Lyndon Carlson rep.lyndon.carlson@house.mn 651 296-4255 Crystal
April 16th, 2009 at 9:47 am
Hey Alec,
Excellent blog! I love it! Catch ya later!
April 16th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
[...] in 200 less homeowners getting downpayment assistance. Read more about it at Alec Grebis’s Mortgage Scoop. Categories : Buying [...]
April 17th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
Glad to see Minnesota has -some- common sense.Why Should tax money be spent to help someone buy a home is beyond me — as was a key catalyst to this problem in the first place.