From jims at greens.org  Fri Nov  6 15:33:06 2009
From: jims at greens.org (Jim Stauffer)
Date: Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:33:06 -0800
Subject: [Sosfbay-news] Stop San Jose from Gutting Affordable Housing
Message-ID: <4AF4B232.4010305@greens.org>

I got a call from Sol Wachter of the Affordable Housing Network. The SJ city 
council is poised to gut the funding of the Housing Dept., which includes the 
low income housing subsidies. They will be deciding this next Tuesday about 
2:30 at the Redevelopment Agency budget meeting, which follows the regular 
city council meeting.

San Jose residents are encouraged to attend the meeting and speak out against 
these cuts, or send a message to your council member.

         http://www.sanjoseca.gov/council.asp


The story is...

The state is gutting local budgets. In SJ, $75M has been taken from the 
Redevelopment Agency's budget. Part of that money is what funds the Housing Dept.

The only other funding source for Housing is borrowing money with repayment by 
issuing bonds. Currently, no bank will lend them money under these conditions. 
This means that housing subsidies for the poor will be curtailed.

Sol reported that the Redev budget for commercial property development is not 
cut as much as housing.

Please make your voices heard.


Jim Stauffer