Office of Housing is in trouble, but maybe not forever
When a governor descends from the fourth floor of the Roundhouse to sit for three hours at the first committee meeting for a bill she supports but knows will fail this session, a statement is made.
That’s what happened Wednesday at the Senate Health and Public Affairs Committee when it heard Senate Bill 71 to establish an Office of Housing being sponsored by Sen. Michael Padilla, with testimony from the governor’s new housing adviser, Daniel Werwath.
The bill is unlikely to make it to the Senate floor, let alone to the House for discussion, since it must first get on the agenda of a skeptical Senate Finance Committee. Although Padilla is on that committee, its powerful vice chairwoman, Sen. Nancy Rodriguez, a consistent advocate for affordable housing, is a supporter of the New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority.
That quasi-governmental organization has done intense behind-the-scenes lobbying to suggest a new housing office would infringe on its turf with a “duplicative” mandate. It wouldn’t, but not everyone is convinced. The governor put a stake in the ground for next year’s 60-day session.
Given the testimony of citizen opponents and mild comments from Republican senators voting against the measure, the governor, Werwath and others should have a successful year making the case for the new office.
When relatively conservative organizations like the Greater Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce and the state homebuilders’ association urge support, Republicans generally fall in line. Wednesday’s convoluted voting defied normal political logic but did hint at the legitimate power of quiet mortgage authority lobbying.
Sen. Steven McCutcheon, a Republican rancher and homebuilder from Carlsbad, expressed surprise at the few voices speaking in opposition because he said his phone had been ringing off the hook from people urging him to vote against it.
Who surprisingly did heed those calls of opposition was the committee’s chairman, Sen. Jerry Ortiz y Pino, and his stalwart vice chairman, Sen. Bill Tallman. When the vote came up for a “do-pass,” Tallman and Ortiz y Pino joined three
Republicans voting no, potentially sending it to the legislative graveyard. The vote was surprising. Ortiz y Pino quickly suggested an alternative motion could be made to move the bill along with no recommendation.
On that vote Tallman switched to yes but Ortiz y Pino stuck with Republicans, so it moved on with weak support. With the governor sitting 30 feet away from Ortiz y Pino, who is not running for reelection, it seemed a personal statement was being made.
The primary argument against the office made by supporters of the mortgage authority is the belief the office’s charge to create an annual housing plan is being done by the authority, so another plan is “duplicative.” But the housing office plan would not be redundant.
As Werwath pointed out, the authority’s comprehensive plan spells out numerous strategies to achieve its goals, but more than half of them are governmental actions it cannot control and rarely lobbies to achieve. Werwath and the governor expect the plan for the housing office to strategize on legislative and executive action to get things done. It also could advise appropriations by the Economic Opportunity Revolving Fund to stimulate residential construction by offering hard-to-get infrastructure loans to residential homebuilders and developers.
With the passage of House Bill 195, which would finally authorize that revolving fund to be used for housing and which appears on a good track for passage, the governor would achieve a strong win for workforce housing.
As a seasoned long-game player, she’s well-positioned to get her office of housing next session. That’s three hours well spent.