Housing
When will housing affordability improve? Spoiler alert: It will take some time
Inflation is slowing and job growth has surged, but many Americans still feel the burden of expensive housing – fueled in part by high demand, low inventory and mortgage rates. Home prices across the U.S. rose 5.5% over the past year as of December 2023 and they are projected to increase 2.8% year over year […]
A bill targeting low-income housing vouchers passes Kentucky Senate
A bill that would prevent Kentucky cities from requiring landlords to accept low-income housing vouchers, something housing advocates say doesn’t happen, passed the state Senate Wednesday by a near party line vote.? The debate on Senate Bill 25 echoed much of what was heard in the House the day before as a similar bill won […]
Opponents fear House-approved bill would preempt a Louisville housing ordinance
Republican-backed legislation passed the Kentucky House of Representatives Tuesday that would ban local governments from requiring landlords to accept federal housing vouchers from tenants, something housing advocates say no local government has done.? House Bill 18, sponsored by Ryan Dotson, R-Winchester, passed 74-20 on a party line vote with the minority of Democrats repeating concerns […]
GOP bill would ban KY cities from requiring landlords to accept Section 8 vouchers. None do.
Kentucky cities could not require landlords to take federal low-income housing vouchers, also known as “Section 8” vouchers, for rent under a bill passed out of a Senate committee Wednesday. Housing and tenant advocates, who strongly oppose the proposal, say it could potentially stop efforts by Kentucky’s two largest cities to prevent housing discrimination.? Bill […]
’We desperately need something:‘ Kentucky lawmakers urged to put $200 million into housing
FRANKFORT — Without the help of a friend, Regina Quillen doesn’t know where she would go.? She lost virtually everything in her Letcher County home, a place that her father built and where she raised her children for 23 years, in the deadly flooding that hit Eastern Kentucky in July 2022.? She invested thousands of […]
States, Biden administration push efforts to aid renters, keep people housed
Maine’s housing authority received $35 million in 2023 — the first time in 54 years it has received a direct appropriation from the state budget — to help build more affordable rental housing for communities that have struggled to keep up with high housing prices. The state’s program provides funding to developers for affordable housing […]
Floodplain buyouts in Kentucky are ‘the fastest in the program’s history’
When floodwaters rushed through the town of McRoberts in July 2022, Kimberly Sapp-Allen and her husband packed what they could in their vehicles, left their home that sat along the rising creek and headed for higher ground. The floods scoured several counties across Eastern Kentucky, including Letcher County — where Sapp-Allen lives. In the end, […]
Grant will help Eastern Kentucky organization fix more houses
The Kentucky Association of Health Plans has given a $50,000 grant to Saint Vincent Mission in Floyd County, which the organization says will go toward building a new warehouse.? With the extra storage space in David, the organization says it can hold onto more materials and fix 15 more houses annually in an area that […]
Kentucky could win ‘massive’ solar investment in federal competition. Here’s what’s possible.
An unlikely collaboration between a Kentucky coalfield county and Kentucky’s largest city began when a former high school English teacher, Megan Downey, walked into the Lawrence County courthouse in Louisa in August.?? Inspired by a personal desire to find ways to tackle the impacts of climate change, Downey had launched a nonprofit called The Solar […]
Rosalynn Carter acclaimed by admirers for her pioneering advocacy for mental health, caregiving
Former first lady Rosalynn Carter has died, according to the Carter Center, leaving a rich legacy of championing mental health and women’s rights. She will be buried at the ranch house in Plains she and former President Jimmy Carter built in 1961. She died Sunday just days after the family announced she had entered hospice […]
For one Kentucky city, a new home highlights the housing challenges rural communities face
Along the Tennessee border in West Kentucky, Fulton County Judge-Executive Jim Martin traced his rural community’s economic challenges, and its coinciding lack of housing, back decades.? As the federal government built interstates throughout the country and in Kentucky in the mid-20th century, less traffic subsequently came through the county as new routes were planned. Garment […]
Report: Flood insurance cost a barrier to Eastern Kentucky recovery
The cost of flood insurance is a large recovery barrier for people living in Eastern Kentucky flood plains, says a report by the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. Researcher Matt Klesta reported what locals have said: Flood insurance is too expensive for most residents. Also, floods have made affordable housing problems worse and driven locals […]