United States HUD Secretary shares plans of action for Jacksonville's housing crisis

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JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — United States Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge made a special trip to Jacksonville Monday to discuss ways to address the city's housing crisis.

"Housing is a crisis in this nation, no matter what they say about inflation - until they deal with housing, we cannot bring down inflation," Fudge said.

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She said she's found most people spend half their income on rent or a mortgage, and added that property owners don't want to rent to people on fixed incomes and Social Security.

Fudge shared three plans of action to tackle the housing crisis:

1. She said President Biden plans to request $35 billion in the next budget to build at least 200,000 houses over the next three years.
2. Fudge also shared plans to keep investors from buying up properties. As we've reported, investors have bought more than a third of Jacksonville homes so far in 2022.
3. Fudge plans to hold the people who house those with HUD to a higher standard.

"I do not believe in people living in squalor," she said.

Read: HUD Secretary visits Jacksonville amid city's housing crisis

HUD tenants like Lisa Manners, who suffers from chronic pain, shared her concerns with Fudge:

"Throbbing pain 24 hours a day for the last three months; they still have not fixed the stairwells," she said.

Fudge vowed to put pressure on "the bad actors" who are neglecting their properties and tenants.

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