APPENDIX XIV Correspondence Regarding the Indian Housing Set-Aside in the Housing and Community Development Act of 1974 Hon. JAMES T. LYNN, U.S. SENATE, OFFICE OF THE MAJORITY LEADER, Secretary, Department of Housing and Urban Development, DEAR SECRETARY LYNN: Among the many provisions of the omnibus housing legislation enacted this year in P.L. 93-383 was the setaside of traditional public housing contract authority for Indian use only. This provision, Title II, Section 5(c), was introduced in the Senate in order to continue the production commitment made to Indians in 1969 by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and to continue it with programs that can actually serve Indian people living on tribal and other Indian lands. When this provision was introduced, it was expected that it would contribute to the construction of 7,500 units annually for fiscal years 1975 and 1976. That is, in addition to the 30,000 unit commitment made in 1969, the provision was expected to build some 15,000 additional low-income units that are so desperately needed by Indian people. We, the undersigned, are now concerned that the intent of this provision will not be carried out. We have attempted to analyze recent Indian housing production figures of your HPMC staff, and your recent statements to Indian housing personnel in Scottsdale, and have concluded that only 1,100 units will be produced in fiscal years 1975 and 1976 instead of the 15,000 units that were intended by the legislation. These are the facts as we see them: According to a 6 November 1974 memorandum from Morris Shroder to Shelton Lubar, there were 6,558 units allocated to tribal housing authorities before the end of FY 74 that were not put under ACC. These units will, according to that memorandum, "exhaust the FY 75 funding set-aside." Is it your intention to use the FY 75 Indian contract authority for units that are already in the pipeline? Furthermore, at the recent HUD Indian conference in Scottsdale, you stated that in FY 15 6,000 units would be allocated to the field. However, these units would not be put under ACC until FY 76 because, you stated: "it takes 18 months" from time of allocation to ACC. It is our view that this lead-in time is unduly long, that the law intended for $15 million in contract authority to be spent in each of the fiscal years 1975 and 1976 for new commitments, and that 6,000 units do not constitute any new commitment. When FY 74 ended, not only were there 6,558 Indian units in the pipeline, but there were an additional 4,900 units of the original 30,000 unit comitment that had not been allocated. If these are the units to be allocated in FY 75 for ACC in the following year, then Indian people will be receiving only 1,100 units of the new commitment legislated by Congress. At another point during your Scottsdale appearance, you were asked if the units allocated in FY 74 could have been funded with FY 74 funds, specifically a portion of the $140 million appropriated by Congress last October 1973, in P.L. 93-117. Your response was that they could have. We wonder why they were not. Congress increased the contract authority for public housing by $260 million when it enacted P.L. 93-383. These funds were intended to help HUD meet prior commitments. There can be little question that the 1969 promise made to Indians of 30,000 units by the close of FY 74 constitutes a "prior" commitment that should be honored. P.L. 93-383 provides HUD with authority to finance the construction of approximately 15,000 more units of Indian housing over a two year period. We are extremely interested in how you intend to implement this legislative mandate; your timetable for allocating units; and what steps are being taken to insure that processing will be speeded up so that more Indian people will be housed. Congress and the Administration share the goal of eliminating the bad housing conditions of Indian people. The tools are available, but it is up to you to implement them expeditiously. Very truly yours, LEE METCALF. Frank E. Moss. MIKE MANSFIELD. HENRY M. JACKSON. TED STEVENS. BILL HATHAWAY. PETE V. DOMENICI. THE SECRETARY OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT, Hon. LEE METCALF, Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., January 29, 1975. DEAR SENATOR METCALF: This is in response to your letter of December 13, 1974, which discusses the number of Indian housing units to be funded for fiscal years 1975 and 1976 under the United States Housing Act of 1937, as amended by the Housing and Community Development Act of 1974. Like you, I am concerned that sufficient numbers of decent, safe and sanitary housing be provided for all Americans, including Indians. In that connection, I think it's important that we keep a stream of units allocated to our field offices against which the Indian Housing Authorities can submit applications. We provided those authorizations in fiscal years 1974 and 1975 and certainly that principle will be taken into account in our fiscal year 1976 allocations. At the outset, I think it may be helpful to clarify the use of some of the terms at least as between "commitment," "allocation," "authorization," and "annual contributions contracts (ACC)." We receive the "authorization" from the Congress, "allocate" those units to our field offices and, after applications are received and approved, enter into an "ACC" with the entity that submitted the application. Typically, it has taken about 18 months from the time we allocate the units until the ACC is signed and construction can begin. We agree the processing time is too long and we are making every effort to shorten it. However, the time necessary to complete the essential processing steps is only partly under HUD's control. In addition to problems encountered in the processing of public housing applications generally, the production of Indian housing is complicated by many special problems, including difficulties arising from the legal status of Indian trust lands, and problems arising from the necessity of coordinating HUD processing with processing of the Indian Health Service and the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which are integral members of the group of Federal agencies responsible for delivering the final product. The number of units that can be processed to ACC in fiscal years 1975 and 1976 by the Indian housing authorities is also limited by the current administrative capabilities of individual Indian housing authorities. In that regard, we are engaged in a joint study with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to determine the relative housing needs among the Indian tribes-not only their physical needs, but their planning capacity and other software needs as well. Many of them do not yet have the capacity to determine and project their housing needs and how to satisfy them. We hope to have that information before the allocations are made in FY 1976. You ask whether it is HUD's intention to use FY 1975 contract authority for units already in the pipeline. In a related question you ask why units allocated in FY 1974 were not funded with FY 1974 funds. The answer to the first question is "yes," because the statute is clear that the set-aside applies to all Indian housing placed under annual contributions contracts on or after July 1, 1974. The units allocated in FY 1974 could not have been funded with FY 1974 funds because the processing could not be completed to allow the contracts to be entered into prior to July 1, 1974. Consequently, the FY 1974 contract authority was carried forward for commitments in FY 1975 and thereafter. These monies are completely fundable and there is no way to identify which monies are from previous years. Specifically, Section 5(c) of the USHAct requires, in part, that the Secretary: enter into contracts for annual contributions, out of the aggregate amount of contracts for annual contributions authorized under this section to be entered into on or after July 1, 1974, aggregating at least $15,000,000 per annum . . . to assist in financing the development or acquisition cost of. . . . [Indian housing] Thus, the statute does not provide for an additional allocation this fiscal year. The provision established a set-aside for FY 1975 and FY 1976 that may be satisfied out of all available contract authority (including the FY 1974 contract authority carried forward) by entering into annual contributions contracts on or after July 1, 1974. Therefore, entering into annual contributions contracts for Indian housing in the amount of $15,000,000 in FY 1975 and $15,000,000 in FY 1976 satisfies the statute. Further, it would be unrealistic to allocate more units for Indian housing this year because the Indian Housing Authorities could not prepare and submit allocations for any more units than are already allocated and we could not process them. |