Administration Sends Housing Assistance to Five More States

The administration today announced an expansion of its Housing Finance Agency Innovation Fund for the Hardest Hit Housing Markets program, which uses TARP money to provide states in the worst economic straits with block grants. In the first round, five states whose housing stock lost more than 20 percent of its value — California, Nevada, Arizona, Florida and Michigan — split $1.5 billion. In this round, the five states with the highest concentration of people living in counties in which unemployment was over 12 percent in 2009 — North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island and South Carolina — will split an additional $600 million.

The grants for the first round of funding were awarded in this fashion:

• California received $699.6 million
• Florida received $418 million
• Michigan got $154.5 million
• Arizona got $125.1 million
• Nevada got $102.8 million

In the new round, the awards are generally smaller, though the administration says they are “equivalent on a per person basis to the $1.5 billion awarded in the first HFA Hardest Hit Fund.”

• Ohio gets $172 million
• North Carolina gets $159
• South Carolina gets $138 million
• Oregon gets $88 million
• Rhode Island gets $43 million

As with the previous program, states have to submit their plans for review to the Treasury Department, which encourages them to focus on unemployment and distressed homeowner programs but doesn’t limit its assistance to just those ideas.