Senate-House negotiators present $200 million CHIP framework, leave final approval pending

Negotiators in a Senate-House conference on S.127, the omnibus housing bill, described a draft financing framework that would authorize roughly $200 million in projects financed under a CHIP-style tax-increment structure, with a 10-year issuance period and 20 years of increment retention, participants said.

The negotiators said the package assumes a roughly 75 percent capture of the increment and that, under that scenario, the education fund portion would see about $38 million returned over the period. "We have confirmation that the administration could sign this bill," one conference participant said.

The discussion focused on capacity, program scale and reporting requirements. Participants said staff used figures provided by Chris Donnelly of CHT on average infrastructure costs to estimate housing need and finance outcomes. Conference participants reported a statewide housing need of about 7,500 new units per year and said CHIP financing could conceivably support roughly half that number — about 3,750 units a year under their assumptions.

Negotiators described two procedural changes they preferred to omit from the previous draft: a five‑year lookback/review of the cap and additional subsections related to smaller supplemental funding. "If the cap is at $200,000,000, then you don't really need the next two subsections," a conference participant said. The group said they were willing to leave an optional $5 million authorization on the table as a contingency.

Participants also discussed staffing and reporting burdens tied to administering the program. One participant said they view the current reporting requirements as duplicative given annual reports already produced by the administering entity, and noted that additional staff capacity would be needed if the program's workload increases.

No formal motion or vote was recorded during the session. Multiple participants said the draft represents a favorable path forward but that negotiators needed time to confer with absent members; one participant provided a window of availability for follow-up discussions. The conference did not announce a final agreement or submit the draft for legislative approval during the meeting.

Next steps described by participants include reconvening to confirm positions and to share the spreadsheet and revenue projections prepared by staff; Patrick Titterton, who prepared the added column showing the education‑fund impacts, was cited as a resource for follow-up questions.