House approves amendment letting housing trust fund cover loan-processing fees

The House approved House Bill 122 to permit the state Housing Trust Fund to cover reasonable loan-processing fees, shifting those administrative costs from the general fund to the trust. Representative Kim R. Birmingham, sponsor, said the fund has grown substantially due to federal HOME program matching and that the bill would align administrative costs with the fund’s purpose.

"If we don't pass the bill, we gotta find 10,000 more dollars somewhere else," Birmingham said, pointing to an estimated increase in loan-servicing fees. The sponsor told members the fiscal-note wording was confusing: analysts used an older figure of $6,000 in the note, while the current estimated annual loan-processing cost is about $16,000; passage would move the larger amount onto the trust fund and restore $6,000 to the general fund according to the fiscal note's framing.

Birmingham and other advocates described this as a sensible fiscal policy that allocates administrative costs to the fund that benefits from the lending activity. The House voted to forward HB122 to the Senate; the clerk recorded 67 yes votes and 0 no votes.