Minnesota Housing agency policy bill advances with lived-experience consultant plan

House File 4207, Minnesota Housing’s annual agency policy bill, was moved and amended before being referred to the House Committee on Taxes.

Dan Pittsburgher, legislative director at Minnesota Housing, told the Housing Finance & Policy Committee the bill includes mostly technical clarifications and programmatic alignments. He said the bill would allow applicants who receive awards through the Greater Minnesota Workforce Housing Development program to waive certain income requirements under the state housing tax credit program. Pittsburgher also described a new agency authority to hire "lived-experience" consultants—individuals who have faced housing instability or homelessness—to help score competitive applications. "The stipend would be $1,000 per individual," he said when the committee asked about compensation.

Pittsburgher explained further clarifications to local and statewide affordable housing statutes, including how program income and proceeds must be used on qualifying projects. He also described a provision allowing tribal nations a mechanism similar to local housing trust funds so tribes can establish accounts for unspent funds if they cannot spend them on qualifying projects by a deadline.

The agency representative discussed a repealer tied to an earlier work group’s projection of emergency rental assistance need, noting that the U.S. Census Bureau Community Pulse Survey—one of the primary data sources for that projection—has been discontinued, which undercut the agency’s ability to repeat a prior estimate.

Committee members voted by voice to adopt the A3 technical amendment and to refer the bill to the Committee on Taxes. No public testimony was offered on the bill during this hearing.

Next steps: House File 4207, as amended, will move to the Committee on Taxes for further consideration.