Federal housing funds are critical to Missoula's fight for affordable housing

Martin Kidston

(Missoula Current) A small pool of funding that comes to the city each year has gone a long way in renovating public housing and helping low-income residents with rental subsidies over the past year, program officials said Monday.

Each year, the City of Missoula receives and distributes funds from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. In exchange for these funds, the City must submit an annual evaluation and performance report.

Tracy Pohndorf, grant manager, said the $397,000 from HOME funds resulted in one project last year, while the $555,000 from the Community Development Block Grant resulted in funding for four projects.

In total, the funds have helped provide or preserve housing for more than 700 area residents, including ongoing renovations to Creekside Apartments and the opening of the Trinity and Villagio affordable housing projects.

“A major achievement (in the last program year) was the completion of the Trinity and Villagio apartments,” said Pohndorf. “These are two major HOME projects that contributed to the development of 402 affordable rental apartments.”

The Villagio currently houses more than 294 adults and 305 children and teenagers. Rents are based on people earning 30 to 60 percent of the area median income. For a family of four, that equates to $31,000 to $54,000 per year.

Pohndorf said Trinity's 202 rental apartments also house 278 adults and 111 children and teens, with about 65% of residents earning 50% or less of the area median income.

The latest round of funding also helped renovate the exteriors of several social housing projects managed by Homeword, as well as several owner-occupied homes, and equipped 12 households with wheelchair ramps to enable residents to remain in their apartments.

A further 101 people received financial assistance to cover late rent payments or other arrears.

“United Way's rental assistance program helped 101 people stay in their homes by providing rental assistance and arrears payments. These households were all below 80% of AMI,” Pohndorf said.

Housing authorities have attributed rising housing costs in Missoula in part to a lack of supply. With so little supply, affordable housing remains a challenge, and the funding provided by HUD has become an important tool to ensure that those already living in affordable housing continue to do so.

“These are extremely important funds,” said Sam Oliver, executive director of the Missoula Housing Authority. “These are very valuable funds and often a critical resource.”