It would cost more than $2 billion for Connecticut’s Rental Assistance Program (RAP) to provide for every income-eligible family.
A new study by housing advocacy nonprofit, Partnership for Strong Communities, analyzes the level of housing assistance needed in Connecticut and what demand the RAP meets.
Nearly 240,000 renter families in Connecticut are considered very low or extremely low income, meaning their incomes do not exceed 50% or 30% of the Area Median Income (AMI), respectively.
Only about 50,00 of those families receive any form of rental assistance, according to the report, leaving more than 175,000 families without any aid.
To serve every income-eligible family under RAP, it would cost Connecticut about $2.5 billion, according to the report.
Sean Ghio, policy director with the Partnership, said the report is not calling on Connecticut to invest that much into the program. Rather, it lays out the scope of the state’s affordability crisis.
“Putting that number in the context of housing insecurity, family insecurity, educational consequences, economic consequences to the state,” Ghio said. “I think it's really just, it's another measure that shows the depth of the crisis.”
The report also considers the impact of smaller economic investments into RAP. Increasing the number of households served under RAP by 10%, or more than 600 families, would cost the state about $9 million annually.
Connecticut’s RAP provides housing vouchers for about 6,500 families, ensuring they pay no more than 40% of their monthly income on housing costs.
The goal of the report is to determine how much it would cost the state to care for every income eligible family under RAP, according to Samaila Adelaiye, the study’s author.
“It also speaks to the fact that, this is how large a problem this is based on policies like the under production of affordable housing across the state,” Adelaiye said.
In the most recent legislative session, state lawmakers approved an $18 million boost to RAP and several hundred additional vouchers for families with children, senior renters or families with disabilities.
However, with rising rent and inflation, the funding isn’t stretching as far and providing for as many families as it used to.
The issue comes back to increasing affordable housing production and ways to make existing housing more affordable for renters, Adelaiye said.
“More funding for the voucher program is always a good thing, right? More people are going to be impacted by this, or are going to have access to safe, secure and affordable housing through this,” Adelaiye said. “However, I think we always want to go back to the fact that if there's long-term more housing development, more affordable housing development is key.”
