OKLAHOMA CITY — Despite ongoing efforts by the Trump administration to dramatically scale back grants and spending at all levels of government, Oklahoma City housing officials are staying tight-lipped about plans to weather possible rollbacks, even as they say they’ve seen no major changes in their current funding model.
With reports and rumors swirling daily about layoffs and closures hitting the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) – including a recent halting of a $1 billion program for aging structure rehabilitation – housing program leaders in OKC say that local projects and assistance programs have been spared so far.
“We are completing housing and development projects as planned,” Senior Program Planner Shannon Entz told Free Press.
Strong Neighborhoods Initiative leaders ‘hopeful’
As the lead planner on OKC’s Strong Neighborhoods Initiative, or SNI, Entz deals directly with grant funding and distributions for affordable housing efforts like infill and neighborhood revitalization.
But even as grants targeting similar efforts are being frozen across the country, she said that she hasn’t been aware of any changes in funding or halts to grants for OKC housing programs as of yet.
“Our office has not been informed of any cuts to the annual allocation the City receives from HUD that would directly impact the City’s Strong Neighborhoods Initiative,” she said.
The $1 billion Green and Resilient Retrofit Program that made headlines this month when it saw its grant funding fully canceled nationwide was not implemented or granted in Oklahoma.
Many SNI programs in OKC focus on the same priorities as that grant, specifically rehabilitating aging houses and affordable units up to current energy efficiency and sustainability standards.
Entz remains optimistic that the City’s success with those programs will shield them from any further financial cuts or targeted rollbacks as HUD continues to downsize.
“We are hopeful that the value, effectiveness, and benefits of these programs to the public and economy have been successfully demonstrated,” she told Free Press. “If our programs are cut, our response would be to evaluate and prioritize our efforts in the same way we have when there were budget cuts in the past.”
Section 8 increases?
It’s not only City housing development and construction project leaders that are remaining confident in the face of nationwide funding cuts and changes, though.
Rental assistance and housing voucher programs are also reporting no major funding changes or service interruptions in OKC at this time, and officials overseeing the city’s Section 8 rental assistance program say there may even be a funding boost coming.
“I have not heard of any scaling back or cutting or anything like that,” Richard Marshall, the director of Housing Voucher Programs with the OKC Housing Authority, told Free Press by phone. “As a matter of fact, the last thing I saw was that there was going to be an international increase in funding for the [Section 8] program.”
While Marshall said that he’s not anticipating that federal funding cuts will affect OKC’s Section 8 program, he did warn that potential mass layoffs at HUD could significantly slow their processes, especially for new applicants awaiting approval for rental assistance.
“I don’t anticipate any families losing their assistance as a result of cost cuts, and I don’t anticipate any landlords losing any funding that they’re already receiving,” Marshall said. “The issue will be that those that are seeking assistance will have to wait longer to get the assistance.”
Not discussing plans
With federal funding models and grant approvals seemingly changing by the day, Oklahoma City housing officials admit that major cuts and rollbacks could still be coming for City programs as shakeups at HUD continue to affect housing efforts nationwide.
How that could affect City programs that rely on HUD grants – programs like the interagency Key to Home Program that pairs City and HUD funding to private investment – remains to be seen.
“Depending on the type of cuts, they could impact anything from small-scale to large-scale housing construction that have HUD funds as part of their finance package,” Entz said regarding the kinds of cuts that City housing programs could still see. “It could also impact the number of people experiencing evictions or homelessness, as well as handicap accessibility, housing discrimination, and safety inspections.”
But whether housing officials and city leaders have any plans to protect those programs in the face of potential HUD cuts is a hand they’re keeping close to the chest right now.
“I do not feel comfortable commenting on any potential contingencies,” said Ben Davis, director of OKC’s Housing and Community Development Division, when reached for comment. “Those would be decisions made by top City leadership,”
Likewise, OKC Planning Director Geoff Butler declined to comment on housing funding contingencies, saying he doesn’t “want to speculate.”
All of which means that, for now, housing efforts for OKC are continuing as normal, and any plans for an uncertain future are being kept behind the scenes.
Brett Fieldcamp has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly 15 years, writing for several local and state publications. He’s also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.
