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May 8, 2008
House passes foreclosure bill with LaTourette funding boost
The House of Representatives today passed legislation that includes an extra $150 million to help Ohio cope with the foreclosure crisis. The additional funding was sought by U.S. Rep. Steven C. LaTourette (R-Bainbridge Township), who brokered a deal to boost funding by reworking a funding formula that originally would have steered more grants and loans to states with high home prices.
LaTourette, a senior member of the House Committee on Financial Services, worked with Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA) and colleagues Deborah Pryce (R-OH) and Charles A. Wilson (D-OH) to amend the Neighborhood Stabilization Act of 2008, H.R. 5818, to make a formula for distributing funds to states more equitable. The bill passed today by a vote of 239 to 188. The bill provides $15 billion in loans and grants to states and cities to deal with foreclosures nationwide. The measure includes $7.5 billion for zero-interest loans and $7.5 billion in grants to be distributed to the states based on a specific funding formula. The original formula would have steered a third of all the available money to California, which has a huge foreclosure problem and very high home values. LaTourette argued that the formula would penalize states like Ohio that have large numbers of foreclosures, but home prices that didn’t escalate much during the recent real estate boom.
“Ohio and 46 other states do better under the new formula we brokered,” LaTourette said. “I argued that our goal should be able to help as many states and homeowners as possible, not just those in states who are having trouble keeping up with payments on million dollar homes.”
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