HUD Secretary Fudge visits Alexandria, says affordable housing is a Biden Administration priority

U.S. Housing and Ubran Development Secretary Marcia L. Fudge was in Alexandria Friday to tour The Spire affordable housing complex and tout the Biden Administration’s Build Back Better agenda.

“There are so many people who live on the outskirts of hope in this country,” Fudge said. “I am in a community now… where the median value of a home is nearly $640,000. Most people can’t afford to live here. There is no place in this country today where a person making minimum wage can rent a two-bedroom apartment.”

Fudge continued, “This project makes me feel good about what I do every day,” Fudge said. “Affordable housing and low income housing was a problem before COVID. It is a bigger problem now.”

Fudge was accompanied on her visit by Congressman Don Beyer (D-8th) and Mayor Justin Wilson. The complex they visited has been praised, since the land was converted by the Episcopal Church of the Resurrection into a 113-apartment affordable housing community.

“We are so excited to welcome Secretary Fudge to the City of Alexandria, and to highlight this project especially,” Wilson said. “This is an exciting project in the city that has brought together so many city priorities.”

The administration’s $7 trillion COVID-relief plan would lower housing costs, raise wages for blue collar workers and would reportedly create millions of clean-energy jobs.

Alexandria is currently experiencing an affordable housing crisis, and lost 90% of its affordable housing stock between 2000 and 2017. Consequently, the city has pledged to produce or develop thousands of units to meet 2030 regional housing goal set by the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments. 

“We are one of the wealthiest jurisdictions in the world, certainly in America,” Beyer said. “We’re the best-educated, and there are many people still struggling and living in poverty among us… I believe we’re 150,000 affordable housing units short in Metropolitan Washington D.C.”

Public appearances from Biden Administration officials has become almost commonplace in Alexandria. President Biden visited the city in April and May to make discuss COVID-19, and, in March, Vice President Kamala Harris made her first official visit outside of the White House to stop by Old Town knitting shop fibre space. Also in April, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona visited Ferdinand T. Day School.