Observers: Continuing Calls for GSEs to Fund Affordable Housing Could Find Sympathetic Ear in Director Watt
June 5, 2014
Progressive policy groups and low-income housing advocates ramped up their calls for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to honor their legislatively mandated affordable housing commitment to finance the National Housing Trust Fund, and industry observers speculate that the government-sponsored enterprises’ regulator is inclined to reverse course … when the timing is right. Two weeks ago, a letter spearheaded by the Center for American Progress with a dozen co-signers renewed calls to Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt to lift the GSE funding moratorium and begin channeling funds to the National Housing Trust Fund and the Capital Magnet Fund. Notably absent from Watt’s first major policy speech as FHFA director last month was...