The Economic Justice Group of the Council of Churches has recently voted to join the Affordable Housing Network in its local campaign to enact the ‘National Affordable Housing Trust Fund’ to establish a dedicated funding source for the production, preservation and rehabilitation of 1.5 million affordable homes over a period of 10 years. At least 75% of the funds will be for households that are extremely low income, earning less than 30% of an areas median income. The House of Representatives passed this legislation last October. It was introduced into the Senate as S. 2523 in December. The need is great. Nationwide there are only 6,187,000 homes renting at prices affordable to the 9,022,000 extremely low income renter households – a shortage of 2,835,000 homes. Not a single Congressional district has enough rental housing affordable to extremely low income families.

The problem is not just the lack of housing; it is also the lack of action by the US Senate on the Affordable Housing bill. This bill has been sitting in the Senate waiting to be made a priority. It needs advocates. It needs vocal supporters. As Christians, we are called to be these voices, these advocates.

Rev. Bea Chun, pastor of Christ the Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in San Jose, recently wrote about this problem and what we can do to help. We've included Bea's excellent letter for you - just go to "read more" below or to download a copy click here. She has some great ideas - like sending a Mother's Day card to Senators to urge them to support families by working for this bill.