The week kicked off with a roundtable discussion featuring Congressmen Denny Heck (D-WA) and Sean Duffy (R-WI), who are both members of the powerful House Financial Services Committee and both have a keen interest in housing policy. In fact Congressman Duffy is the Ranking Member of the Housing Subcommittee, and Congressman Heck co-authored the New Democrat Coalition’s “Missing Millions of Homes” report. They discussed some of the committee’s work on housing and what to expect in the 116th Congress, including the Committee’s previous day hearing on the Infrastructure Needs of America’s Housing Stock. And what was a departure from the perceived partisan warfare of Washington, the two members spent much of their time discussing how much they agree on the issues of the day – including housing. Up for Growth Action is here to facilitate those conversations and push bipartisan solutions with broad-based appeal.

Up for Growth National Coalition released its Housing Policy and Affordability Calculator during the Conference. The first instance of the calculator focuses on Seattle and the cumulative impacts of individual city and state-specific housing policies on the cost of rent, the probability of a project getting built, and the expected change in citywide housing supply. We received some positive feedback on the calculator and suggestions that will be incorporated in future iterations of the calculator. Seattle is the first of many calculators; we will bring it to cities across the country in the coming months. Take some time to utilize the calculator today, and see how small policy choices can make big impacts on housing.