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Dallas’ $200 Million (Housing) Question

D Magazine - By Matt Goodman - July 2023

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Here is an excerpt:

Next year, the city will ask voters to approve a $1 billion bond. It wants to use a chunk of that money to help stave off a housing crisis. But how much?

Dallas City Hall is finally poised to use bond dollars to pay for housing. The city has never seriously used the bond program to boost the supply of apartments and homes, a technique that has grown common in cities such as Austin and San Antonio.

The new attention comes as research shows a dire situation growing worse. The nonprofit Child Poverty Action Lab recently identified a gulf in supply of 33,660 rental units for Dallasites who make 50 percent of the area’s median income. That’s $31,150 for a single person, $35,600 for two, and $40,500 for three.

Forty percent of the labor pool here works lower-paying retail, service, and support jobs, which have median wages of under $40,500. If we do nothing, the shortage will nearly triple to 83,500 units by 2030. The city of Dallas now admits that these earners have to work multiple jobs just to afford a one-bedroom apartment.

The Dallas Housing Coalition wants to change the equation. The group of 90 organizations—businesses, chambers of commerce, nonprofits, churches—are calling for the city to use as much as one-fifth of the entire bond package on housing. That would be $200 million. The city is proposing a housing ask of $125 million, but that figure could drop to as low as $80 million.

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