One Democratic Senator Votes Against Landmark Housing Bill Even Republicans Back (Brian Schatz - Hawaii)

[Celerity]

One Democratic senator voted against the legislation, which overwhelmingly passed the Senate.

https://newrepublic.com/post/207700/one-democrat-senate-votes-no-housing-bill

https://archive.ph/A1j8S

The Senate passed a landmark housing bill Thursday with a rare show of bipartisan support, but one Democrat still voted “no.” Brian Schatz of Hawaii was the lone Democrat to vote against the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, which would create incentives to build new homes, launch a program to turn abandoned buildings into housing, and ban Wall Street from purchasing single-family homes, among other long overdue reforms.

Co-sponsored by Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren and Republican Tim Scott, it passed 89-10, with all of the “no” votes coming from Republicans except Schatz. Why? Schatz gave a clue that he wasn’t happy with the bill Wednesday, claiming on the Senate floor that “there is a problem” with the bill.



“It was written in such a way that it was trying to capture the hedge fund problem, but they wrote it wrong,” Schatz said, citing a provision in the bill that requires large institutional investors to sell their rental properties to families after seven years. He claimed that the legislation defines such investors as for-profit organizations that own ​​over 350 single-family homes, not just hedge funds.

Warren disagreed, and said Schatz was mischaracterizing the kind of businesses that own more than 350 homes, and that they could still build as much as they want. “Private equity can build as many multi-family homes as they want, as many apartment buildings as they want, and as many single-family buildings as they want,” the Massachusetts senator told HuffPost. “They can suck up all of the tax benefits that they’re currently entitled to, with the one exception that after seven years of benefits, private equity has to take those single-family homes and make them available for families to buy.”

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[WSHazel]

1. I respect Schatz

This bill is attacking the right problem with the wrong solution.

This bill will create a glut, which will cause a recession.

[NNguyenMD]

3. Do you mean a glut of housing?

Increasing housing units makes sense to shift the supply demand mismatch IMHO.

[msongs]

2. his/our state has a massive shortage of affordable housing with tons of units aimed at tourists instead of

residents. then there's the parade of concrete towers near the beach affordable to speculators and off island investors thanks to the city council, construction industryand unions