Affordable Housing

Developers have built roughly 8,000 affordable homes, less than a quarter of the city’s overall goal.

AISD has three sites that it wants to repurpose, including the former Pease Elementary School in downtown Austin. The district began holding public meetings in January and has three left for public input, as well as a survey that closes on Oct. 9.

The Austin Community College Student Government Association surveyed more than 500 students about their living situations. The group found most struggled to afford rent and a handful were experiencing homelessness.

Roughly 70 residents were given 60 days' notice to leave this summer. Since then, about a dozen families have stayed, unable to find new places to live.

Austinites voted last year to reinstate a ban on public camping. In other words, voters made living on the streets a crime. Experts say solving homelessness means building or finding thousands of homes for those who don’t have them. And that housing has to go somewhere.

Austin ISD is urging the school board to include $50 million for affordable housing for teachers in the 2022 bond package. Teachers have raised concerns about what it would be like to live in employer-owned housing.

If the measure passes, the bond money will go toward building affordable housing, repairing homes for low-income people and acquiring more land.

Homelessness is a real possibility for tenants of the Congress Mobile Home and RV Park after the land was purchased by a developer.

Housing choice vouchers allow households to pay no more than 40% of their income toward rent; the federal government pays the landlord the rest.

In the months ahead, trustees will decide whether to send a bond package to voters in November. One effort the bond could help fund is creating affordable housing on district-owned property to try to retain teachers getting priced out of the city.