The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has awarded Fort Worth $5 million in grant funding to combat the city’s affordable housing crisis, city leaders announced at a press conference July 2.
“Today is a huge opportunity for us,” Mayor Mattie Parker said. “We know that in Fort Worth, over one-third of our households in our city are burdened by high housing costs. One-third. And it’s a challenge that we’ve committed to as a city.”
The funds are part of HUD’s Pathways to Removing Obstacles to Housing program, a new initiative aimed at providing money to communities with a track record of addressing local housing barriers. Fort Worth, the only city in Texas to receive funding from the program, received the third largest amount of any grantee nationwide.
“We’re trying to improve affordable housing preservation and production,” Candace Valenzuela, the southwest regional administrator for HUD, said. “So some of those boring, unsexy things that are difficult to fund, this is for that.”
Valenzuela said Fort Worth was competitive for the grant in part because of how it engages stakeholders.
“I don’t just mean elected officials, I don’t just mean business owners,” Valenzuela said. “I also mean folks that actually live in those communities. They prioritize making sure that folks aren’t pushed out of the communities that they’re seeking to develop.”
The money will go toward several strategies outlined in the affordable housing plan approved by council members in October, though specifics are still being ironed out. The city’s initial grant application for $10 million outlined plans to develop a pattern book of preapproved housing designs for infill housing, create a capital pool for affordable housing projects and create a formal land bank.
Amy Connolly, the city’s assistant director of neighborhood services, said the next step is to negotiate with HUD to determine which plans included in the application should be funded with the $5 million grant. Those discussions are expected to take place over the next month, before the City Council takes a final vote on where to allocate the money.
“We’ll be looking at different ways that we can speed up the development of housing and planning,” Connolly said.
The pattern book, for example, is intended to lower costs of construction for affordable housing developers; it was one of dozens of recommendations included in the affordable housing plan.
Another option laid out in the grant, creating a formal land bank, would let the city buy underused, abandoned or foreclosed property, maintain it and sell it at a low cost to approved developers. Fort Worth has engaged in informal land banking for several decades, but hasn’t been actively acquiring properties to resell after selling its existing stock.
Fort Worth is one of 21 grantees, according to HUD, who collectively received around $85 million. The department received more than 175 applications across 47 states and territories. Applications for a second round of $100 million in funding will become available later in the summer.
The funding announcement comes shortly after Fort Worth ratified its first land trust, which will be operated by a private nonprofit. Connolly said continued public-private partnerships will be essential in tackling the city’s housing affordability crisis.
“This funding is going to have to be used similarly, it’s going to be a public-private partnership to get this funding expended and get the implementation steps down,” she said.
The city is also considering — for the first time in its history — adding housing to its bond program in 2026. The bond, if approved, would support single-family housing and housing for people experiencing homelessness.
Overall, Parker said, the city is operating with a sense of urgency.
“We understand in the city that there are a lot of barriers to housing, both in development and redevelopment in the inner city, permitting costs, (and) red tape,” she said. “… All of these things really will integrate within our departments so we can use this $5 million to break down those barriers.”