HUD announces Alaska affordable housing funds

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced its third round of funding as part of its upcoming Neighborhood Stabilization Program -- including $5 million to help create more affordable housing in Alaska.

The Alaska Housing Finance Corp. says it's creating 250 new housing units, turning homes which were foreclosed or boarded up into new ones that are more appealing and affordable.

Several local housing providers joined in on a teleconference Wednesday, in which HUD announced that the funding was part of an effort to reverse the effects of the foreclosure crisis.

The Cook Inlet Housing Authority was one of the providers who received a portion of the first grant. It used the funds to turn 10 boarded-up sites in Mountain View into 20 units.

CIHA says it received more than $5 million to use in Anchorage and just over $1 million to use in Wasilla. Already, eight units are occupied and officials say they expect all of the units to be occupied by the end of September.

“Have such a huge issue but it did help with neighborhood stabilization and neighborhood renovation, so we were able to strategically target those neighborhoods that really needed a little bit of extra help,” said CIHA’s CEO, Carol Gore.

“We feel very lucky that we've been able to take advantage of our funds, work with our community partners to leverage those dollars and for a specifically targeted individuals,” said Debe Mahoney with Neighborworks.

HUD will announce regulations and targeted communities when the program is officially launched in the next few weeks.

HUD allocates funding based on a distribution formula outlined by Congress, which weighs factors to match funding to needs in certain neighborhoods.

Contact Christine Kim at ckim@ktuu.com