House Financial Services Committee
Housing, Community Development and Insurance Subcommittee
Built to Last: Examining Housing Resilience in the Face of Climate Change
America’s housing infrastructure is vulnerable to the growing costs of climate and weather disasters, which may accelerate the need for maintenance and repair, or render units of housing infrastructure uninhabitable.
Prior to the passage of the Fair Housing Act in 1968, housing policies, such as redlining and zoning, were used to overtly segregate low-income people and people of color into less desirable areas that were susceptible to flooding, located in close proximity to industrial districts, lacked adequate infrastructure, and were systemically disinvested in. Due to historic and ongoing socioeconomic segregation, the current effects of climate change and weather events are concentrated among low-income communities and communities of color.
Legislation:- Reforming Disaster Recovery Act
- National Flood Program Reauthorization Act of 2021
- Green Neighborhoods Act
- Rodney Ellis, Commissioner, Harris County, Texas
- Ariadna M. Godreau-Aubert, Executive Director, Ayuda Legal Puerto Rico
- Andrew N. Mais, Commissioner, Connecticut Department of Insurance, on behalf of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners
- Shelley Poticha, Chief Climate Strategist, Natural Resources Defense Council
- Stephen Ellis, President, Taxpayers for Common Sense