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The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced Tuesday that it will be awarding a $21.3 million Native Hawaiian Housing Block Grant to support the housing needs of low-income Native Hawaiian families, according to a news release.
The grant will be given to the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands and may be used for construction, rehabilitation and acquisition of housing, infrastructure and other support services.
“The State of Hawaii has the highest median home prices in the nation, and too often our Native Hawaiian communities are among the most negatively affected by the prohibitively high cost of housing,” said Richard Monocchio, principal deputy assistant secretary for Public and Indian Housing, in the release. “The NHHBG program enables HUD to get federal funds directly to Native Hawaiian communities for affordable housing and long-term investments that will benefit generations to come.”
In the past two decades, DHHL has used more than $150 million in NHHBG funds to increase and improve housing for Native Hawaiians, including expansion of housing-related services, financial literacy training, home repair training and rental assistance.
The current grant funds are slated to support a variety of affordable housing activities, including homeowner and developer financing, tenant rent subsidies, a kupuna rental subsidy program, housing counseling, housing conversion, property acquisition, and supplemental dwelling unit financing.