Houston is a cross-section of so many factors when it comes to low-income housing. It is the fourth-largest city in the nation, is famously home to relaxed zoning laws, and hosts one of the highest eviction case filinings in the entire nation, outpacing several states.With this in mind, Taylor Laredo joins A Little Louder to talk about his deep dive into H-Town's eviction problem – the Harris County Eviction Mapping Tool – and his takeaways from the project, including what we can do to vastly improve the issue.

Our first episode of 2025 is a running start right into the 89th Session of the Texas Legislature and there is much ground to cover. On this episode, research director Ben Martin joins the show to talk about Texas Housers' major focuses for housing this session, what bills are grabbing our attention right away, and how you can get involved as well. For more information on what Texas Housers is tracking, you can visit texashousers.org/lege25 for everything on housing at the 89th Texas Legislature.

In a supersized episode, we leave 2024 with a bang. Michael Depland speaks with the staff of Texas Housers to reflect on this past year, to talk about what we were most proud of this year, and a brief look forward into the new year. Thank you to Sidney Beaty, Erin Hahn, Ben Martin, Suzanne Baker, Julia Orduña, and Riley Metcalfe for joining the show. We've got big things planned for 2025, so stay tuned listeners!

Ashley Flores from Child Poverty Action Lab joins the show to talk about the organization's recent 2024 Rental Housing Needs Assessment. With growing populations but without rising wages or homes to match that influx, the data tells a story that highlights an urgent need for affordable housing, especially for Very Low Income households. Flores tell us about her findings in the report, what all of these compounding demographics indicate in terms of need, and how 10 years down the road will look if we do not act now.

The shortage of affordable housing is one of the largest crises facing low-income households in our state, if not the largest. While our work at Texas Housers has long focused on solving this issue, we are now seeing a renewed interest at our state capitol in addressing this problem from many policymakers, specifically on how land use deregulation can solve this housing crisis for good. Ben Martin and Sidney Beaty from our research team join the show to tell us what exactly land use deregulation is, in what ways it falls short to help populations most in need, and what we can do to help those who are missed by this kind of policy. You can read more about Land Use Deregulation in our research team's latest report that can be found on our blog.

On this episode of the show, Michael is joined by Heather Way of the University of Texas School of Law’s Housing Policy Clinic to discuss their latest report. Best Practices to Prevent Substandard Conditions in Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Properties: An Examination of Replacement Reserves Policies in Texas’ LIHTC Program dives into the issues that aging properties face as their change ownership, rules and accountability loosen, and tenants need far more protection. To learn more, you can read Professor Way's report on our website.

As we work to serve low-income communities, it's important to recognize that they often are dealing with many issues at once, and they often overlap. Jamie Olson from Feeding Texas joins this episode of A Little Louder to talk about their mission to eradicate hunger across the state, how food and housing insecurity are linked, and how we must endeavor to work across issues to serve low-income people.

Live from the NLIHC’s Disaster Housing Recovery Coalition convening in Washington D.C., our Southeast Regional Director Julia Orduña speaks with members of the Northeast Action Collective out of Houston – Sade Hogue, Cheryl Henderson, Dana Jones, and Rita Robles – during a special panel. The group touches on how their lived experience grounds their expertise in disaster housing recovery, and they discussed their critical work in Texas ensuring their communities have a seat at the table in disaster planning, response, and recovery. We again want to thank @nlihc for the invite and hope you enjoy this lively panel!

On this episode, we're joined by Rich Acosta from My City Is My Home/Mi Ciudad Es Mi Casa as we touch on a wide variety of housing issues in San Antonio, including fighting for renters' rights, battling against source of income discrimination for veterans, pushing back against property tax assessments for lower-income homeowners and much more.

Only twice in a decade, Texas reviews its status on fair housing. State officials evaluate how they are affirmatively furthering fair housing, consider the condition of affordable housing across the state, and provide what steps they intend to take to ensure they are proactive in pursuing fair housing practices. All of these findings are collected in an Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing or an A.I. The 2024 Texas A.I. is now available for comment, and Housers' research director Ben Martin and research analyst Sidney Beaty join the podcast to talk about what's in this document, how Texas must do a better job in engaging affected parties and everyday people for feedback, and how you listeners can express your thoughts as well. If you'd like to provide comment on the 2024 Texas A.I., you can do so here. If you have questions on this, you can contact Ben or Sidney via email.