Washington, D.C., September 14, 2021 – The House Ways and Means Committee Democrats released their budget reconciliation legislative text for amending community development tax incentives over the weekend. The bill will be considered by the full Ways and Means Committee this week. In a very promising step for the largest expansion of the HTC in a generation, the following HTC provisions, similar to the House version of the Historic Tax Credit Growth and Opportunity Act (HTC-GO), were included in this first version of the bill.
Rehabilitation Tax Credit
- Sec. 135301. Temporarily Increasing the HTC From 20% to 30% for all projects.
- Sec. 135302. Permanent increase in the rehabilitation credit for small projects.
- Sec. 135303. Modification of substantial rehabilitation definition.
- Sec. 135304. Elimination of basis adjustment.
- Sec. 135305. Modifications of tax-exempt use leasing rules.
- Sec. 135306. Enabling HTC to be used for public school buildings.
To read the full text of the section-by-section breakdown of the infrastructure bill, Click Here (HTC on Pages 3 and 4).
Next in the legislative process, this bill must be approved by the committee, move through the reconciliation process in the House, pass the House, pass the Senate, and be signed into law.
The budget reconciliation bill will be a partisan exercise of Democratic priorities and is unlikely to receive any Republican votes both in the House and the Senate. Both the House and Senate have very small Democratic majorities (slim to none!). So, as the debate moves forward, there will be efforts to make the package smaller and advocates will have to work hard collectively to fend off any threats to these provisions.
Please join HTC advocates in reaching out to Democratic members of Congress, in both the House and Senate, to voice support for these enhancements. Share the benefits these provisions will bring to your community.
Take Action
Constituents of Democratic lawmakers should review the House bill fact sheet below (HTC Page 3 and 4) and ask their legislator to support the Historic Tax Credit enhancement provisions included in the infrastructure legislation.
- Locate the names, phone numbers, and websites of your Representative and Senators:
- Send a message to your Representative and Senators through their website and select “tax” or “taxation” as the issue area, or call (during office hours) the offices of your Members of Congress. Introduce yourself as a constituent and ask for the email address of tax staff.
- Ask/Explain to your Democratic Member of Congress:
- Introduce yourself as a constituent.
- “Thank you for your previous support of the Historic Tax Credit. Provisions to enhance the Historic Tax Credit, have been included in the infrastructure budget reconciliation bill. These provisions are similar to the provisions of the Historic Tax Credit Growth and Opportunity Act (HR 2294), which would greatly benefit our community. Please continue to support and protect these provisions as the bill moves forward.”
- Explain how enacting these provisions would benefit your community
- Feel free to share the bill’s Section-by-Section Breakdown (HTC provisions on Pages 3 and 4) or copy and paste the HTC provisions in your message.
- Sign the petition from our partners at the National Trust for Historic Preservation
Other Resources
- HTC State Maps and Project Lists FY2002-2020
- House HTC-GO Fact Sheet
- Find out if you Members of Congress Cosponsored HTC-GO
Thank you for your advocacy! Please share responses from House and Senate offices and gain assistance with your advocacy by emailing Mike Phillips, Shaw Sprague, or Patrick Robertson.
Background
In August the Senate passed two bills, representing the first critical steps in President Biden’s signature economic recovery initiative. With the razor-thin majority, President Biden and Democratic Senate leaders have worked to secure agreements for these measures in the Senate. Moderate Senate Republicans have agreed to a $1.2 trillion bill which contains $600 billion in new spending to fund roads, bridges, transit, and freight rail, as well as electric vehicle transit and infrastructure priorities. The bill passed the Senate on a 69 to 30 vote. The Senate also passed a $3.5 trillion budget “blueprint” on a 50 to 49 party-line vote that will be the vehicle to fund Democratic community development, health care, and other “human” infrastructure priorities this fall.
The focus now turns to the House to continue the legislative process for these two bills. The House adopted the Senate’s budget resolution in late August. House Democratic-led committees are presently moving forward a more detailed $3.5 trillion budget bill, building upon the blueprint passed in August.
The House Ways and Means Committee Democrats released their reconciliation legislative text for amending community development tax incentives, with enhancements to the HTC. They will work to complete passage out of the Committee by an internally set September 15th deadline.
House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, is striving to pass both the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill of roads bridges, transit, and broadband, (likely gaining support from House Democrats and Republicans) and the partisan driven budget reconciliation bill in September.
Once passed by the House, the budget reconciliation bill with Democratic priorities will be sent to the Senate for a vote under budget reconciliation by a simple 51-vote majority, which cannot be subject to a Senate filibuster.