Bill on CDBG Budget Cut Pulled from House’s Consideration

The House’s Republican leaders pulled Wednesday the proposed law that would cut nearly in half the Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) of many Southland districts including Pasadena’s.

The Transportation, Housing and Urban Development Appropriations bill, usually allocated to local nonprofits, would reduce Pasadena’s share from $1.7 million to less than $1 million.

D-Pasadena Rep. Judy Chu, who earlier opposed the bill and cited its “catastrophic” effect to her community, said its removal from the House calendar is a victory for low-income local nonprofits, the Pasadena Star-News reported.

“From Rep. Chu’s perspective, this is the first sign that even Republican Members are not prepared to push through the kind of austerity cuts that their leadership has been advocating recently. CDBG funding is safe for now,” Chu’s Press Secretary Dan Linder told the Star-News.

Meanwhile, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers of D-Kentucky expressed his disappointment on the removal of the bill from House consideration through a statement, the newspaper reported.

“I am extremely disappointed with the decision to pull the bill from the House calendar today. The prospects for passing this bill in September are bleak at best, given the vote count on passage that was apparent this afternoon,” Rogers said in the statement. “With this action, the House has declined to proceed on the implementation of the very budget it adopted just three months ago.”

Pasadena’s CDBG fund in 2012 was allocated to local nonprofits including Union Station Homeless Services, Pasadena Unified School District and El Centro De Accion Social. For the past few years, there had been a consistent budget cut in the CDBG to make way for other projects.