Bill Fulton was quoted in Michael Kimmelman’s New York Times article on homelessness in Houston, published June 14.
Kimmelman’s article highlighted the progress Houston has made in reducing homelessness and quoted Mayor Sylvester Turner as wanting to eliminate chronic homelessness before he leaves office next year. Fulton provided context by highlighting the fact that near-homeless people and other Houston residents of modest incomes are competing for a limited – and shrinking – pool of affordable housing units.
“Housing costs are rising faster than incomes,” Fulton was quoted as saying. “And, as a result, a large majority of Houstonians have been shut out of homeownership and become renters, half of them rent-burdened, meaning they pay more than a third, and often more than half, of their income in rent.”
Kimmelman also quoted Fulton as saying that “compression” at the lower end of the housing market means that rent-burdened Houstonians — people like Mr. Sanders — are competing with “the homeless for a shrinking stock of deteriorating apartments that are charging increasingly higher rents.”
Fulton’s comments are derived in large part from the Kinder Institute’s 2021 “My Home Is Here” report, an affordable housing study done in collaboration with the Harris County Community Services Department. This report was the first-ever study of affordable housing needs done in Harris County.