Letter to the Editor: District 74 should not have to match funds

Federal funds known as Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) are distributed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to Indiana in two methods. First they are awarded to 17 HUD Entitlement Communities and secondly as a Block Grant to the State of Indiana for use throughout the state in the “Non-Entitlement” areas. CDBG is designed to be used for quality of life improvements such as demolition of blighted structures, infrastructure improvements and housing development/rehabilitation. Millions of dollars come into Indiana every year.

In House District 74, which includes all of Crawford and Perry counties and parts of Dubois, Orange and Spencer, there are NO Entitlement areas. The closest are the cities of Bloomington, Evansville and New Albany. The Entitlement areas, such as Evansville or Indianapolis, receive these funds directly from HUD on an annual basis as funds are appropriated by the U.S. Congress and must submit a plan on how they intend to spend the funds. The funds are subject to various Federal requirements.

HUD requires no matching funds from the Entitlement Cities. To receive these Federal funds in rural areas, including all the cities and counties in District 74, units of government must submit competitive applications to state agencies of Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs (OCRA) and/ or Indiana Housing and Rural Development Authority (IHCDA).

Not only must the cities, towns and counties of District 74 submit competitive applications, where they compete with every other rural city, town and county in the State, they are required to provide matching funds.

So in summary 17 cities in Indiana automatically receive Federal funds from HUD every year without providing matching funds and the cities, towns, and counties in District 74 can only receive these same federal funds through a competitive application and must provide matching funds to even apply.

Does that seem fair to you? I say no.

I believe the “rule” used by Indiana to require matching funds from the rural areas is a holdover rule adopted by the Robert Orr/John Mutz administration when they were Governor/Lt. Governor. It is not a Federal Requirement — it is a State Rule and it needs to change.

I’ve heard the argument for requiring matching funds is it makes communities have “skin in the game.” Let me say the people in District 74 already have “skin in the game” as they have paid the same federal taxes as the residents of the Entitlement communities.

We’re not putting skin in the game, we’re being skinned by state bureaucrats and policy makers. At the least our rural communities are being treated unfairly, at the most we are being discriminated against.

If elected as Representative for House District 74, I will propose legislation to prohibit state agencies from imposing unfair matching fund requirements on Federal funds that come into Indiana. Our citizens who reside in District 74 should not have any restrictions or requirements that the citizens of Evansville, Bloomington, New Albany or Indianapolis have placed on them.

Sincerely, Larry K. Kleeman, Candidate for State Representative House District 74