A national group called the LIBRE Initiative is calling for loosening regulations on housing development in Wisconsin to improve affordability, with a focus on the state’s Hispanic community.
Roel Sanchez, the grassroots engagement director for the group in Wisconsin and a former real estate agent, said “we are in one of the worst times” for housing availability given the limited number of homes available in the state and strong demand.
In a recent interview on the organization’s policy goals, he argued the state’s Hispanic residents are among the most impacted by these challenges.
“With the limited access to properties available on the market and the amount of buyers that are actually still on the market, the people that are getting affected the most are more of the individuals like our Hispanic community,” Sanchez said.
He argues zoning restrictions in the state are placing too many limits on how people can build homes or remodel existing structures. The group says Wisconsin isn’t building homes fast enough and points to “outdated zoning and permitting” as a key factor keeping first-time Hispanic homebuyers from entering the market.
“We’re trying to emphasize a focus on loosening restrictions specifically on zoning and of course a lot of the red tape that we have here in Wisconsin,” Sanchez said.
The organization, which seeks to advance what it calls “freedom-minded policy solutions,” is affiliated with the conservative group Americans for Prosperity-Wisconsin. The LIBRE Initiative has endorsed Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany in the governor’s race, touting his “commitment to property tax relief.”
But the group argues housing in particular isn’t a partisan issue, and that regulation of the industry should happen at the state and local level, rather than federal.
Sanchez said the organization backs some elements of the federal 21st Century Road to Housing Act, which became law late last week after clearing the House and Senate in June. The LIBRE Initiative supports provisions in the law that cut “environmental permitting red tape” and other requirements.
But other elements of the law that add new restrictions are less popular with the group, such as language restricting institutional investors from buying single-family homes with some exceptions.
Diego Gomez, the group’s press secretary, says it supported aspects of the law that serve to “get the federal government out of the way … but housing is fundamentally a state and local issue, and Congress should empower those reforms rather than pile on new federal subsidies and mandates.”
He argued every new subsidy or investor restriction “ultimately crowds out private investment and raises costs” for American families.
