New interactive map details where affordable housing has been created, preserved in D.C.

The Office of the District of Columbia Auditor has created a new interactive map that makes tracking affordable projects in Washington, D.C. easy. The map, titled, “Housing Production Trust Fund Database of Multi- and Single-Family Projects, FYs 2001-2016,” is separated into the city’s eight Wards with blue dots indicating which properties were supported by D.C.’s Housing Production Trust Fund (HPTF) from 2001 through 2016.

The HPTF is the city’s tool to producing and preserving affordable housing, created in 1988. Since 2001, approximately 9,000 affordable housing units have been produced thanks to the HPTF.

Some of the information provided by this new map include the property address, borrower name, and the award date, purpose, and amount. It also includes the number of affordable units created and whether the units were offered to households making up to 30 percent, 50 percent, or 80 percent of the area median income.

The map was created by using documentation provided by the D.C. Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) and the Office of the Chief Financial Officer. According to a pop-up notification on the website, the database does not indicate whether the units were produced or maintained as affordable.

Already, the new tool by the Office of the District of Columbia Auditor has garnered some responses. The main takeaway cited is the issue that the creation and preservation of affordable housing has not been evenly distributed throughout the city. Instead, there have been far fewer affordable units created west of Rock Creek Park, an area of the District that is well known for being one of the most expensive places for buying a home.

Interested in seeing the map up close? Check it out here.

• Housing Production Trust Fund Database of Multi- and Single-Family Projects, FYs 2001-2016 [Office of the District of Columbia Auditor]