Virginia HB 352

Local authority; affordable housing performance grant programs. Allows any locality that has created an industrial development authority or economic development authority (the Authority) to establish, by ordinance, an affordable housing performance grant program. The bill outlines that such ordinance authorizes the Authority to award affordable housing performance grants to qualifying applicants. Such an ordinance must include: (i) a definition of affordable housing; (ii) grant application guidelines and processes, including an identification of the local officer that is designated to receive applications; (iii) criteria for determining whether the construction or improvement of property qualifies for the awarding of the grant; (iv) provisions that require an applicant seeking the award of a grant to acquire appropriate permits and complete the construction or improvement to develop affordable housing before such a grant will be awarded; (v) provisions that require an applicant seeking the award of a grant to present evidence demonstrating that he has filed and recorded a restrictive covenant to provide affordable housing on the property for a set term, as determined by the ordinance, provided that such term shall be no more than 30 years, on the subject qualifying property before such a grant will be awarded; and (vi) a timeline for the Authority to award grants to qualifying applicants, which may be either upon the completion of the construction or improvement of the property, or on January 1 of the year following the completion of the construction or improvement of the property. The bill also limits the total amount of any such grant to being no more than the amount equal to the increase in assessed value resulting from the construction or improvement of a property. Finally, the bill permits a locality that adopts such ordinance to impose a fee, not to exceed $250, to offset the costs of processing an application.