Penn Political Union hosted Pennsylvania state Sen. Nikil Saval (D-1) for a fireside chat on local housing issues on Monday.
The Feb. 9 discussion focused on urban policy and housing affordability at local and federal levels. Vincent Reina, a Stuart Weitzman School of Design professor and founder of the Housing Initiative at Penn, moderated the event.
“Housing is the center of everything, and if we fail to house people adequately, we’re just failing as a society,” Saval told The Daily Pennsylvanian.
During the event, Saval framed his perspective on Pennsylvania’s housing issues and the respective legislative solutions through “three P’s:” preservation, production, and protection.
Preservation poses a challenge given the state’s quickly aging buildings and “elderly population that needs support.”
Saval said that Pennsylvania has “one of the oldest housing stocks anywhere in the country,” with “200,000 homes with moderate to severe deficiencies.”
He explained that his Whole-Home Repairs Program addresses preservation by providing “grants to low income homeowners across the Commonwealth to make basic repairs to their homes so that they can stay in them.”
Reina referred to this legislative initiative as an example of “purple politics,” because it emerged from a bipartisan collaboration during the pandemic era.
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In acknowledgement of tenant rights legislation being “one of the biggest issues” at the moment, Saval emphasized the need to “unleash housing supply” to meet increasing production demand. He also advocated for sealing eviction records, anti-discrimination protections, and rent stabilization in manufactured homes.
Saval expressed concern for the “dramatic reduction” in housing funding at the federal level, while acknowledging the “surprising bipartisanship and work being done” — through legislation such as the ROAD to Housing Act, which was passed unanimously by the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee.
Reina, who researches housing policy and urban economics, told the DP that there is “a vibrant community of folks at Penn really earnestly interested in housing and doing really meaningful work.”
“If you’re interested in this topic, Penn is a really exciting place to be,” he added.
Mansha Kohli, 2024 School of Design graduate, expressed concern about affordable housing across the United States.
“There’s a huge deficit, but I’m glad that there are state senators that are talking about it, and are especially talking to young people,” Kohli told the DP.
Marc Schultz, 2022 School of Design graduate, said that the talk “gave us a little bit of hope to see one of our elected officials so ardently advocating for housing affordability and justice.”
College junior Neil Pereira, the event’s organizer, told the DP that “a lot of people have misconceptions about the crisis, how it’s defined, and how it actually translates into real problems for tenants and homeowners.”
“An issue so complex as housing affordability really can’t be condensed into 15 seconds or 30 seconds,” he added, referring to short-form content on TikTok or Instagram. “It needs to be explained by someone who is an expert.”
Saval also expressed solidarity with a Penn graduate student union, which is facing a contract negotiation with the University and a strike deadline of Feb. 17.
“I stand with you, you deserve everything that you are fighting for,” Saval said.
