Cleaver, Pressley, Warren, Warnock Introduce Innovation Fund Act to Bring Down Housing Costs by Incentivizing Communities to Build Housing

(Washington, D.C.) – This week, U.S. Representative Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO), Ranking Member of the Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing and Insurance, and Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), along with Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Ranking Member of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, and Senator Raphael Warnock (D-GA), introduced the Innovation Fund Act to establish a program to reward communities that are taking innovative steps to increase housing supply. The bill creates a competitive pot of highly flexible funding for communities that are building more housing, which can be used to improve community infrastructure, build housing, and supplement water and sewer grants. The bill is included in the landmark bipartisan ROAD to Housing Act, which recently passed the Senate in the FY2026 NDAA.

The Innovation Fund Act:

• Will award competitive grants to cities, counties, other units of local government or Indian tribes that have demonstrated an objective improvement in housing supply.
• Requires applicants to describe how they are currently facilitating the expansion of their housing supply.
• Will prioritize eligible entities that demonstrate the use of innovative policies, interventions, or programs to increase housing supply.
• Allows eligible entities to use the funds to carry out CDBG eligible activities, as matching funds for water and sewer grants, and for initiatives that facilitate the expansion of the supply of attainable housing and supplement initiatives the eligible entity has carried out.

Official bill text is available here.

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Emanuel Cleaver, II is the U.S. Representative for Missouri's Fifth Congressional District, which includes Kansas City, Independence, Lee's Summit, Raytown, Grandview, Sugar Creek, Greenwood, Blue Springs, North Kansas City, Gladstone, and Claycomo. He is a member of the exclusive House Financial Services Committee and Ranking Member of the House Subcommittee on Housing and Insurance.