Housing forum highlights divide between local needs and federal leadership

Democrats warned that Trump’s tariffs could worsen Nevada’s already severe housing affordability crisis, one of the state’s most pressing challenges.

As Nevada faces one of the nation’s worst affordable housing shortages, a Trump-appointed housing official with no experience in the field opened a major housing conference in Las Vegas on Thursday, embodying the striking disconnect between the White House’s approach to housing and local realities. 

Speaking at the annual Southern Nevada Regional Housing Authority’s Affordable Housing Forum, William Spencer, the Region 9 administrator for the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), openly admitted he lacked expertise, casting doubt on the federal government’s commitment to addressing the nation’s housing crisis.

“Housing and urban development isn’t my forte,” Spencer said during his opening address. “National security and those types of things are more of my background.”

Spencer’s remarks came before a crowd of politicos, real estate professionals, and investors who filled a ballroom inside the Keep Memory Alive building in downtown Las Vegas. 

Spencer, a former US Navy SEAL, oversees the nation’s most stressed housing supply, Region 9, which includes California, Arizona, and Nevada, a state with the lowest stock of housing for extremely low-income residents—those earning $20,000 a year or less. 

According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition’s gap report released last month, Nevada has only 17 affordable homes available per 100 extremely low-income renters– a staggering shortfall of 93,574 homes. 

Housing uncertainty is not just affecting low-income renters struggling to get by; the state’s housing woes have become so severe that working-class and middle-class Nevadans are now priced out of the market.

Despite the scale of the issue, Spencer on Thursday mirrored the Trump administration’s broader goal of shifting responsibility away from Washington and back to states and localities.

“We want to put the decision-making back in the hands of those closest to the people they serve, and that’s exactly what today’s forum represents,” Spencer said.

This emphasis on decentralization isn’t isolated. It mirrors the vision in Project 2025’s chapter on HUD, which seeks to diminish the federal government’s role in confronting housing disparities, a stance that risks leaving vulnerable communities without sufficient federal support or oversight. 

The event featured a range of discussions about the deepening housing crisis with local mayors, commissioners, federal delegates, and transportation leaders. 

Several speakers and attendees emphasized the need for partnership, and as calls for public-private collaboration rang out, topics like vanishing public housing and ballooning costs for low-income renters remained largely unaddressed.

“We are better together,” the crowd echoed back to former Clark County Commissioner Dr. Lawrence Weekly, who served as the event’s master of ceremonies. “The minute we let that resonate…we will truly understand that partnership is key,” he said.

The answer to Southern Nevada’s housing crisis wasn’t explicitly stated but strongly implied: the Southern Nevada Regional Housing Authority (SNRHA). In hosting the forum, the agency positioned itself as a key player in shaping the region’s response to a crisis that continues to outpace solutions. 

Spencer echoed the program’s emphasis on public-private partnerships.

“We’re going to cut red tape and expand opportunities for public-private investment, whether through the revitalization of public housing or expanding housing choice vouchers for supporting development that blends affordability with dignity,” he said.

At the same time, however, the federal government is also enacting policies that could add red tape, drive up housing costs, and make it harder for states and localities to address their housing crises, as Democratic Rep. Steven Horsford pointed out.

Speaking via a prerecorded video, Horsford warned that tariffs will worsen the affordability crisis at a time when federal support is being weakened. 

Horsford said “blanket tariffs” will raise the cost of key construction materials, slowing down production.

“It affects timelines,” he said, “And ultimately, who can and cannot afford a home.”