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LOUISVILLE, KY – The U.S. Department Housing and Urban Development today presented a check for $37,408,788 to Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear to help communities in the State acquire and redevelop foreclosed properties that might otherwise become sources of abandonment and blight. HUD's Community Planning and Development Director Virginia Peck presented the check to Governor Beshear during a ceremony in Covington, Kentucky.

These funds were awarded by the Obama Administration under HUD's new Neighborhood Stabilization Program (NSP). NSP funds will be used for a broad range of neighborhood stabilization activities throughout Kentucky including:

• The repair and sale of foreclosed homes;
• Creating more affordable rental housing;
• Tearing down abandoned and blighted buildings that lower surrounding property values;
• Creating land banks to temporarily manage and dispose of vacant land for the purpose of stabilizing neighborhoods; and
• Encouraging the reuse or redevelopment of urban property.

HUD's Neighborhood Stabilization Program was created under the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 and provides nearly $4 billion to every State and certain local communities experiencing particularly high foreclosure problems and risk of property abandonment. The program permits these State and local governments to purchase foreclosed homes at a discount and to rehabilitate or redevelop them in order to respond to rising foreclosures and falling home values.

State and local governments can use their neighborhood stabilization grants to acquire land and property; to demolish or rehabilitate abandoned properties; and/or to offer downpayment and closing cost assistance to low- to moderate-income homebuyers (household incomes not exceed 120 percent of area median income). In addition, these grantees can create "land banks" to assemble, temporarily manage, and dispose of vacant land for the purpose of stabilizing neighborhoods and encouraging re-use or redevelopment of urban property.

The NSP also seeks to prevent future foreclosures by requiring housing counseling for families receiving homebuyer assistance. In addition, the Agency seeks to protect future homebuyers by requiring States and local grantees to ensure that new homebuyers under this program obtain a mortgage loan from a lender who agrees to comply with sound lending practices.

To find out more about the Commonwealth of Kentucky Neighborhood Stabilization Plan, visit the website.