Source: United States House of Representatives – Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley (MA-07)
A transcript of the Congresswoman’s remarks is available below, and the video is available here.
Transcript: Grandfamily Housing Essential to Preventing Homelessness, Keeping Families Together
House Financial Services Committee
December 3, 2025
REP. PRESSLEY: Thank you to our witnesses for joining us today.
2.5 million. 2.5 million children. That’s how many children are currently being raised in grandfamilies or kinship households in the United States. And in my home state – that which I share with Mr. Sears – over 100,000 children are raised in grandfamily or kinship households.
Now these are the children of servicemembers and veterans that are living with a grandparent while their parent is deployed.
These are the children whose parents have been impacted by the opioid epidemic and are struggling with substance use disorder.
These are children who — were it not for their grandparents’ intervention — perhaps they and their siblings would be separated or living in foster care.
These are the children who are living with grandma while their parents are getting back on their feet after losing a job.
That is exactly why Representative Jim McGovern and I have introduced the Grandfamily Housing Act to provide resources to those households to help with schoolwork, after school care, and home repairs.
This affords us a chance to support those grandfamilies, our elders that are living on fixed incomes, who are struggling to take care of a child after they’ve already raised their, raised their children.
Ms. Bailey, some people are unaware of this family model, which has really quadrupled in the last decade. As the Co-Chair of the Task Force on Aging and Families, I’m well aware.
But do you mind just educating the public on why this is, in fact, an issue deserving of our attention, and can you discuss the unique types of challenges that elders face when trying to raise young children in senior residences?
MS. BAILEY: Thank you so much for the question. It’s very important. And thank you for your legislation.
Grandparents living at home often times need home modifications for safety so that they can remain there and maintain their families and help to keep their families whole.
And without your legislation and full enforcement of our Fair Housing Act to make sure we’re doing things to ensure that they’re not being discriminated against – they’re not able to stay in those homes, and then that means that we have family instability, which is not the outcome that we desire. We actually want to make sure we keep families together and that we empower them.
They also, in many ways, support people that might not be biologically family. And I think that’s something that we really have to talk about. They’re very generous, taking in neighbors, so they’re helping to hold whole communities.
REP. PRESSLEY: Whole communities. Excellent. Thank you for that.
Ms. Bailey, across our country, more and more elderly people are becoming homeless, so we’re talking about the role that they play in keeping families whole and providing stability to the community and to children.
But it’s also essential to their own stability, and what we’re seeing is a growing gray wave, where our elderly are representing the highest rising rate of homelessness.
Could you speak to these challenges, and what are you seeing and getting in terms of keeping elderly folks in housing they can afford to live in?
MS. BAILEY: I think the Administration’s most recent actions on Continuum of Care really, really should be alarming, because, as you stated, many older Americans are increasingly becoming homeless. Many people are being left without any support, and what we see is that the recent actions could add to those numbers.
So we already have about 700,000+ people in homelessness every day, and the recent way that they have put out a proposal to redesign the program would only leave funding for about 30%. And the Notice of Funding Opportunity literally cut the program’s funding in half, so we can actually grow more homelessness by almost an additional 200,000 families just with those changes.
REP. PRESSLEY: My goodness, deeply consequential and preventable. Thank you.
Recently, I joined Ranking Member Waters in urging the Department of Housing and Urban Development to avoid a gap in funding the Continuum of Care programs.
In Boston, grantees rely on these funds to provide life-saving housing assistance, and I’m calling on the Administration to treat housing like the essential priority that it is.
It’s why I work with my colleagues to introduce bills like the Innovation Fund Act to improve housing supply, the Eviction Helpline Act to create a national support hotline, and the Appraisal Modernization Act, which would allow homeowners to seek a second appraisal when they suspect their home’s value is underrepresented.
These little- to no-cost bills help people remain housed and allow them to build wealth and maintain their homes, pass their homes down to their children, or move into new homes as their families expand. I yield back.