Bipartisan legislation announced Friday by key senators would change the federal government’s role in housing in an effort to limit the barriers to construction imposed by localities and environmental rules.
The bill, the ROAD to Housing Act of 2025, is authored by Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Scott (R-SC) and the top Democrat on the panel, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, and is set for consideration in the committee on Tuesday.
It’s notable that the bill has the support of both a conservative Republican in Scott and one of the most liberal members of the upper chamber in Warren. In past years, Democrats in particular have favored greater government subsidies for housing and “affordable housing” to address the growing affordability problem. The Scott-Warren bill, though, is focused more on increasing the supply of all forms of housing, not just units set aside for low-income earners, by reducing regulatory barriers, although it would also enact some new subsidies, including grants to address homelessness.
Warren said in a statement that she has been working to address the housing shortfall for years, and that the bill “will boost housing supply, reduce homelessness, and expand homeownership for families.”
The legislation includes a range of measures to change federal housing programs to encourage lower-level governments to permit more housing.
Land-use policies are mostly determined by state and local governments. But the ROAD to Housing Act would incentivize lower-level lawmakers to ease barriers to housing through various means.
One notable provision would launch an effort by the Department of Housing and Urban Development to develop guidelines for zoning and land-use laws around the country, specifically by recommending the reduction of requirements that drive up the cost of housing, such as parking minimums and restrictions on accessory dwelling units.
Another provision would tie Community Development Block Grants administered by HUD to housing construction. Entities that saw slow housing growth would see their funding reduced by 10%, and the funding would be redistributed as a bonus to localities with strong housing growth.
The bill would also deregulate manufactured housing, especially by removing an existing requirement that manufactured homes have a permanent chassis to adhere to code.
Parts of the bill would limit environmental reviews for small construction projects or urban infill, a reform that could spark opposition on the left.
With those and other provisions, the legislation would orient federal government policy toward discouraging states and cities from limiting housing supply via land-use policies, such as zoning and codes.
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That would be a change from recent years, in which Washington, D.C., has sent conflicting signals.
For instance, during the first Trump administration, HUD moved to condition some funding on states and cities deregulating housing. Ahead of the 2020 election, though, President Donald Trump reversed policy directions and sought to prioritize single-family housing via zoning to counteract what he described as a “war on the suburbs” by Democrats — although he again switched sides on the issue in 2024.
