The House will try again this week to pass an infrastructure bill, having failed in late September and again last week to get progressives' buy-in on a process that would have them voting on infrastructure before a reconciliation bill is completely finished. Progressives have kept leadership guessing as to what exactly they require — a framework? bill text? a Senate vote? — before voting on infrastructure.

On Thursday, October 28, President Biden announced the Build Back Better Framework. The President is confident this is a framework that can pass both houses of Congress, and he looks forward to signing it into law. He calls on Congress to take up this historic bill – in addition to the Bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act – as quickly as possible. This framework will guide the drafting of legislative language.

Pending municipal finance provisions in the big-spending bills before Congress could benefit issuers, investors, and taxpayers. To get the best deal, state and local leaders must press their case immediately. As Congress continues to kick around bills for infrastructure and federal spending priorities, state and local leaders need to keep their eyes on the shape the legislation's somewhat arcane provisions for municipal finance will take.

President Joe Biden attended a meeting with all House Democrats shortly before his trip to Europe in a last-minute push to get progressives to vote for a stalled bipartisan infrastructure bill. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is aiming to hold a vote Thursday on the $550 billion measure, but progressives have insisted that a larger social safety net bill proceeds alongside the Senate-passed infrastructure package.

To win over their most centrist members, the Democrats will need to fit all their wishes into the smaller box. As Democrats in Congress debate how to pare back their big social spending bill — to a total budget increase of less than $2 trillion over a decade — they have even further to go than it may appear.

As Democrats work to reduce the $3.5 trillion topline of their reconciliation measure, transportation analysts worry dollars for transit and high-speed rail will be a target. The House budget reconciliation measure allocated $57.3 billion to the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, including $10 billion for transit and $10 billion for high-speed rail. The House is also considering a Senate-passed bipartisan infrastructure bill that included $550 billion in new spending for transportation and infrastructure.

In the multifamily industry, 4% LIHTCs have long served as a crucial tool in the financing of affordable housing across the country. Congress aims to further bolster equity participation in affordable housing transactions by increasing the amount of 4% LIHTCs available for affordable housing projects through a reduction of the required amount of tax-exempt bonds that must be utilized for projects to benefit from the program and expanding the types of projects eligible for basis boosts.

Congressmen Ronny Jackson (R-TX) and Filemon Vela (D-TX) introduced the bipartisan Foreign Adversary Risk Management (FARM) Act, which would combat foreign interference in America's agriculture supply chain through reforms to the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) introduced companion legislation in the U.S. Senate.

EDA is pleased to announce that 529 applications from regions in all 50 states and five territories have submitted applications for Phase 1 of the $1 billion Build Back Better Regional Challenge. Below is an open letter sent from Alejandra Y. Castillo to Phase 1 applicants. Also provided is a link to the list of Phase 1 applicants by lead institution, project title, and state.

U.S. Department of Agriculture announced a significant expansion of access to high-speed internet, health care, and educational services for millions of rural Americans nationwide. The announcement continues to advance President Biden's Build Back Better Agenda. USDA will also invest $50 Million to improve access to telemedicine, distance learning for 7.6 Million people in rural areas.

EPA Assistant Administrator for Water Radhika Fox announced a $224 million Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) loan to the City of Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation. EPA's WIFIA loan will help finance a project to purify wastewater and replenish the San Fernando Basin to bolster precious groundwater resources in this drought-stressed region.

SBA Administrator Isabella Casillas Guzman announced grantees for the Biden-Harris Administration's Community Navigator Pilot Program. The Community Navigator Pilot Program will provide $100 million in funding to 51 organizations that will work with hundreds of local groups to connect America's entrepreneurs to government resources so they can recover and thrive. 

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced that the U.S. Department of Agriculture is investing $272 million to modernize rural drinking water and wastewater infrastructure for 270,000 people living in rural communities across 37 states and Puerto Rico.

The U.S. Department of Energy today announced $61 million for 10 pilot projects that will deploy new technology to transform thousands of homes and workplaces into state-of-the-art, energy-efficient buildings. These Connected Communities can interact with the electrical grid to optimize their energy consumption which will substantially decrease their carbon emissions and cut energy costs.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury has released the Treasury Climate Action Plan, which is directed by Section 211 of Executive Order 14008 and Treasury's efforts to bolster adaptation and increase the resilience of its facilities and operations to the impacts of climate change.

Freddie Mac announced that the company plans to offer at least $3 billion in Single-Family affordable housing bonds. This new bond program will support affordable homeownership and serve historically underserved markets. To underscore this effort, the company will offer approximately $285 million in Uniform Mortgage-Backed Securities™ backed by loans purchased through its Home Possible program.