The State House and Senate Conference Committee released its FY2027 budget, H.5555, this week, with a total appropriation of approximately $63.4 billion. Below is a summary of where the final conference budget lands on CHAPA’s priority housing items, compared to the FY2026 final budget.
Thank you to everyone who reached out to their legislators and engaged in advocacy throughout the budget process.
A full side-by-side of funding figures is available in CHAPA’s updated FY2027 Budget Tracker.
What’s Next
With the conference committee’s budget released, the House and Senate take final votes on the conference report, after which it moves to the Governor. The Governor then has 10 days to act on it, and may sign the budget, veto or reduce individual line items, veto outside sections, or return items with recommended amendments. The Legislature may then vote to override any vetoes.
CHAPA respectfully urges the Governor to approve the budget as passed, preserving the key housing priorities it contains.
Rental Assistance
MRVP (7004-9024)
- FY2027 Conference: $278,341,728 | FY2026: $253,311,840
- The conference budget funds MRVP approximately $25 million above FY26. Provides funding for current mobile vouchers and approximately 350 project-based vouchers in the development pipeline.
AHVP (7004-9030)
- FY2027 Conference: $19,263,183 | FY2026: $19,461,214
- Approximately $198,000 below FY26; this funding supports the vouchers already in use.
Housing Assistance for Re-Entry Transition (7004-9034)
- FY2027 Conference: $3,320,000 | FY2026: $3,120,000
- Approximately $200,000 above FY26.
DMH Rental Subsidy (7004-9033)
- FY2027 Conference: $17,548,125 | FY2026: $16,548,125
- Approximately $1 million above FY26.
Homelessness and Supportive Housing
HomeBASE (7004-0108)
- FY2027 Conference: $82,322,001 | FY2026: $57,322,001
- Approximately $25 million above FY26. HomeBASE’s quarterly reports must also cover EOHLC’s efforts to work with the Office for Refugees and Immigrants and resettlement agencies.
Home & Healthy for Good (7004-0104)
- FY2027 Conference: $8,890,000 | FY2026: $8,890,000
- Level-funded with FY26.
Unaccompanied Homeless Youth (4000-0007)
- FY2027 Conference: $10,539,590 | FY2026: $10,645,850
- Approximately $106,000 below FY26.
Sponsor-Based Permanent Supportive Housing (7004-0105)
- FY2027 Conference: $10,572,875 | FY2026: $10,072,875
- Approximately $500,000 above FY26. Allows at least $2.1 million to be spent to keep running the low-barrier “sponsor-based” leasing model, where a nonprofit holds the lease and rents to tenants, that was previously funded through the pay-for-success projects.
New Lease for Homeless Families (7004-0106)
- FY2027 Conference: $250,000 | FY2026: $250,000
- Level-funded with FY26.
Public Housing
Public Housing Operating (7004-9005)
- FY2027 Conference: $117,840,000 | FY2026: $115,600,000
- Approximately $2.2 million above FY26.
Public Housing Reform (7004-9007)
- FY2027 Conference: $1,243,831 | FY2026: $1,250,000
- Approximately $6,000 below FY26.
Housing Stability and Homeownership
RAFT (7004-9316)
- FY2027 Conference: $209,000,000 | FY2026: $207,477,715
- Approximately $1.5 million above FY26.
Housing Consumer Education Centers (7004-3036)
- FY2027 Conference: $5,700,000 | FY2026: $5,850,000
- Approximately $150,000 below FY26.
First-Time Homebuyer and Foreclosure Counseling (7006-0011)
- FY2027 Conference: $1,500,000 | FY2026: $1,500,000
- Level-funded with FY26.
MassAccess Registry (4120-4001)
- FY2027 Conference: $150,000 | FY2026: $150,000
- Level-funded with FY26.
STASH (7004-0107)
- FY2027 Conference: $500,000 | FY2026: $500,000
- Level-funded with FY26.
Access to Counsel (0321-1800)
- FY2027 Conference: $3,000,000 | FY2026: $2,500,000
- Approximately $500,000 above FY26. The program provides free legal representation to low-income tenants and owner-occupants facing eviction.
Administrative Capacity
EOHLC Administration (7004-0099)
- FY2027 Conference: $22,400,301 | FY2026: $16,017,804
- Approximately $6.4 million above FY26. Includes $175,000 to help towns carry out the new “seasonal community” designation.
Housing Production and Zoning (Outside Sections)
The conference budget includes a set of zoning changes, outside sections that started in the Senate, meant to make it easier to build housing. They amend Chapter 40A, the state zoning law:
- Electronic notice (Sections 40, 41, 48, and 49): lets cities and towns send notices of zoning hearings by email, not only by mail.
- Earlier protection for projects (Section 42): locks in the zoning rules that apply to a project when the developer applies for a permit, rather than when the permit is issued, so a project is not derailed by rule changes during the wait.
- Improvements on nonconforming lots (Section 43): lets owners of lots that do not meet current size, shape, frontage, lot-coverage, or floor-area-ratio rules extend or alter their buildings as of right, without needing a finding from the special permit granting authority, as long as the work meets today’s height, story, and setback rules.
- Protection for nonconforming structures (Section 44): extends existing protections for nonconforming uses so they also cover nonconforming structures.
- More time to build (Section 45): protects a project from later zoning changes if construction starts within 24 months of getting its permit (up from 12 months), and pauses that clock while the developer is still obtaining other required permits.
- Broader residential exemption (Section 46): widens an existing exemption so it applies to more kinds of residential use, not just single- and two-family homes.
- Easier variances (Section 47): replaces the hard-to-meet “substantial hardship” standard for a variance with a “practical difficulty” test that weighs the public interest in producing housing, and gives an approved variance two years (up from one) before it expires.
Streamlined Disposition of Public Housing (Outside Section 75)
Section 75 amends Chapter 121B to remove the rule that public housing property must sit unused for at least two years before a housing authority may dispose of or redevelop it, allowing vacant public-housing sites to be put back into use more quickly.
Tenant Protections (Outside Sections 84 and 85)
Two laws enacted in 2025 pause certain evictions and foreclosures during a federal government shutdown for tenants and homeowners who are “impacted federal workers,” meaning Massachusetts residents furloughed or required to work without pay because of the shutdown, including members of the military and National Guard. One is the summary-process (eviction) law, Chapter 239, Section 17; the other is the foreclosure law, Chapter 244, Section 42. Each defines a “federal government shutdown” as a period in which non-essential federal functions cease. Sections 84 and 85 change that definition from “all” non-essential functions ceasing to “any,” so the protections apply during a partial shutdown, not only a complete one.