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A Utah House bill that would increase state funding for affordable housing won favor from a Senate committee.

Although fiscal analysts say HB36's ramped-up income-tax credits for landlords would cost the state $1.4 million per year in education funding, the Senate's Economic Development and Workforce Services Committee expressed no reservations Tuesday before sending it to the floor with a unanimous recommendation.

Rep. Becky Edwards, R-North Salt Lake, based the bill on insights from a task force convened last April by Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox.

Utah's extremely low-income renters exceeded affordable units by more than 38,000 in 2016, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

Edwards' bill increases state income-tax credits for landlords who provide low-income housing from $12.5 cents per person to $34.5 cents per person.

It sets aside $4 million from general funds toward a fund for units targeting households at 30 percent of the area median income.

And it calls for $1 million to reimburse landlords for the difference between tenants' federal vouchers and market rates, as well as $1 million for transit-oriented developments.

Edwards has countered concerns about the tax credit's effect on education by arguing that housing will help children in poor families and, in doing so, potentially save schools more money than the credits would cost.

The appropriations were included in Gov. Gary Herbert's budget, Edwards told the committee Tuesday.

Matthew Piper