Housing windfall for L.A.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and other officials announced on Monday a new $100 million fund designed to help build and replace affordable housing in Los Angeles in what leaders said is an effort to fill a housing gap in the nation's most expensive city. Daily News.

"The gap between income and housing affordability is larger here than anywhere else in the nation," Villaraigosa told former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who was on hand for the Skid Row news conference.

The New Generation Fund, developed by the private Enterprise Community Funds and a number of financial institutions, will be administered by the city to provide up to $10 million to developers of affordable housing.

Villaraigosa said it is in addition to $200 million the city has put into its own Affordable Housing Trust Fund.

The mayor said he will announce soon how much is to be budgeted this year for the program.

The mayor said he and others recognize that the national mortgage crisis is affecting the middle class, but said affordable housing is particularly needed for the working poor who are being forced out of lodging because of hous