Clinton calls for $30 billion housing fund

By Jeff Mason

ANDERSON, Indiana (Reuters) - Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton called on Thursday for a second stimulus package, including a $30 billion emergency housing fund, to help boost the ailing U.S. economy.

Saying "the housing and credit crisis is the biggest threat to the health of our economy," the New York senator said the emergency fund would help states buy foreclosed properties and provide mortgage restructuring.

Her proposal also included expanding the Mortgage Revenue Bond Program by giving state housing agencies up to $10 billion to refinance "unworkable mortgages," the Clinton campaign said in a statement.

Clinton is in a tight race with Illinois Sen. Barack Obama for her party's nomination and the right to face Republican Sen. John McCain in the November presidential election.

Her campaign said the newly enacted $168 billion stimulus package passed by the U.S. Congress and signed by President George W. Bush did not go far enough to address the housing problem.

"Declining home values and record foreclosures threaten to not only devastate millions of American families but send communities across the country spiraling into deep recession."

Clinton poured scorn on Bush for not addressing the nation's deteriorating economic situation with more urgency.

"I think that we have been badly served by this administration," she told reporters earlier in Terre Haute, Indiana.

The $30 billion emergency housing fund would put cash in the hands of local governments and nonprofit organizations to buy and resell properties to low-income people or turn them into affordable rental housing units.

The fund would also offer financial support to state programs aimed at educating and supporting people at risk of losing their homes.

The U.S. Senate this month approved a budget plan that includes about $35 billion for another round of economic stimulus if the first package fails to adequately invigorate the U.S. economy.

The House of Representatives-approved budget does not have such a provision and the two chambers must work out their differences.

Clinton declined to say if she would intervene to bolster the U.S. dollar if she won the White House or to call on Bush to do so.

"I'm not going to speculate on what I would do as president on something as ... sensitive as an intervention with respect to the value of the dollar," she said.

(Additional reporting by Rick Cowan; Editing by Peter Cooney)