Housing Minister (Kulanu) Yoav Gallant announces his ministry is working on a plan to address the nationwide housing shortage. He announced the plan will resolve the shortage in the chareidi sector within the next 20 years. The plan calls for the construction of 200,000 apartments for the chareidi tzibur alone. The minister revealed the plan in response to a Knesset query from MK Uri Maklev, who asked what is being done regarding the apartment shortage in the chareidi sector.

Maklev explained the shortage in the chareidi community is worsening by the day and the Housing Ministry seems to be short on answers.

In his response, Gallant explained that when he assumed his post he met with the experts, instructing them to formulate a plan to address the growing apartment shortage in the chareidi sector and he recently received the plan on his desk. The plan calls for massive building for the chareidi sector in the coming years and the plan addresses resolving the shortage within the next two decades. Gallant hopes to address the plan, which calls for affordable apartments and he promises to expedite obtaining the necessary approval to begin acting on the plan.

He assured Maklev and his colleagues that the matter of the chareidi apartment shortage has not slipped his mind, but quite the contrary, he is tenaciously working to resolve the matter. He added that he ordered subsidizing NIS 200 million to lower the cost of the apartments as much as possible.

Maklev later told Gallant the chareidi tzibur needs 5,500 new apartments annually without beginning to address the shortage, explaining previous ministry plans do not address the crisis in the chareidi tzibur.

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)