Senator Warner joined Northern Virginia faith and community leaders last night to announce an agreement with several leading banks to provide housing assistance in Prince William County – the hardest-hit Virginia locality during the housing foreclosure crisis.

Sen. Warner has worked for three years with Virginians Organized for Interfaith Community Engagement, or VOICE,  to develop programs to assist Prince William residents. By some estimates, 20,000 county residents lost their homes to foreclosure.

Last night VOICE announced that due to meetings brokered by Sen. Warner, major financial institutions that bore partial responsibility for the collapse of the Prince William housing market would invest more than $30 million to rehabilitate dilapidated housing and provide hundreds of affordable rental housing units. 

The relief will give those Prince William County residents who lost their homes after being guided into exploitative mortgages the chance to get out from under the catastrophic events of 2008 and move forward with their lives.  It will also provide a needed boost to the housing market of a region that has suffered disproportionately.

Sen. Warner praised VOICE's work.

“This group has a power and persuasion that is tough to say no to,” he told NBC 4.  “They have shown the relentlessness, faith, and willingness to stick to it that made this happen.”

VOICE leaders returned the favor.