Washington — While Congress has been enjoying its spring break, monetary policy-makers and regulators have been scrambling to help the housing market. They slashed interest rates, rescued an investment bank and rewrote rules so Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could pour $200 billion into mortgages.

Now, with Congress returning Monday, lawmakers will start pitching in, too, trying to offer help for struggling homeowners.

CAROL T POWERS/Bloomberg News (ENLARGE)

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) plans to push a multibillion-dollar program aimed at tamping down home foreclosures. Frank says his plan, which involves the Federal Housing Administration, could require lenders to take 'a haircut' by accepting a smaller profit.

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"While it is important to calm the turmoil on Wall Street, we must just as urgently help the families and communities on Main Street who are threatened by this mortgage meltdown," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said in a statement.

But no matter how quickly Democrats want to move, progress may be slow because President Bush disagrees with their basic approach. The White House backs a regulatory overhaul of the financial system but opposes direct aid to homeowners.

"We have not seen any new ideas out there that we're willing to support," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said recently.

Nevertheless, key Congress members plan to put their legislative muscle behind several bills:

* House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) plans to quickly advance a multibillion-dollar program aimed at tamping down home foreclosures. He and Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.) say they hope to give the Federal Housing Administration a role in helping renegotiate mortgages held by homeowners who can afford reasonable mortgages but cannot keep pace with the ever-escalating payments required by many subprime mortgages.

Under their bill, such a homeowner could turn to an FHA-approved lender, which would assess the home's value and how much the borrower could afford. The mortgage holder then would be asked to accept a reduced payment to wipe out the old mortgage so that a new one could be imposed and insured by the FHA. The government would insure up to $300 billion in new mortgages.

Frank said lenders would have to take "a haircut" by accepting a smaller profit. But the bill would reduce the record rise in foreclosures, allowing prices to stabilize.

* In the Senate, Reid's Foreclosure Prevention Act would give bankruptcy judges permission to lower interest payments, or even the principal, on mortgages for primary residences. Supporters say such flexibility would help perhaps 600,000 borrowers avoid foreclosure. Dodd has suggested that Frank's bill could be folded into Reid's.

Before the recess, Senate Republicans used procedural maneuvers to prevent Reid's bill from advancing to a vote, and the Bush administration threatened a veto. The Mortgage Bankers Association fiercely opposes the bill, saying mortgage rates would increase by at least 1.5 percentage points for all borrowers if lenders had to absorb the cost of "cram-downs," their word for the forced rewriting of terms.

Still, Reid's bill could yet get traction because it has many supporters, including AARP, unions, mayors and consumer groups.

* Other housing-related bills also could see action this spring. For example, the House and Senate have each passed an FHA reform bill to reduce the down payment requirements for FHA-backed loans. House-Senate negotiators are smoothing out differences to prepare a final bill for passage soon. And Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) is pushing to create a one-time $15,000 tax credit for buyers of houses in foreclosure or new homes built before September 2007.

The White House soon will unveil its plan for simplifying regulations while strengthening federal oversight of Wall Street investment banks, as well as the complex securities they trade, such as bundles of mortgages. Frank has been considering going even further by introducing legislation to create a super-regulator to oversee financial institutions, or perhaps give enhanced regulatory powers to the Federal Reserve. Whether such an ambitious proposal could pass Congress in this election-shortened year and win Bush's signature is unclear.

In this election year, many lawmakers are eager to show concern for homeowners.

"I think we'll see a flurry of activity when they come back," said Andrew Jakabovics, a housing policy expert with the Center for American Progress, a "progressive" research group. The desire for action increases as "the seriousness of the situation becomes more and more apparent."