Meera Barry
I have summed Meera by enthusiastic prior consent to answer questions about affordable housing.
Here's the one to start off: How can people like me who want everyone to have sufficient housing help?
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I'm not sure what individuals can do. But at the government level:
ReplyDelete1 Build more houses.
2 Make buy-to-let illegal.
Brian Ashford Today, we are listening to the expert. :-)
ReplyDeleteOh ok. :-)
ReplyDeleteSince it's my expertise, I'm gonna talk affordable housing, but "sufficient" is an interesting view, too. (If you want the progressive answer, "A universal housing voucher program," would be my first response for 'sufficient,' without talking about programs that take empty homes and crazy markets.)
ReplyDeleteLet me be straight: without government subsidies and policy support, affordable housing development is doomed. To make it sustainable, it needs to be public before partnering with private entities and investors. It takes political will. The creation of affordable housing takes more than a single person, or single group. Skilled coordination is required.
I want to direct you to: ctb.ku.edu - Chapter 26. Changing the Physical and Social Environment | Section 3. Providing Affordable Housing for All | Main Section | Community Tool Box which has a good breakdown and a lot of great steps you can take. I'd consult that as a guide first... but basically:
The first thing you need to do is raise the issue everywhere. Talk to your representatives and make it a priority. Do this along all areas of government even local transportation and educational groups. Your local housing authority (you can find it at https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/pha/contacts) will have projects that generally rope in city, county, state, and then federal funds through a double-handful of programs with various requirements.
In collaboration with this, you need to learn the vocabulary and find your focus. Multi-family (your general "apartment complex") housing or single-family housing (we call them, um, "houses") have different vocabulary, and different needs.
The first place I'd have you start? Things that help solve the affordability shortage include zoning referendums (local city council) (see: NIMBYism) that create inclusionary housing programs, and building code exceptions (also generally a local level.)
(For example, in the latest development my organization has had to go to city council numerous times to request release from building requirements regarding percentage of land xeriscaped versus grass, amount of wall that has to be made of brick, amount of metal on building face, amount of parking that has to be covered AND connected to the building... things that require questionable improvement, or restrict cost-saving materials and technologies.)
Then, join groups: community development corporations, affirmative action committees, fair housing committees, human rights committees, minority group organizations, other anti-poverty or advocacy groups.
On a national level, stay in touch with organizations like the National Housing Conference (nhc.org), NAHRO (National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials), and NAHMA (National Affordable Housing Management Association) who have action groups and alerts to tell you who is a mover-and-shaker so you can jump in and say, "Hey, Rep. So-and-So, can you give some honest attention to this other Rep.'s bill number such-and-such? I think that this would be a great idea to help solve the homeless/affordable housing needs of our community."
Habitat for Humanity, YouthBuild, and AmeriCorps all can take individual labor.
There's also some of the private organizations, like Enterprise Community (.org) that are collections of investors, but have policy and advocacy groups as well. If you have the means to invest at a significant level, a place like Enterprise isn't a bad place to make your money work. Just remember that investors intend to make a profit, and sometimes that means rental rates that relate market highs.
ReplyDeleteUniversal Housing Voucher programme is an interesting concept.
ReplyDeleteIn the UK, the most prominent charity focused on this issue is Shelter.
Tony Lower-Basch has expressed some interest in this.
ReplyDeleteIn the UK after WW2, there was an enormous wave of building for social housing. Now there is zero political will to do so.
ReplyDeleteHow do we create the political will to do it again?
My question may be off the topics Meera can speak to authoritatively, but I'll put it out there: The kind of building-code restrictions you talk about needing to circumvent for low-cost housing seem like they are a perennial way for the wealthy to exclude the poor, without ever admitting (even to themselves) that they're doing that. What does it take to shift the narrative that people are engaged in, from "This is what a nice neighborhood looks like" to "This is what a neighborhood needs to do in order to be affordable"?
ReplyDeleteTony Lower-Basch If you (or anyone else) is interested in understanding the inside track of development of an apartment complex from planning-construction-management, I can try to break that down into a series of posts. [grinning]
ReplyDeleteI will say in support of city codes relating to zoning and community maintenance that not all of them are designed to "keep up property values" (which, yes, is a way of excluding those with lower socioeconomic status) as some of them are things like "addresses need to be visible from the street, and no less than 4 inches in height and in sharp contrast to the building," because, well, you want emergency services to be able to find you. On the other hand, maximum number of people as derived by their internal relationship is pretty much pure hooey. "Only forty percent of the front yard can be a parking or driveway surface," is a way to keep vehicles on the street, which is a way to tow them if they look "unsightly" under other laws and yes, effectively penalize the poor.
Meera Barry: punitive towing, huh? Is that why in some neighborhoods the cheaper cars are parked densely into the driveway, behind a barricade of more expensive and heavier vehicles?
ReplyDeleteTony Lower-Basch, absolutely. And, of course, extortionist registration fees; if the car is off the street and you can't obviously see that the tags are expired, your private property is generally within the clear. (I know a lot of people who have to hide trailers in their back yards until they can contest valuation for tax purposes.)
ReplyDeleteIt seems I learn something new and horrifying every day.
ReplyDeleteBeing poor is expensive.
ReplyDeleteIn this vein...
ReplyDeletePiecing it Together: A Framing Playbook for Affordable Housing Advocates
November 26 | 2:00 p.m. EST
Learn how affordable housing messaging can be transformed for greater effect. Get the practical recommendations to achieve four important communications goals for housing advocates:
• Elevate the issue
• Explain disparities
• Make the case for community development organizations
• Highlight solutions
enterprisecommunity.webex.com - Cisco Webex Meetings