Luxury Housing Is Not the Enemy





In this issue: Desmond's "Evicted" Challenges Field ● NJ "Just Says No" to Payday Lending ● No Pay for Promises in Austin ● Transforming Zip Codes
www.shelterforce.org
Tuesday, March 15, 2016


Industry News


Lisa Sturtevant, former vice president for research at the National Housing Conference (NHC) recently stepped down from that position to launch a consulting firm focusing on housing market analyses and program and policy evaluation. Read her writing for the Rooflines blog here.

Opportunity

Call for Applications | Culture of Health Leaders
The Build Healthy Places Network announces a $60,000 leadership development funding opportunity. This 3-year leadership program includes a leadership development curriculum, mentoring and coaching, in-person convenings and support to complete a bold cross-sector project. The call for applications is open through April 19, 2016.

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Your Voice!

What Made NJ Divest from Payday Lending?Shawn Aiken, freelance writer
How advocates in New Jersey mobilized to make a state pension fund put its money where its state regulations are . . . More


Luxury Housing Is Not the Enemy
Rick Jacobus, Street Level Advisors
In hot markets, displacement is a real problem, and there are many ways to address it, but restricting construction shouldn't be one of them . . .    More


In Austin, Corporations Don't Get Paid for Promises
Amy Evans, writer and educator
Many cities give away the store to corporations to get them to come to town.
Austin is not that city . . . More

Axel-Lute
Matthew Desmond's "Evicted" Supports, Challenges Housing Field
Miriam Axel-Lute, Shelterforce
For the community development field, the publication of Evicted is a very interesting moment. The need for stable, decent-quality, affordable housing is suddenly the unapologetic center of a sensation . . . More


Let's Transform the Zip Codes
Bill Bynum, HOPE Credit Union
One of America's best writers, William Faulkner, in explaining why he always set his fiction in the South, said: "I discovered that my own little postage stamp of native soil was worth writing about, and that I would never live long enough to exhaust it." . . . More 


You Said It!

Cities will have to start backing the projects in better areas if they want to attract and retain working income families. Since the middle class is shrinking everywhere, this is the income group for whom we should be building . . . --Maryellen Hess Cameron on Are the Kids All Right? Austin Is Asking

HUD has a terminated mortgage insurance database that shows, since 1940, the buildings it stimulates through insurance and interest right downs -- via the Sections of the first Housing Act. Take a glance at the properties that were built housing for the working class. Seems to me that significant precedent exists to renew, revive, or mimic these financing streams . . . --Rachel Johnston

Nice idea, however the problems are services, like transportation and other appointments that must be traveled to. Additionally, it doesn't take developers long to start selling $200,000 houses to those needing/desiring affordable options in housing, for $300-400,000. We have been seeing this for many decades . . . --Dan Rapson

This option may not work well for all households with low incomes (especially those who would benefit from onsite services or case management), but it may work well for some. At a minimum, it would provide an additional option for creating inclusionary housing in jurisdictions where inclusionary zoning is not enabled or is outright prohibited. More arrows in our quiver sounds good to me . . .
--Andree Tremoulet

San Francisco is expensive, but the city has already embarked on your recommended strategy through its Small Sites Program. The city funds nonprofits and community land trusts to acquire buildings of six units or less whose residents typically include longterm tenants facing Ellis Act evictions. So the strategy stops evictions and adds to the permanently affordable housing supply . . .
--Randy Shaw

This idea makes me want to move to France but it's more or less navel gazing in the USA where the lack of resources for affordable housing is a far bigger problem than the way it's delivered . . .
--Tim Mungavan


Looking for a Job?
Community Development Director 

The Community Development Director will prepare assessments and inventories of existing community conditions and resources for revitalization and related projects in cooperation with community-based groups, local businesses, individual residents, appropriate city departments and other nonprofit org . . . Read Full Listing 

Director - Single Family Housing 
This position requires strong real estate experience and a genuine commitment to the mission of building and preserving quality housing and transforming communities. The ideal candidate will have experience managing traditional "soft second" and NSP/HOME acquisition/rehab/sale programs, as well as a thorough understanding of . . . Read Full Listing

Vice President for Applied Research  
The Vice President for Applied Research designs and conducts applied research projects to examine the relationships between economic and demographic disparities in access to economic opportunity, and to support Woodstock Institute's policy advocacy. The research encompasses equitable lending and investments . . . Read Full Listing 



Associate Director,
Affordable Homeownership
CFED is a national nonprofit with a mission of empowering low- and moderate-income households to build and preserve assets. We seek a proven leader who combines a depth of affordable housing policy experience and project management know-how, who thrives on collaboration, curiosity, and . . .  Read Full Listing   


More Job Listings


In This Issue


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Featured Bloggers
Center for Health, Environment
& Justice

Murtaza Baxamusa
Sol Price School of Public Policy, USC

Housing Assistance Council

Michael Bodaken
National Housing Trust

Raphael Bostic
USC Price School of Public Policy

Janis Bowdler
JPMorgan Chase & Co.

HOPE Credit Union

Burlington Associates

Democracy Collaborative

Jamaal Green
Portland State University

Texas Low Income Housing Information Service

Lisa Hodges
Hodges Development, LLC

Planner, Louisa County, Va.

National CAPACD

Rick Jacobus
Street Level Advisors

Daniel Kravetz
Freelance Writer

CFED

Center for Community Progress

Alexandra Moffett-Bateau
City University of New York

Tulane University

Habitat for Humanity

National Urban League

CFED

Center on Budget and Policy Priorities  

NCRC

San Francisco Community 
Land Trust

Shelterforce Weekly

Senior Editor, Lillian M. Ortiz

Associate Editor, Keli Tianga

Publisher, Harold Simon

Assistant Publisher, Terri L. Clegg