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Archive for month: June, 2015

HAND 24th Annual Meeting & Housing Expo

June 30, 2015
June 30, 2015

HAND’s 24th Annual Meeting & Housing Expo Lauded a Success
June 23, 2015

More than 1,200 affordable housing and community development industry members united at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C.  for a day of collaboration, innovation and transformation.  Themed “Connected Region, Connected Future,” this dynamic meeting:

  • explored innovative housing solutions through the lens of what the housing industry can accomplish regionally by combining resources and successful strategies from Maryland, Washington, D.C. and Virginia;
  • celebrated outstanding affordable housing communities and leaders;
  • and captivated participants by challenging housing practitioners to look at how we conduct “business as usual” and envision a more streamlined way to help the communities we serve.

To kick the day off, the Greater Washington Housing Leaders Group (GWHLG), a collaborative of public and private sector stakeholders moved to action about the housing affordability crisis in the Washington, D.C. region and its potential impact on our economy and quality of life in the future hosted the interactive plenary “Regional Strategies to Increase Affordable Housing Development and Preservation in the Greater Washington Area.”  The engaged panel consisted of a never-before-seen cadre of elected officials from municipalities in the region, business leaders and academics who sought to start the conversation around regionalism, a cross-jurisdictional strategy to build and preserve affordable housing. Informed by a George Mason University Center for Regional Analysis forecast, The Washington Regions Future Housing Needs: 2023 and the paper commissioned by Enterprise Community Partners, Call the Question: Will the Greater Washington Region Collaborate and Invest to Solve Its Affordable Housing Shortage, the conversation proved to be a rousing interaction as panelists and presenters went in-depth on the importance of community and political will to create and preserve affordable housing. Today 250,000 households are paying more than half their income on housing, but by 2023 – that number will grow to 400,000 as new households with low-incomes will be added to the region.

The Awards Ceremony and Keynote Address were equally engaging as HAND started the afternoon luncheon off by honoring affordable housing leaders and innovative housing communities in the region with its 2015 Housing Achievement Awards:

Best Large Affordable Housing Project: Bass Circle Apartments, Telesis

 

Best Small Affordable Housing Project: Justice Park Apartments, Dantes Partners & Menkiti Group

 

Nonprofit Developer of the Year: Homes for America

 

President’s Choice Award: Walter D. Webdale, President and CEO, AHC Inc.

….and this year’s Children’s Art Contest First Place Entry….


Community Solutions President and Founder Rosanne Haggerty’s keynote address reminded the participants that by bringing everyone to the table at once, innovative solutions to building challenges can be addressed early in the development process. True collaboration leads to true success:


“Imagine if it always worked this way. Imagine if developers, governments and philanthropic agents saw themselves as part of a shared system with a shared aim. What if, instead of asking, “What would it take to get another deal done?” we asked, “How many apartments would it take to end veteran homelessness, and what’s the straightest line to that outcome?”  

Haggerty is a force behind local supportive housing developments like the John and Jill Ker Conway Residence currently under construction on North Capitol St. in Northeast D.C., as well as key national initiatives like the 100,000 Homes Campaign and the current Zero: 2016 effort.

We would like to thank all of our sponsors, guests, and partners for making this year such a success and look forward to seeing you next year for our 25th Anniversary Annual Meeting!

Featured media articles:

Washington Post: New Jobs Jobs in Region Will Boost Number of Low Income Household, Study Says
DC Curbed: By 2023, the D.C. Region Will Have 410,380 New Households
NonProfit Quarterly: The Nonprofit Agenda for Regional Affordable Housing: An Advocacy Manifesto

View all the photos of the day! Visit our Flickr page.

0 Comments/in HAND News, Member Events & Success Stories /by H.A.N.D.

Housing Achievement Award Spotlight: Homes for America

June 22, 2015
June 22, 2015

Homes for America takes its motto “Creating Communities, Enriching Lives” to heart. Whether it’s a lease-to-purchase property or an affordable community that serves residents with special needs, for more than 20 years HFA has been a partner to people in need of quality affordable housing throughout Maryland, Virginia, Delaware and Pennsylvania. Last year alone, the organization created or processed more than 700 affordable units in seven communities within Maryland….and they are not slowing down. Housing advocates and co-founders Nancy Rase and Trudy McFall have led the charge on legislation, policy and best practices for two decades. With 6,000 affordable units under their belts, the founders will continue to take HFA – and the families it serves – to even greater heights. We are honored to name HFA the 2015 HAND Nonprofit Developer of the Year, and we wish them much success on the next twenty years of service!

0 Comments/in HAND News, Member Events & Success Stories, HAND Member Profiles /by H.A.N.D.

Housing Achievement Award Spotlight: Bass Circle Apartments

June 16, 2015
June 16, 2015

Within a five minute walk of the Benning Road Metro Station in Southeast D.C., the residents of Bass Circle Apartments are once again proud to call this 119-unit apartment community “home.” This was not always the case, however. Just a little while ago, the apartment building had fallen into significant disrepair with the owners defaulting on the mortgage and the property only partially occupied. It was then that the residents through their tenant association – along with the DC Department of Housing and Community Development – selected recognized developer Telesis as their partner in the extensive rehabilitation. With an innovative financing structure, Telesis was able to use federal funds and a creative mix of additional resources to revitalize the property, completing the needed repairs as well as other site enhancements such as energy-efficiency measures that exceeded the Enterprise Green Communities requirements. Today, Bass Circle Apartments is once again a cornerstone of the Marshall Heights neighborhood and HAND is proud to call it the Best Large Affordable Housing Project for 2015!

0 Comments/in HAND News, Member Events & Success Stories, HAND Member Profiles /by H.A.N.D.

Housing Achievement Award Spotlight: Justice Park Apartments

June 10, 2015
June 10, 2015

#Amazing. When Dantes Partners and the Menkiti Group finished Justice Park Apartments in 2014, the 28-unit workforce housing community was already 100% pre-leased, with a waiting list of more than 1000 people. During construction, the development team used an innovative social media marketing campaign to spread the word and the results were #TrulySuccessful.

Built on the site of the infamous park the building was named after, the apartment community lies in the heart of the rapidly gentrifying neighborhood of Columbia Heights and provides green affordable housing to residents looking to live close to jobs, transportation and other lifestyle amenities. Another special note? Justice Park is fitted with special features that support its deaf and hearing-impaired residents, allowing for independent living in a responsive and tactilely enhanced environment. HAND is proud to honor Justice Park Apartments as its 2015 Best Small Affordable Housing Project!

0 Comments/in HAND News, Member Events & Success Stories, HAND Member Profiles /by H.A.N.D.

“Day in the Life of a Child” PSA on WMATA Buses & Subway Platforms

June 8, 2015
June 8, 2015


The Housing Association of Nonprofit Developers Launches “A Day in the Life of a Child” PSA Series to Address
Housing Affordability in the Washington, D.C. Region

New PSA Displayed on WMATA Buses and Subway Platforms in the Month of June

WASHINGTON, DC, June 8, 2015 – To coincide with its 24th Annual Meeting and Housing Expo (June 23,2015), the Housing Association of Nonprofit Developers (HAND) has released the first in a series of an unprecedented public service advertisement (PSA) campaign directed towards highlighting the need for housing affordability. The “Day in the Life of a Child” series focuses on the disparity between wages and affordability in the Washington, D.C. area by highlighting the professionals in a child’s life whose average salary often does not sufficiently cover market-rate housing in addition to the other basic necessities of life.

According to the U.S Department of Housing and Urban Development, housing costs should not exceed more than a third of an individual’s salary. However, in the metropolitan area where rental housing is one of the most expensive in the country, many workers are spending disproportionate amounts of their salaries on rent and putting their families, our communities and the regional economy at risk.

“As an association dedicated to supporting organizations committed to affordable housing and community development, we are all well aware of what happens when families don’t have access to affordable housing,” said Heather Raspberry, executive director, HAND. “It is our hope that this PSA series will elevate the need for greater access to housing that is affordable and open the dialogue on how we can address this issue regionally.”

Sponsored by the Washington, D.C. Department of Housing and Community Development and using data from the National Housing Conference’s Paycheck-to-Paycheck 2014 database, this first PSA uses a nurse as its focal point and highlights how this professional cannot equitably afford a two-bedroom apartment in the region.

“There’s often a misconception about who needs affordable housing,” continues Raspberry. “Some would be surprised to know it’s your neighbor, your child’s teacher or the school bus driver. If people and families continue to pay for rents that far exceed what they can reasonably afford, then our economy will continue to suffer and our children will be embedded in generational poverty.”

###

For over 20 years, HAND has served as the only regional membership association dedicated to supporting the community development industry in its efforts to increase the supply of affordable housing in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. Through education, engagement and training, HAND builds the capacity of its diverse membership comprised of nonprofit and for-profit housing developers, resident service providers, lenders, government agencies, policy analysts and others, to support the development of sustainable communities for people and families at all income levels. Visit www.HANDHousing.org to learn more about HAND’s efforts to build vibrant communities across the metropolitan region.

Contact:
TeAnne Coleman Chennault
TeAnne@ChennaultCreative.com
213.399.6467

* To celebrate this inaugural PSA, we’re also sponsoring a PSA photo contest. To enter, simply take a picture and send it to us for an opportunity to win the grand prize. It’s simple, just snap a photo of yourself next to the PSA or of the PSA by itself and either email it to hraspberry@handhousing.org or post it to one of our social media feeds with the #HAND_PSA.

Please include the bus route or the name of the Metro station!

0 Comments/in Uncategorized, HAND Press Releases /by H.A.N.D.

HAND MEMBER SPOTLIGHT: 2015 President’s Choice Award

June 3, 2015
June 3, 2015

This month we are excited to run a special HAND Member Spotlight series in honor of our Housing Achievement Award recipients. We look forward to hearing more about our winners during the Annual Meeting, but please enjoy these weekly spotlights for now!

HAND’s 2015 President’s Choice Award goes to Walter Webdale, president and CEO of AHC Inc. For fifty years Walter has served in the affordable housing industry. He was just twenty-two when he and his brother, with capital borrowed from their grandmother, purchased and redeveloped an old stone barn into three townhouses in western New York. Firmly on the path of community development, Walter went on to hold leadership positions throughout New York state and then in his adopted home of Virginia, where he became the first director of the Fairfax County Department of Housing and Community Development –  a position he held for more than two decades. As the current head of AHC Inc., Walter has tripled its multifamily housing portfolio and helped the organization expand its geographic footprint to include properties in Baltimore and Montgomery County. Throughout his career, Walter has pioneered great change in our industry, and we are honored that he is the HAND 2015 President’s Choice Award recipient!

0 Comments/in HAND News, Member Events & Success Stories, HAND Member Profiles /by H.A.N.D.

Harkins Builders Celebrates 50th Anniversary

June 3, 2015
June 3, 2015

On May 21st, Harkins Builders celebrated their 50th Anniversary at the Four Seasons Hotel in Baltimore. More than 200 guests, including employees, long-time clients, architects, former executives, and other Harkins friends, gathered to celebrate 50 years of preconstruction, construction, and design-build excellence in the Mid-Atlantic region. Harkins President and CEO Dick Lombardo acknowledged all of the people who have contributed to the company’s success, and shared plans for how the company would continue to grow and prosper.Maryland Secretary of Business and Economic Development Mike Gill presented Harkins with a Governor’s Citation expressing the State’s appreciation and good wishes, and Howard County Executive Allan Kittleman presented an Executive Proclamation declaring May 21st, 2015 as Harkins Builders Day in Howard County, Maryland, where the company has its headquarters. The cocktail and hors d’oeuvres reception included signature red Harkintinis, a cigar bar, and live music.

0 Comments/in HAND News, Member Events & Success Stories /by H.A.N.D.

The Importance of a Regional Affordable Housing Strategy: “Small Steps” Towards Regionalism

June 1, 2015
June 1, 2015

By
Lisa A. Sturtevant, PhD

Why Regionalism?

Housing is a regional issue, like transportation and environmental quality. However, unlike with those other areas, a regional approach to housing policy has been largely a non-starter, despite its importance to the Washington DC area’s overall well-being. We know a lot about the region’s housing needs and the potential repercussions of an insufficient supply of housing. Research from the George Mason University Center for Regional Analysis has analyzed the amount and types of housing that will be needed to support sustainable regional economic growth over the next 20 years. New data from the Census Bureau shows that last year population growth in the region slowed; that slowdown has been attributed to weaker economic growth as well as to the region’s high cost of living.

A lack of a regional approach to affordable housing exacerbates income and racial inequality throughout the region.  According to a recent report by the Urban Institute, there is a severe shortage of housing regionwide that is affordable to extremely low income individuals and families. Lower-income households that access affordable housing with a voucher tend to be concentrated in higher-poverty, lower-opportunity neighborhoods. Richard Florida and his collaborators have shown that the Washington DC region has a relatively high level of economic segregation compared to other US metro areas.  And this map (below) of poverty by race shows that poor African Americans—and to a lesser extent Hispanics—are concentrated in certain parts of the region.

We are fortunate to live in a prosperous region with a wealth of opportunities that can support individual and family economic well-being and success. Thus, we are better positioned than many other places to create real regional tools to expand housing options. There are challenges, of course, including the presence of three separate states (or state-like bodies) with different rules and priorities for housing and land use. But we should be able to overcome that and other obstacles to regionalism, particularly if we take an incremental—but results-driven—approach.

What is Being Done in the Washington Region?

Advocates, policymakers, planners and others across the region are well aware of the regional scope of the affordable housing challenge in the greater Washington DC area. Through the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (MWCOG), local elected officials and others have come together to develop goals for planning regionally for housing within existing and growing activity centers that provide opportunities for the region’s residents.

And even more recently, the Greater Washington Housing Leaders Group (GWHLG), a group of regional organizations led by Citi, MWCOG, Enterprise and the Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers (WRAG), has sponsored research and meetings on the need to work collaboratively on affordable housing across the region.  With representatives from advocacy groups, industry leaders (including HAND), community groups, business groups and local governments, the GWHLG has plans to move beyond talking about needs to building buy-in from diverse stakeholders throughout the region and moving solutions forward by supporting affordable housing proposals in individual jurisdictions.

Like past regional housing efforts (for example, the Greater Washington Housing Initiative), it remains a challenge to find ways to develop a set of tools that includes ways to hold local jurisdictions accountable for meeting housing needs and to provide some type of regional oversight of affordable housing policies and production.

How Can the Greater Washington Area Move More Forcefully to a Regional Affordable Housing Strategy?

The time seems particularly ripe to try new things on the regionalism front.  While the Washington DC area’s affordability challenges are long-standing, the current economic climate—with slower job growth and more competition from regions around the country—creates a new opportunity for regionalism.

The challenges to regionalism in the Washington DC area are not unique to us.  Regional bodies across the country generally have not had the authority to implement real regional plans effectively, despite federal efforts to support regional efforts on housing and related issues. There is only a small number of places across the country that have adopted meaningful regional affordable housing tools and funding sources. Is there something the greater Washington DC area can learn from these places?

  • State-generated regional housing plans. At the state level, New Jersey and California have been leaders in developing regional fair share housing plans and determining the housing needs in each local jurisdiction.  However, political opposition at both the state and local levels, as well as a number of court challenges to affordable housing requirements, highlight the difficulties in adopting enforceable regional housing plans, even when only one state is involved.
  • Regional funds for affordable housing development. One example of a regional affordable housing fund is the Bay Area Transit-Oriented Affordable Housing (TOAH) Fund which provides flexible financing to purchase or improve property near transit lines for the development of affordable housing and other community services. The TOAH is funded by a $10 million investment from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the transportation planning agency for the San Francisco Bay Area. Additional capital for the Fund is provided by private groups, including Citi Community Capital, Morgan Stanley, the Ford Foundation, Living Cities, and the San Francisco Foundation. Examples of recent projects completed with TOAH funding can be found here.
  • Issue-specific regional strategies. Some regions have developed regional agreements and funding sources to address a specific affordable housing challenge, particularly homelessness.  The greater Portland, Maine area adopted a single community plan to address youth homelessness. The plan includes funding for housing, as well as employment, physical health, mental health, substance abuse, and education services. The Hampton Roads (VA) region has established a regional task force to end homelessness to bring together regional leaders not only to discuss strategies for addressing homelessness and but also to focus on how to increase resources for regional homelessness prevention programs.
  • Regional administration of affordable housing programs. Some localities have turned to regional entities to administer local programs. The Metropolitan Council, an appointed body created by the Minnesota Legislature to plan for growth in the Twin Cities metro area, has been granted fairly broad powers to tax and take other actions for the public good at a regional scale.  The Metropolitan Council administers the region’s Housing Choice Voucher (Section 8) program, with the goal of improving efficiency of the program and maximizing the number of families served.

These and other regional efforts from around the country can serve as models for the greater Washington DC area. However, our region also has the opportunity to be innovative and to explore new approaches to regionalism. While there may not be many new tools for affordable housing, there can be new ways to coordinate and collaborate. Building small and recognizing successes can help demonstrate how regional action can benefit the wider community without squelching local autonomy. Some potential “small steps” for regionalism:

  • Locally-developed regional affordable housing plan and progress report. There is growing acknowledgement among the region’s local leadership about the need to plan for more housing that is affordable to lower-income individuals and families. Localities could demonstrate their commitment to meeting the region’s housing needs by signing on to a regional housing plan that includes specific local housing targets for production and preservation. Each jurisdiction’s progress towards these goals could be reported annually (or bi-annually). The keys to this approach are to get real buy-in from each local jurisdiction and to choose an appropriate regional organization (perhaps MWCOG or WRAG) to oversee the evaluation of local efforts.
  • Regional compact around ending homelessness. In March, the leadership of the District of Columbia, Montgomery County, and Prince George’s County announced plans to organize private and public sector partners to work together to end homelessness in the metro area. This collaboration is an important step towards regionalism and additional steps could be taken to build off of this effort to develop an even stronger regional strategy.  The collaboration should include jurisdictions in Northern Virginia, for example, and specific goals and dates for ending homelessness and local and regional sources of funding for specific homelessness programs.
  • Common ordinances around specific affordable housing tools.  Many jurisdictions across the region struggle with how to develop effective policies and ordinances to promote affordable housing. While local jurisdictions often listen and learn from each other about best practices, there could be benefits—such as wider adoption of policies that have been demonstrated to expand affordable housing options and predictability in the development process—for multiple jurisdictions to adopt common ordinances around specific tools. Example common language might be developed for ordinances about accessory dwelling unit (ADU), form-based codes, or parking requirements.

There are many other ways we could approach regional strategies to the affordable housing challenges in the Washington DC area, and the suggestions presented here may seem incredibly modest in contrast to some other proposals (e.g. a regional affordable housing trust fund, regional taxing authority).  However, there are benefits to starting with
small initiatives that can have an impact—even if at the margins—in the relative near term.  Longer term, successes born from these small steps can help build broader support for regional action and can lay the groundwork for more comprehensive regional strategies down the road.

0 Comments/in Uncategorized, HAND Thought Leadership /by H.A.N.D.

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