Crossing the Digital Divide During COVID
Flyers, phone calls, and podcasts, oh my! Organizations blend past and present strategies to stay in touch with community members.
It’s Time to Move On From Community Consensus
When we rethink the problem as one of political voice rather than community consensus, it opens up new, innovative techniques to determine public priorities.
The Most We Can Do: A National Mandate for Housing Justice
As the United States wrestles with its long history of racial injustice, shared-equity programs stand as one solution to address inequality and exclusion in the realms of housing.
We Need a Federal Housing Agency
Our politics have made an artificial divide between the public and the private sectors when it comes to housing. It’s time to do better.
Lasting Affordability Is the Path to Resilience
We now have a unique opportunity, generated by a combination of life-threatening conditions and focused political will stemming from the Black Lives Matter movement, to re-prioritize local housing policies and resources.
How Do We Change the Narrative Around Housing?
In-depth public opinion research points to ways to intensify support for housing justice policies—and to a few danger spots to avoid.
Frances Goldin—Revolutionary, Organizer, Visionary, Friend—Joins the Ancestors at Age 95
Frances Goldin's vision was of a multiracial, multiethnic community based on the principles of justice. Her instruction to us was to fight for it.
Racial Equity, Housing, and COVID: A Roundtable
Six regional and state housing advocates discuss the connections between uprisings over racial injustice, the pandemic, and the need for housing security.
Community Organizations Have to Talk About Police Violence Directly
It’s easy to quickly refocus the conversation around police violence on the problems our organizations are already set up to fix—here’s why we shouldn’t.
A Transformative Experiment in Alaska
What do mimes, micro-units, and honoring Alaskan Natives have in common? Artists. The Cook Inlet Housing Authority's work with artists helped the organization realize new markers of success and furthered its housing goals.
What Prior Disasters Have Taught Housing Advocates About How to Respond to COVID-19
When it comes to helping people maintain or recover their housing, hurricanes and fires aren’t as different from a pandemic as one might think.
Nonprofit Housing Providers Face Down COVID-19
As organizers struggle to get strong eviction moratoriums passed and enforced around the country, there’s one sector where evictions during the pandemic were not...
Community Development Is Crucial in This Moment
One month ago, when I began the first draft of this article, the world was drastically different. Well before we became part of this...
Massachusetts Affordable Housing Providers Lead With Voluntary Eviction Moratorium—But There’s More to Do
Boston didn't have the power to suspend evictions itself, so while advocates pushed the courts and the state legislature, affordable housing providers agreed to a voluntary eviction moratorium and the city encouraged other landlords to join.
A Love Letter to the Next Decade of Community Development
For a long time, we’ve been too quiet about what’s working and what’s fueling us. But our field has major reasons to be proud; reasons you could miss in the cacophony of daily news.
Pulling the Rug From Under Community Development?
Investments and funding motivated by the Community Reinvestment Act are more foundational to the work of community developers than is often discussed. But if regulations change the incentives for banks, the effects on communities will be dramatic.
Why Organizations Should Invest in Home Repairs to Improve Health
A closer look at the relationship between health and the home repair needs of lower-income households.
How a Dozen Organizations Are Fighting Persistent Poverty Together
A national coalition of development financial institutions, CDCs, and financial intermediaries have banded together with local leaders who live in communities where more than 20 percent of the population has lived in poverty for more than 30 years.
Tiny Houses: Does Size Matter?
The suggestion of tiny houses as a solution to housing unaffordability is both condescending and impractical. Here's why.
Redlining Would Be Relegalized by CRA Reform Proposal
In an attempt to make compliance easier for banks, regulators are proposing to incentivize the very thing the Community Reinvestment Act was written to fight.