State Policies Play a Central Role in the Fight Against Vacant Property
Abandoned and vacant properties seem like a quintessentially local problem. But state policies have a huge effect on how well municipalities can fight it.
Making a Pipeline for Vacant Building Rehab
Baltimore’s Vacants to Value program sparked revitalization block by block with a few key legal powers and partnerships.
Condemning Asthma, Not Homes in North Carolina
An apartment complex in North Carolina generated 120 times as many hospital visits as would have been expected for its population, until a creative coalition forced its sale and worked with the new owner to change things.
Transforming Vacant Land Into Community Assets
Vacant land activities can be low cost and high impact; the price of failure is not steep, but the return on investment can be high.
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—Nov. 2
News from—and affecting—the community development world. This week: rent burden relief, policy suggestions for worker co-ops, a new credit scoring model?, states take on housing, and more.
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—Oct. 19
News from—and affecting—the community development world. This week: rent really is racist, new tales of voter suppression, swimming pool access, a response to a pro-gentrification argument, more.
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—Oct. 12
News from—and affecting—the community development world. This week: fast food swamps, Seattle has too many apartments, criminal justice, basic income pilot, more.
The Right to Stay Put
There is much work to be done around housing and equitable development, but the solution is not simply to move people around. A key challenge is creating real choice.
The Warren Housing Bill: Ready to Take On The Affordability Crisis?
Sen. Warren's proposed bill represents the kind of holistic housing strategy we need from the federal government in facilitating affordable housing for all Americans in all cities and towns who have been left out, locked out, or exploited over decades by the national housing market.
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—Sept. 21
News from—and affecting—the community development world.
Fair Housing at 50: At the Root, It’s Still Race Over Place
We should have known better. The Kerner Commission taught us that race matters most, not place. But it also embedded in our psyches the equation of Black = central city and the similarly absolute equation of white = suburbs.
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—Sept. 14
Whole Foods Employees Seek to Unionize, Your Job Won't Save You From Homelessness, Rent-to-own May Equal Jail Time
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—Sept. 7
What driverless trucks will mean for drivers, public toilets as a human right, disappointing Democratic leadership, and more.
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—Aug. 24
Philly's Fight for Affordable Housing | HUD Targets Facebook In Complaint| An Eviction App | A "Massive" Multifamily Housing Fraud
Is a Home with Lead Hazards Really “Affordable”?
The cost of housing is not simply the mortgage, rent, and utilities, but the individual and community health, education, and social costs associated with low-quality, unstable, and unhealthy housing.
Eviction Lab Misses the Mark
As housing activists and academics who conduct research on issues of housing and displacement, we have encountered major problems with Eviction Lab’s practices.
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—Aug. 17
HUD's Latest Assault on Fair Housing | Decriminalizing Homelessness | "Buying the Block" | FEMA's Roadblocks In Puerto Rico | Public Transport And Health
In Memoriam: Jeremy Nowak
Jeremy Nowak, a founder of Reinvestment Fund and founding board member of the Opportunity Finance Network (OFN), passed away on July 28. Nowak was,...
Housing Advocates—Seize This Moment!
I’ve been working to address housing affordability since the late 1970s. There has never been this much media and public focus on the issue.
Taking Sexual Harassment Seriously: Tips for Nonprofits
Sexual harassment is a topic that’s not often addressed in the community development field, but it should be.
Loneliness Kills; Community Developers Can Help
Some social determinants of health are concrete and physical. A substandard house with mold and pests, for example, will lead to more asthma and...
How to Kill Land Speculation
People live in communities because natural and human-made resources make them productive places to live, work, and play. Because geographically based resources are gifts...
Practical Ideas for Addressing Micro-Segregation in Mixed Income Communities
Practical lessons from long time community builders on promoting integration and interaction among residents of mixed income communities.
The CLT Solution: In Suburbia and Beyond
After 30 years and the development of thousands of units of affordable housing, the Long Island Housing Partnership Inc. and its affiliates are now concentrating on the Community Land Trust model.
CDCs and Nonprofits are Indeed Leading Affordable Housing Innovation
Blaming community development corporations (CDCs) for the high cost of affordable housing construction is not only misguided, but it ignores the work of CDCs and nonprofits that are leading efforts to reduce costs in the key areas of financing, construction, and land costs.
In Baltimore, Johns Hopkins Seeks to Be a Good Neighbor
The current HopkinsLocal effort, a three-year program launched in September 2015, is also clearly a response to the death of Freddie Gray and the events that followed.
Regrets of an Accidental Placemaker
Had I unintentionally contributed to the gentrification of my neighborhood and other neighborhoods around Washington, D.C.?
Advocacy for Social Change: Coalitions and the Organizations that Lead Them
Many books discuss the corrosive effect of money in politics and lobbying organizations, but few are devoted to how those representing the have-nots organize on a national level to fight for laws and regulations that seek to empower communities.
Smaller Cities Are Laboratories for Change
In smaller cities it is typically much easier to engage high levels of leadership, get traction for strategies that are more visible, engage the wider community, build trust, and scale solutions more quickly than in larger areas. Here are a few examples.
Panacea or Problem? The Possibilities in Opportunity Zones
With Opportunity Zones, the potential is there for great benefit, but it is not yet clear where, how, and to whom any benefits will accrue. People who care about connecting residents and businesses in distressed communities with opportunities need to act now so they fulfill their promise.
Shelter Shorts, The Week in Community Development—May 11
Democrat’s Housing Proposal | Tracking SNAP Recipients Is a Bad Idea | Including Antiracism Practices Into The Housing First Model | An Asylum-Seeker Game? | Mick, Can We Rate You?
Beating Luxury Developers at Their Own Game
The tide is starting to change as a number of organizations have partnered with nonprofits to make deals to acquire naturally occurring affordable housing.
The State of Shared-Equity Homeownership
Though the need is greater than ever for resale-restricted, affordable homes, the growth of this model of homeownership appears to be limited.
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, May 4
A Trauma-Centered Approach to Youth Violence in Cleveland | We May Know Who Benefits From Port Covington | What Housing Crisis? | Clearing Homeless Encampments in Philadelphia | Restaurant Tax for Affordable Housing
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, April 27
Climate Gentrification | A Marijuana Tax for Housing? | Homeownership Alone Can't Close the Wealth Gap | Illegal ICE Raids on Farms | Keeping An Eye on Opportunity Zones | More...
What Black Panther-inspired Gift to Oakland Should Have Looked Like
Disney's Black Panther-inspired gift to Oakland children is great, but there is a way it could be better.
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, April 20
NIMBYs, YIMBYs, PHIMBYs-Oh My! | Can Algorithms Make Equitable Cities? | Retail Segregation Takes a Toll | E.R. Visits and "Tough" Neighborhoods | Enough Innovation Already | More...
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, April 13
Really, YIMBYs? | TOD Without Displacement | Tracking 80 Million Evictions | MLK's Campaign, Revitalized | Airbnb Hastening Demise of NOLA Culture? | Bike "Borrowing" for Equity | More
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, April 6
Gentrification Is Bad For One's Health | Housing Teachers-At School | Protecting Space for Local Business | TOD Doesn't Have to Displace | Community Artists Win in Court | More . . .
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, March 30
Helping Cannabis Entrepreneurs of Color | The "Business" of Homelessness | Housing Is a Mental Health Issue | Justice for Wage Theft Victims | 2020 Census Already Off to a Bad Start?
Interview with Michael Bodaken, retiring director of the National Housing Trust
Shelterforce took the occasion of Michael Bodaken's retiring from the National Housing Trust to speak with him about how he got into housing, some of his favorite projects, and his recommendations for the field going forward.
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, March 16
A Cautionary Housing Tale from London | Hospitals Peddling Loans for Healthcare Costs? | Public Housing Resident Lawsuit | Kentucky Rezones for More Housing | Florida Sides with Payday Lenders | More...
New Money on the Block: Funders for Housing and Opportunity
A new funding collaborative, Funders for Housing and Opportunity, has just launched. The collaborative, officially a project of the New Ventures Fund, involves (so far) nine large and well-known foundations.
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, March 2
Are Black Incarceration Rates Really Falling? | Clinics in Schools Remedy Absenteeism | Hispanic Homeownership Rate Increases | Uber is Causing Traffic Jams | "Adjustable" Houses | More
The Displacement Crisis of Immigrant-Owned Small Businesses
Growth of new business is a sign of a robust economy, but New York City’s true success hinges on ensuring that all residents have access to opportunity and community resources.
Tools of the Trade: Measuring the Health-Related Returns of Community Development
Partnerships are becoming more the norm and less the exception, but how do we know that they are actually having a good effect on health, well-being, and economic opportunity?
Why Do We Care About Health Equity?
The fight for health equity—for everyone to have a roughly equal shot at the potential and choice that good health offers—is of course, similar to the fight for economic justice and the work of community development.
Not Just Partners, But Neighbors: Health Care in Affordable Housing Developments
Offering on-site health care in housing developments makes sense. But developing and managing housing and health care facilities can be very different. How do you make them work together?
Financial Metrics Won’t Tell the Full Picture
Cost savings alone do not measure the full value of the collaboration between the health care and housing sectors.
Aligning Health Systems With Community Development
Hospitals and health systems can’t solve societal challenges alone. But they can play a key role in mobilizing and aligning joint resources to bring positive changes to low-income communities.
Approaching Partnerships Between Health Care Institutions and Community Development Organizations
There isn’t an exact science to forming partnerships. The slow and sometimes messy process requires patience, allies, and trust.
Q: Can Supporting Community Development Improve Outcomes for the Health Sector?
Yes! Over 50 percent of premature deaths in the U.S. can be attributed to preventable non-medical factors, specifically behavioral, environmental, and social conditions.
What If We Didn’t Have to Beg for Community Benefits?
Perhaps publicly owned land should be developed for the community first—and market-rate developers should be asking us for access to part of it.
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, Feb. 2
Quote of the Week:
“Even as the core problem in cities shifted from disinvestment to displacement, the policy paradigm has remained the same: Spur growth...
Who Gets to Live Where, and Why? The Answer May Be Settled By Our...
Why housing messaging is backfiring and recommendations on how to change course.
Shelter Shorts—The Week in Community Development, Jan. 26
Bus Routes Out of Poverty | Amazon—Earn Your Subsidy | The Numbers Behind 'Urban Renewal' | Overdue Rent is Sickening | Med. Students As City Planners? | Trump's Medicaid Work Requirement
Moving Hospital and Health System Investments Upstream
Across the country, nonprofit hospitals are under intense scrutiny due to the discrepancy between the substantial revenues they generate compared to the level of...
Nun Funds: The Original Impact Investors
Rising out of a practice of shareholder activism that began in the 1970s, Women Religious made the leap from monitoring their investments on Wall Street to becoming pioneers in investing directly in the communities and social justice causes for which they cared.
The Power of Proximity: Making the Case for Living Where You Work
Twenty years later, it’s hard to overstate how wise I think that group of board members was in imposing its residency requirement on me. While initially skeptical, over the years I’ve learned some powerful lessons about the benefits of proximity.
Shelter Shorts: The Week in Community Development, Jan. 12
Activists at the Golden Globes | Carson’s HUD Takes Some Heat | We Make an Exception on Workforce Housing | Companies Must "Do Better" in Nashville | California Makes Policy Using Opportunity Maps
The Mysterious Art of Collaboration
Five housing organizations' effort to merge reveals both pitfalls and practical possibilities for bringing community development groups together.
Shelter Shorts: The Week in Community Development, Jan. 5
2018 Housing predictions | Gentrification News | Local Resistance | Unlikely inspiration for planners
Endangering Community Investment with Tax “Reform”
There wasn’t one Republican senator who was willing say tax reform aimed at growing our economy should augment, not diminish, community investment.
Shelter Shorts: The Week in Community Development-Dec. 22
Canada says housing a human right | Protecting local business | Homelessness prevention saves money | CLT milestone in Colorado
Shelter Shorts: The Week in Community Development-Dec. 15
Walmart and Ben Carson looking out for your financial health?! | Homelessness numbers up, but lowering them saves money | Rental market finally slowing down.
Creative Placemaking: Honoring the Past While Welcoming our Futures
A discussion about honoring the history of a place while actively working to encourage its growth and foster positive change.
Shelter Shorts: The Week in Community Development-Dec. 8
“Attainable” housing | Defeating land contracts | Harassed tenants get legal win | Preaching against gentrification | Housing on Bill Gates’ mind
Shelter Shorts: The Week in Community Development-Dec. 1
Demolitions conducted using Hardest Hit Funds have exposed already suffering communities to asbestos; Vancover gets accessory dwelling units right; Obama dismisses the idea of a community benefits agreement in Chicago; and more in this week's Shelter Shorts, a look back at the week in community development news.
Community Development Potpourri
This issue represents a great cross-section of what community development is. We have stories of organizing, housing, health, and arts. Stories of affordable housing challenges in strong and weak markets; we have pieces on policy, program, and resistance; and more.
When Bad Names Get in the Way of Good Policy
Today, America is a place where symbols are often more important than the causes or deeds they describe. With social media and the 24-hour...
Your “Opportunity” Map is Broken. Here Are Some Fixes
If we are truly going to reduce our housing policy objectives to the realm of goals related to “opportunity,” I would like to offer some guidelines for its proper use.
New York City Becomes a Hotbed of Community Land Trust Innovation
New York seems poised to move the concept of community land trusts in new and exciting directions.
Trickle Up Housing: Filtering Does Go Both Ways
Here's something we don't talk about enough: developing affordable housing in a tight, high-cost market also increases overall affordability through filtering! Just in the other direction—it trickles up.
Rules for Radicals to Demand a Fair and Transformative Disaster Recovery
At Texas Housers, we've confronted a series of natural disasters over the past decade that forced us to develop new approaches for our housing advocacy. In the wake of Hurricane Harvey, we find ourselves back at it. Here are seven lessons we have learned.
#ThisIsNotUs. Except, It Is.
We are constantly faced with the decision of whether to #TakeAKnee in our work, and whether we meet this challenge or not either reinforces our racialized landscape or disrupts it. What is clear is that we cannot sit on the sidelines with a universalist perspective, claiming to do good work.
A Crisis of Culture (Again)
From the removal of confederate statues throughout the South to the controversial actions by football players during the national anthem, we, as a nation,...
Not If But When: A Disaster Preparedness Conversation
Against the back drop of 2017's California wildfires, a quickly organized session took place to discuss disaster response and recovery from the perspective of being a housing organization.
What to Do When ICE Comes to Your Buildings
If you own and/or manage affordable housing, do you know what to do if ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) shows up on your doorstep looking for someone? If you haven’t thought it through yet, now’s the time.
The Problem with “We Have to Do Something”
This summer, Eve Ewing, a sociologist of race and education at the University of Chicago, wrote an article called “The Chicago Negro and the...
10 Ways to Talk About Inclusionary Housing, Differently
We need to talk about inclusionary housing in a different way that circumvents common misperceptions and creates a new narrative for policymakers in moderate markets and more conservative political climates. Here are 10 messages to help frame your conversations.
Defending DACA Is a Moral and Economic Imperative
President Donald Trump has decided to end the Obama-era program that grants work permits to undocumented immigrants. Over the course of its five-year history,...
Civil Rights Organizations on Hurricane Relief Efforts
Throughout what we know will be a long recovery over the coming weeks, months, and years, Shelterforce hopes to share the stories of the...
Industry versus Movement – Redux
Three years ago, I posted a blog in which I wrestled with the question of whether community development is an “industry” or a “movement.”...
Police and Communities: Conversations Continue, Solutions Appear
Community development corporations play an important role in community safety. As such, they are often at conflict with themselves over their relationships with the police and the communities they serve.
When a Person’s Character Trumps Their Credit Score
Some CDFIs approve loans based on a person’s character instead of their credit score. But they only recommend
doing so when you know the applicant.
Preparing a Career Path for Community Change Agents
College credentials combined with local organizing experience helps create a new generation of community activists.
Editor’s Note: Racial Justice — Beyond Good Intentions
Race affects everything in American society. Working to fight racial injustice is a large part of what the community development field does. And yet, that doesn’t get us off the hook.
Who Will Lead Community Development Corporations?
Community development corporations are surprisingly short on executives of color. Why? And how can the field do better?
Roundtable: Policing and Community Development
Many people in the community development field are conflicted about the police presence where they work. We invited a group of practitioners to share their experiences and talk through this tension.
Chipping Away at Implicit Bias
Structural discrimination has led to an unconscious association between blackness and poverty and neighborhood disinvestment. Here’s what we can do to change the status quo.
CDFIs Led By People of Color Face Financial Disparities Too
A lack of access to capital, capacity-building resources, and technical assistance significantly constrains the ability of CDFIs led by people of color to achieve greater impact.
Measuring What Really Matters in Community-Based Development Organizations
Developing a road map for performance improvement within CBDOs can be a daunting task, and while their missions are sometimes nebulous, here are some ways to measure them.
Terrorism in Charlottesville — And Possibly Your Town Next
The Trump-era increase widespread racial terror, as was on display in Charlottesville, is going to affect community developers' work at least as much as as his legislative and funding agenda.
A View from the Other Side of the Funding Proposal
During my time on a CDC's board, my expectations and assumptions have been challenged. This change in perspective and experience has offered me some interesting observations and lessons.
In Memoriam: Pete Garcia
The community development world lost a leader on May 3. Pete Garcia, who was the director of Chicanos Por La Causa (CPLC) from 1984 to 2008, passed away at the age of 71.
High Cost of Affordable Housing Is Not CDCs’ Fault
You know what doesn’t help lower the cost of affordable housing? Spuriously blaming some of the organizations that are working hardest to create it in the most difficult situations.
How to Build a Case for Community Development and Affordable Housing
In the new administration, housing programs will feel the pressure of budgetary cuts and tax reform. Advocates should be careful not to put down other programs in the process of defending their own, or everyone will lose.
Indigenous Approaches to Succession and Mentoring
The American approach to work often values productivity in terms of outputs and deliverables, and generally, this prevails even in our social justice work. Many of us give of ourselves and sacrifice our time, energy, and other facets of our lives for the cause or to advance the movement; but without some sort of balance and planning on our end, we could face a harsh reality as we meet our advanced years in life.
Not Your Average Community Garden
A good community garden is a space that nurtures hope, natural abundance, and growth, and eventually moves beyond food and into the realm of relationship-building that can help sustain healthy communities.
In Troubled Times, Taking Stock of Our Community Wealth
In thinking about how to face the current federal environment, it might be helpful to take stock of where gains have occurred. Among these growth areas are: