Housing as a Framework for Health Equity

Every individual, whether they are a renter or homeowner, has the right to healthy housing. Having a secure, stable shelter for oneself and one’s family should be considered a basic human need. Thinking about housing as a ​“home” that adds value to our lives in terms of our mental and physical wellbeing is an important step in identifying the social factors that impact the state of housing and, consequently, opportunities to lead a healthy life. This section establishes definitions for and describes the circumstances of a range of housing types and the variables across all of these types that impact physical and mental health.

Healthy Homes

Healthy homes are accessible, attainable, and affordable, which is generally defined as not exceeding more than 30% of monthly household income (which includes monthly rent or mortgage and utility bills as well as real estate taxes, homeowner’s insurance, and other fees). A healthy home is also a home that is safe and has all the basic amenities required for residents to have a comfortable quality of life, including hot and cold running water, electricity, and broadband connectivity. Healthy homes have enough space for all their occupants, and every resident who lives in a healthy home does so voluntarily and stably; they do not risk being forced from the home against their will. Finally, healthy homes are situated in neighborhoods and communities with ample access to resources that help optimize health outcomes, such as recreational opportunities, open space, education and employment opportunities, supermarkets selling fresh food, health care facilities, and safe streets.

Cost-Burdened Households

Cost burdened households are defined as spending more than 30% of their household income on payments for shelter, including costs such as rent, mortgage, and utilities. Families and individuals who are cost burdened by housing payments, whether they are renting or own their home, have fewer resources to pay for fresher, more nutritious foods, among other resources like health care and transportation. Consequently, they may have a harder time maintaining healthy diets and affording health care, which increases the risk of diabetes, heart disease, and other chronic conditions that result from a lack of routine care. Cost burdened families or individuals also tend to occupy homes that are older and more likely to have structural issues such as poor ventilation and insulation or even chipping paint and old pipes that can result in toxic lead exposure. The physical state of the home can have negative health impacts on its occupants. Housing with cold or low temperatures due to poor insulation has been shown to increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. Those who experience cost burdened living may also find themselves in contexts that do not have ready access to quality amenities, including quality food, recreational activities, and healthcare.

Frequent Moves

Frequent moving can result from experiencing cost burdened living, but can also be linked to other factors beyond affordability, such as the conditions and context of a home. According to data from the US Census, the average American family moves about 11 times in their lifetime. However, not every move for every individual is voluntary. Failure to pay rent in full or on time, or violating certain living standards may be grounds for eviction. Prior to the COVID pandemic, based on data between 2000-2018, an average of 3.6 million eviction cases were filed annually. The housing inconsistency that is inherent to frequent moves can have negative psychological effects on both adults and children who occupy the home: the threat of eviction or constant movement and uprooting can lead to emotional distress. Among young children in particular, frequent moves are connected to the development of mental health and behavioral issues.

Available eviction data is not entirely reflective of the amount of ​‘soft evictions’ that occur, in which tenants leave under the threat of a formal eviction but before an actual notice has been given.

Temporary Sheltered Homelessness

There are just over 300,000 temporary emergency shelters and over 86,000 transitional housing shelters in the United States, a significant proportion of which are in urban areas. For this reason, many public shelters can be overcrowded and under-resourced, conditions vary from place to place and season to season. Public shelters are highly communal spaces, leading to higher rates of disease transmission, including tuberculosis and hepatitis. Competition over lack of resources, extreme stress, and high rates of mental illness and drug addictions makes violent outbreaks common in many institutions. The strict time limits that many shelters practice as well as the limited space they have for personal belongings make it difficult for people to comfortably rest and recuperate from existing injuries or illness.

Sheltered homelessness is a cause and indicator of extreme inconsistency and temporariness. Over 300,000 people experienced sheltered homelessness in the United States on a given night in January 2022. Homeless families seeking temporary shelter are often prioritized, but may have little or no say in how long they stay at the shelter or where they end up afterwards. In addition to these official facilities, sheltered homelessness may also take the form of ​“couch surfing” or temporarily living with family or friends. The precarity of most forms of sheltered homelessness—whether official or unofficial—is that municipal shelters or family members can turn away individuals in need at any moment due to their own financial difficulties, lack of resources, or strain on relationships. This can lead to adverse health outcomes for victims of homelessness and their loved ones, especially for mental health, and may cause or exacerbate stress-related illnesses.

Unsheltered Homelessness

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) estimates that as many as 1.5% of the US population (almost 5 million people) will experience unsheltered homelessness at some point during their lifetime. People experiencing unsheltered homelessness have no choice but to live on the streets, in public spaces under tents or cardboard boxes, in their cars, or in abandoned or vacant buildings. Historically segregated and disadvantaged neighborhoods have often faced the brunt of problems that emerge from a lack of investment in housing, transportation, and other critical resources, resulting in communities that have crumbling and inaccessible public facilities. People of color concentrated in such communities due to historically racist housing policies are more likely to end up homeless and to stay homeless: The Bassuk Center finds that even after receiving services meant to alleviate homelessness, Black youth were twice as likely as white youth to become homeless again.

Due to exposure to the elements; extreme levels of stress, anxiety, and depression; and complete lack of resources, unsheltered homeless people face the highest risk of adverse health outcomes. Additionally, unsheltered people, particularly women, face more exposure to violence and trauma. A survey conducted by California Policy Lab across 15 different states reported that unsheltered people were more than four times more likely to report a physical health condition than sheltered people, one and a half times more likely to report a mental health condition, and more than five times as likely to report a substance abuse condition. They were also 25 times more likely to report all three conditions occurring simultaneously.

Applying Framework to Address Local Conditions

Using this rubric can enable practitioners and social justice advocates to better target resources and connect housing strategies to a wider range of economic, environmental and social issues. It can help create more effective programs by identifying the range of factors that need to be addressed to achieve secure and healthy homes. Advocacy efforts can more readily demonstrate that specific policies, such as improving tenant protections or expanding the supply of affordable homes, can help achieve other outcomes, such as better public health, lower crime, and expanded economic opportunity. And it can help to strengthen partnerships and multi-issue alliances among practitioners and advocates in housing, economic development, transportation, environmental, criminal justice reform and other types of programs and campaigns.

Local stakeholders provide insight to the history, conditions and challenges that affect health and housing in their communities and regions. The next sections of this paper show how the variables of cost, context, condition, and consistency exist in different regions, and how practitioners and advocates in the Planning Exchange network are addressing multiple factors to achieve greater housing security and health equity. Section II shows how local organizations and partnerships in New Orleans and Minneapolis-St. Paul are focused on improving housing security by undoing the effects of historic racism that have been exacerbated by newer global forces–climate change, in the case of New Orleans, and increasing global migration, in the case of the Twin Cities. Section III looks at Planning Exchange participants in four regions—Pittsburgh, Chicago, New York and Portland—to show how solutions can be scaled to achieve success at community, city and metropolitan levels.

New Orleans and Minneapolis-St. Paul are regions with very different histories and housing conditions. New Orleans is in one of the poorest states in America, and has a relatively weak housing market characterized by low average incomes and housing prices. The Twin Cities are a relatively wealthy region with a strong housing market. Yet poor and working families in both places struggle with finding affordable housing , one due to particularly low incomes and the other due to particularly high rents. Both have been shaped by a history of racist housing practices in spite of their different demographic profiles. Migration exacerbates housing insecurity in both places. In New Orleans, the displacement caused by Hurricane Katrina and more recent climate disasters continue to affect economic and housing conditions. In the Twin Cities, newer immigrants, particularly from Africa and Asia, along with residents in older Black communities, face a housing market shaped by a history of redlining and other discriminatory practices.

Addressing Housing Barriers for Improved Community Health in New Orleans

People in New Orleans, Louisiana face a litany of challenges that make it difficult to access stable, healthy housing. New Orleans’ housing crisis, where most renters are paying more than they can afford on housing costs, has been consistent. In addition to the ubiquitous burden of affordability, New Orleaneans must also contend with the devastating confluence of climate change and structural racism - both of which increase the cost and decrease the availability of housing in the city. Community organizers and housing advocates are taking these challenges head-on with targeted programs, and by advancing city ordinances that open housing opportunities and championing fair housing legislation in the State of Louisiana.

Racial discrimination and climate change are major factors that can affect health outcomes, and increase the cost of living and decrease quality of life. Generations of legally supported racial segregation result in concentrated poverty with Black residents predominantly living in neighborhoods with the fewest resources and most environmental hazards. In 2017, eviction rates in New Orleans were double the national average, with some predominantly Black neighborhoods experiencing eviction rates as high as 10.4% of all rented units, compared to the 5.2% rate among all renter households in the city.

Flooding disproportionately affects people of color and low-come people as they are more likely to live in flood-prone areas of the already low lying region. But even in the lowest parts of the city, it is not only a storm itself that shapes the scope of natural disaster. Geography, poverty rates, and racism are the existing conditions which vulnerable populations must deal with.

Louisiana has endured three major hurricanes in the past four years. Though none as severe as Hurricane Katrina, repetitive damage from these severe storms has caused flood insurance rates in the city to skyrocket. Louisiana is projected to have one of the highest flood insurance rate hikes of any state, with an expected increase of 134% for single-family homes on average. Although there is an 18% cap on annual increases, purchasing flood insurance in New Orleans is a requirement in many areas and the higher premiums are likely to exacerbate residents’ ability to find housing within their means. With the impending threat of climate change and more extreme weather events likely to occur in both the near and distant future, New Orleanians—and Black New Orleanians in particular—risk experiencing further disparities when it comes to protecting their homes (and, thus, their health) from the effects of a severe storm.

Following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, there were stark disparities in which neighborhoods were rebuilt. Black communities did not receive the same resources to rebuild as white communities for homes that were equally damaged. For this reason, one in three Black New Orleanians did not ( arguably, because they could not) return home after Katrina. This left historically Black, low-income neighborhoods, such as the Lower Ninth Ward, with large swaths of derelict land and only half of its pre-storm population, nearly 20 years later.

The presence of mold, lead paint, and other hazards negatively impact housing quality and community health. New Orleans does not have a citywide housing department or a non-governmental entity to enforce housing standards. Housing quality assurance falls under the Louisiana State Board of Home Inspectors. Unfortunately, home inspections are not a free service in the state of Louisiana and there are only 28 board-approved entities serving the entire state.

Housing insecurity is perhaps most intense for formerly incarcerated residents. The lack of affordable housing, the stigma of past incarceration, compounded by the difficulty of finding stable employment combine to make housing all but unobtainable. Between 2014 and 2019, 14,000 people were released from Louisiana state custody, many of whom were women. Louisiana’s female imprisonment rate (82 per 100,000 women) is 30% higher than the national average.

Operation Restoration (OR) and Louisiana Fair Housing Action Center (LAFHAC) are working to change state law to improve housing access and health outcomes for those most vulnerable to these intersecting crises of racial segregation, displacement, and re-entry following incarceration. To improve access to healthy homes for these Louisianians—particularly Black women, who experience the highest wage gap in the nation — LAFHAC and OR are reframing the narrative around incarceration and eviction as a public health issue.

LAFHAC was instrumental in drafting the New Orleans Healthy Homes Ordinance, which went into effect in July 2023. The advocacy strategy aimed to educate lawmakers on the challenges that those previously incarcerated face, to urge legislators to make landlords accountable to improve the poor quality housing that these populations often resort to living in, and ultimately change the law to enable healthier living conditions for tenants. Although parts of the legislation were passed. The anti-retaliation section safeguards tenants who are in good standing to their lease agreements, allowing them to request repairs and disclose health and safety concerns without the threat of retaliatory eviction. Upholding the anti-retaliation clause is vital in fostering an environment where tenants feel empowered to voice their concerns regarding health and safety hazards without fear of adverse consequences.

OR was awarded an ARPA-R Emergency Food & Shelter grant in 2022 to support women and girls impacted by incarceration by providing housing and utility assistance. OR and LAFHAC are jointly advocating for equitable spending of other federal dollars to mitigate effects of gentrification and displacement and the legacy of their impact on poor communities of color.

The systems of racial discrimination are entrenched and many of the problems require major budget changes to address. The lesson from OR and LAFHAC’s work is to stay organized and united to prioritize these issues and use the lived experiences of those most impacted by unhealthy housing to change both the narrative and policies that keep these systems in place.

Improving Stability and Access to Resources in Minneapolis

The location of a home also dictates potential health risks and rewards that can be reaped because it determines proximity to amenities such as parks, schools, public transportation, and hospitals as well as exposure to risks including crime, climate events, and hazardous or polluting facilities.

North Minneapolis is the city’s historically African-American district, a consequence of racist redlining practices common throughout the United States in the 20th century. The effects of the original covenants that guided these exclusionary practices are still evident today—not only in the racial segregation of the city, but in the distribution of its resources. A study conducted by a group called Mapping Prejudice at the University of Minnesota found that areas historically holding covenants against the inclusion of people of color are those situated around the city’s largest parks and green spaces.

By contrast, the North Minneapolis area, where many Black Minneapolitans of the 20th century were restricted to, has no large parks and is in close proximity to toxic facilities, such as Route 94 and the Hennepin Energy Recovery Center (HERC), a trash incinerator emitting lead, mercury, PM2.5 and other toxins. Appropriately, because of the health outcomes of racial segregation, Minneapolis and the rest of Hennepin County officially declared racism a public health crisis in 2020.

In more recent decades, North Minneapolis has become home to a variety of ethnic groups, including east African and Asian immigrants. The Twin Cities metro area has over 350,000 foreign-born residents, making up nearly 12% of its total population. The majority of all immigrants residing in the region are recent arrivals (since 2000 or later) and are under the age of 45. As of 2022, just over one fourth of the Twin Cities metro area’s population identified as non-white. Additionally, 82% of the population of the Near North neighborhood in Minneapolis identifies as non-white.

Minneapolis’ economy has been stimulated and growing in recent decades thanks, in part, to its influx of immigrants, but without the housing supply to match. In 2022 Minneapolis permitted 3,626 units (8.5 units per 1,000 residents), and St. Paul permitted 1,072 units (3.5 units per 1,000 residents). Following a general trend observed throughout most of the country, apartment construction in Minneapolis has recently been high, but this was not necessarily the case with the amount of units affordable to the lowest income groups. This has left substantial gaps in affordable housing in Minneapolis that have resulted in highly unstable conditions for both its immigrant and indigenous populations.

People of color residing in north Minneapolis and elsewhere in the city are consistently threatened by displacement and homelessness: The ​“Wall of Forgotten Natives” is the name given to an encampment occupied predominantly by homeless people of indigenous heritage in south Minneapolis along state highway 55, adjacent to an historically indigenous neighborhood.

The Harrison Neighborhood Association offers culturally accessible assistance to the Hmong and Lao immigrant community in the neighborhood, which is facing pressure from the city to vacate its current site for a school expansion. With few affordable areas for the organization to relocate to due to the area’s rapidly growing real estate market, Harrison residents risk losing this invaluable community resource.

Urban growth and development have the potential to benefit everyone but this can only occur if it is planned and implemented equitably with all constituents and potential beneficiaries in mind. In the Minneapolis 2040 plan, the city adopted a new housing amendment that ended single-family zoning, which allows developers to construct duplexes and triplexes in formerly single-family zoned neighborhoods and imposes affordable unit requirements in all new developments of at least 20 units.

Theory and empirical evidence suggest that adding new homes can moderates price increases, which in turn helps keep existing housing more affordable to low- and moderate-income families. In the case of Minneapolis this goal was pursued by modifying land use rules to allow construction of higher density buildings and greater variety of housing types, and as a result, rent growth has been much lower compared to the rest of the state.

While higher density housing is generally regarded as a step towards more equitable housing potential, due to the upzoning ordinance, property values on inexpensive single-family lots in first-ring suburbs are increasing thanks to their new development potential. This begs the important question of whether lower-income people living there will be able to stay in their homes in the long term or be displaced.

The Alliance and New American Development Center (NADC) are working to improve housing stability for immigrants, indigenous, and other people of color in Minneapolis who are most susceptible to housing instability, landlord harassment, and difficulty accessing resources due to language differences, citizenship status, and a legacy of racist housing practices. With cultures that value large and/or extended families, finding housing stock large enough to accommodate multi-generational households has been a challenge for these organizations to keep families stably housed.

During the pandemic, NADC helped dozens of families apply for the RentHelpMN program, pay rent, and communicate with their landlords. Working with the Alliance’s Equity in Place initiative, NADC also helped introduce bill HF 2676, which proposes a rent cap on certain low-income rental housing developments. In addition to supporting housing stability, NADC recognizes the importance of commercial development and small, local businesses who not only provide resources for the local area, but a sense of community cohesion. For this reason, NADC also offers rental assistance to support small businesses in need.

Complementary to this effort, the Alliance is working on an initiative known as HIRE Minnesota to help repair employment discrepancies in the job market for people of color, with the understanding that an important mark of housing stability is earning a steady income to afford housing costs and pay rent on time. To counter displacement for both businesses and housing, the Alliance developed the Equitable Development Scorecard, a tool for measuring and addressing equity and accessibility to resources in communities.

The Alliance has also convened the Blue Line Coalition to fight housing displacement taking place along the proposed metro rail extension. The Coalition puts a strong emphasis on community engagement both before, during, and after such development projects take place to ensure that all stakeholders are adequately informed, engaged, and prepared for such transformation and are not left behind or pushed out in the process.

As described in the Planning Exchange’s initial research investigation, Pathways to Health Equity, initiatives to advance health equity can and do take place at different scales. The examples of Planning Exchange partners highlighted below illustrate the potential, as well as the challenges, of interventions to improve health through housing at a neighborhood scale (Pittsburgh), city scale (Chicago), county level (Multnomah), and regional level (New York).

Community Programs for Healthy Housing - Lessons from Pittsburgh

The Hill District Consensus Group (HDCG), in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania works to address housing insecurity at the neighborhood level and through localized actions. The Consensus Group, founded in the 1990s as a ​“community table” by and for residents of Pittsburgh’s historically Black neighborhoods (coined collectively as the ​“Hill District”), initially focused on a multitude of social justice issues faced by residents. The Group still serves as a space for residents to problem solve and advocate around issues of oppression faced by Black and Brown neighborhoods. Now, the Consensus Group also focuses on housing issues, particularly with regard to public housing and property ownership rights. This work follows a history of displacement and housing loss experienced by residents. The Consensus Group was also a major supporter of the Black-Owned Hill District Federal Credit Union, which created an easier pathway for residents to secure mortgage loans and helped to build financial stability and independence within the neighborhood.

Coalition building and community partnerships are a large part of how local organizations collaborate and work towards common goals. In the case of the Hill District, this means housing security for their neighbors, friends, and families. The Consensus Group contains an entire ecosystem of actors that also represent the Hill District neighborhoods and address different needs and functions: Hill Community Development Corporation, Hill House Association (house for all social services), Hill District Education Council, and Hill District Ministries. Outside of the neighborhood, the Consensus Group has also partnered with other organizations and stakeholder groups that focus on housing issues like Right to the City, The Northside Coalition for Fair Housing, Pittsburgh United, and the Pittsburgh Hispanic Development Corporation (PHDC).

One project of note is the Rent Relief program, an effort established by the Consensus Group in collaboration with Pittsburgh Hispanic Development Corporation (PHDC) and the Community Justice Project. The Rent Relief program entailed the formation of an ​“Eviction Rapid Response” team that assists struggling renters in Pittsburgh who need financial support and legal assistance regarding their housing situations during COVID-19. The program eventually gave birth to RentHelpPGH, to assists renters with applications to different social services and provides rental assistance and legal advice to aid in landlord-tenant disputes in one location. This effort create a system of organizations, both inside and outside of the Hill District neighborhoods, illustrates how communities can merge to create larger, more powerful unions while working toward common goals.

Education is also a significant part of the work that the Consensus Group covers. For example, the Group connects renters to legal resources, teaches residents how to get their homes inspected, and even provides assistance to existing homeowners who struggle to maintain their homes. After COVID-19, the Consensus Group created the Community Resource Navigation Team to help residents navigate resources and help older renters and homeowners gain access to social services. The Resource Navigation Team also administered vaccinations to community members during the height of the pandemic.

With these different initiatives in mind, it’s important to highlight the role that knowledge sharing plays in the local work around housing security and health equity. The successful passage of knowledge between community members frames both the present and future of housing work for Hill District residents. The Consensus Group conducts an ongoing ​“bootcamp” in which residents can be trained on housing issues via community workshops, with an emphasis on educating young people and empowering them to continue this advocacy work. The knowledge shared to new generations of organizers and the connections solidified within the community is enabled by these ​“bootcamps”. This knowledge empowers residents to continue the fight for fair housing in Pittsburgh.

Holistic City-Level Interventions - Lessons from Chicago

Partnerships between like-minded organizations, community leaders, and the City of Chicago government have been essential in advancing healthy home initiatives. Professionals in planning and public health collaborate closely to develop policies, practices, and programs aimed at addressing housing insecurity. This collaborative effort involves working alongside city residents and stakeholders from various social sectors to ensure the strategies implemented are comprehensive and effective.

The Metropolitan Planning Council (MPC), a partner of the Planning Exchange, has been instrumental in co-developing plans and strategies to promote healthy, equitable, and affordable housing in Chicago. As an independent nonprofit organization, MPC has influenced the city’s approach to built environment issues such as transportation, infrastructure, sustainability, and housing.

This coalescence was in practice when MPC, Illinois Public Health Institute (lPHI), played a crucial role in informing the Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) during the formation of We Will Chicago, a 10-year framework for citywide growth. This partnership played an essential role in co-developing strategies used by the Chicago government to generate and preserve healthy, equitable and affordable housing.

In 2017, the MPC released their study on the Cost of Segregation, which laid bare the structural racism at the core of Chicago’s housing issue, and catalyzed a reframing of how MPC looked at housing. As part of the study, the MPC conducted research on economic segregation, African-American segregation and Latino-white segregation. It was clear that segregation was damaging to public safety, regional growth, and overall economic prosperity. Because of this, the MPC began to prioritize equity and inclusion in their housing work to generate economic and social benefits for the entire region.

In connection with their Cost of Segregation study, the MPC came out with the Equity Roadmap, outlining strategies to dismantle institutional barriers and implement immediate policies and programs. Through this work, the MPC showed that to make strides towards increased equity across housing, economic development, and health, it would require collaboration from everyone in the region: the Chicago government, private sector, philanthropy, community organizations, and individuals.

The MPC’s Reconnecting Communities project, launched in 2019, solicited input from community residents and advocates to address the impact of transportation infrastructure on communities. Qualitative data analysis consisting of stakeholder interviews, comprehensive surveys, and working groups informed the project, which not only gathered feedback on how the construction of highways and other transportation infrastructure has harmed communities but also identified projects that would begin to repair some of those harms.

MPC employs a collaborative approach to policy development and advocacy; however, working to find consensus with a diverse body of stakeholders is not always easy. In July 2022, MPC co-led the effort to pass the Connected Communities Ordinance with one of the provisions being increased housing opportunity, affordability and accessibility near transit. ​“The Connected Communities Ordinance was an example of collective action to improve local development policy. ​“There was intentional effort to build a durable coalition across sectors through Elevated Chicago and resources to support the collective work” noted Kendra Freeman, Vice President of Programs and Strategic Impact at MPC. ​“Collaboration can be hard and we need to provide the resources to build community voice and power in shifting inequitable policy.”

Partnerships between like-minded organizations, community leaders, and the Chicago government have been essential in advancing health and racial equity analysis to housing policy ideas. Now that We Will Chicago has passed, the MPC, IPHI and CDPH, will continue to advocate for the implementation of policy ideas that are consistent and advance both We Will Chicago and Health Chicago 2025, the city’s formal health improvement plan.

Key Insights from Collaboration with Indigenous Communities in Multnomah County, Oregon

Future Generations Collaborative (FGC) is an Indigenous-led organization that strives to generate healthy and healing Indigenous communities. It has served the needs of urban Native people in the Portland area since 2012.

Homelessness in Portland, Oregon is a major issue. In 2023, the total number of people experiencing homelessness rose to 6,297, an increase from 5,228 in 2022. Multnomah County is actively responding to this challenge by implementing programs, funding emergency shelters, coordinating long-term rent assistance, and developing supportive housing. In addition to conventional homelessness programs, unique collaborations, such as Barbies Village, are at play that leverage indigenous land-back movements and reparative actions led by religious leaders.

In Multnomah County, Native Americans represent 11.6% of the homeless population despite being only 2.5% of the county’s population in 2019. This disparity has inspired the movement from within the Native American community to facilitate the funding, community support, and return of land to create Barbie’s Village, a tiny home community and early childhood center for unhoused Indigenous families. This initiative is named in honor of the late Barbie Shields, an Indigenous Natural Helper with the Future Generations Collaborative (FGC). Her commitment to the Native community, especially those experiencing homelessness on their ancestral lands, inspired the idea of Barbie’s Village.

Westminster Presbyterian Church played a major role in turning this vision into reality. They actively supported and organized the Barbie’s Village Task Force, which includes members from Future Generations Collaborative, Leaven Land and Housing Coalition and the Westminster Presbyterian Church. Their main goals were to coordinate community healing and repair through building trust, and addressing potential opposition.

On October 30th, 2023, the Barbie’s Village Task Force made the motion to gift land from the former Presbyterian Church of Laurelhurst, in exchange for $1. Returning the land to Indigenous stewardship was an opportunity for the church to begin the path to repatriation and reconciliation.

Jillene Joseph states that ​“This is land back,” she said. ​“This is literal land that goes into the hands of Native people.” Barbie’s Village represents a community-led endeavor to tackle housing issues while respecting and celebrating indigenous histories and legacies in the region.

State and Regional Partnerships - Lessons from NYC Metro Region

The exchange between various organizations within the regional approach towards housing underscores the complexity of collaboration, as seen in MPC’s work in Chicago. Housing dynamics are not static; people move throughout the region, necessitating a coordinated effort.

Successful regional strategies for addressing housing insecurity rely even strongly on multi-state partnerships. Regional Plan Association, Make the Road New York, the Fairfield County Center for Housing Opportunity, and Desegregate Connecticut have coalesced around policies and programs to protect renters from eviction and create more housing to address the NYC metropolitan area’s affordable housing crisis.

In New York, organizations in the Planning Exchange originally came together during the community engagement process in RPA’s ​“Fourth Regional Plan,” which recommends elevating partnerships among organizations and other community stakeholders. Through this partnership, each organization works to amplify the efforts of the others through research, advocacy, and community connections.

In 2022, RPA published a report called ​“Preventing Another Ida” which featured the testimonials of some of Make the Road’s clients who suffered damage and loss of property as a result of Hurricane Ida. These clients, predominantly undocumented immigrants, have struggled to find safe housing that is affordable and resorted to living in illegal, unregulated basement apartments prone to flooding.