Lake View Presbyterian Church

Affordable Housing Task Force

The Affordable Housing Task Force Mission Statement.

We seek to promote diversity in our community by serving as a resource, advancing education, and facilitating action related to preserving and increasing the availability of affordable housing.

Goals and Objectives:

1. To increase Lake View’s knowledge base on affordable housing, especially in the Lakeview community.
   

2. To educate and serve as a resource for the church congregation on the benefits and challenges of affordable housing.
   

3. To facilitate action to preserve and create affordable housing locally, statewide, and nationally.
   

4. To establish and maintain collaborations with community organizations, the Presbytery, other area religious institutions, and political leaders.

Social Justice Committee
Affordable Housing Task Force
Spring, 2004

What is Affordable Housing?

Housing is "affordable" when a household pays no more than 30 percent of its income on housing costs.  Nationally, nearly a third of all households pay spend 30 percent or more of their incomes on housing, and 13 percent spend 50 percent or more.  Locally, Chicago's housing wage -- the wage needed to rent an average 2 bedroom apartment -- is above $18 an hour.

Lake View Presbyterian's Affordable Housing Task Force was formed after we recognized that housing in Lakeview and in many areas of Chicago had become unaffordable to many in our congregation and in our community.  

What is the Affordable Housing Task Force Doing?

The task force is currently gathering information about current housing issues in Chicago and working with the Lakeview Action Coalition on the following issues:

Inclusionary Housing Ordinance - Chicago

The Inclusionary Housing Ordinance, modeled on similar enactments in Boston, Denver, and San Diego, is currently under consideration by the Chicago City Council.  It would require a mandatory city-wide 15% “set aside” of affordable housing units in all new housing developments of 10 units or greater.  Developers would receive incentives to offset construction costs.  Twenty four aldermen out of fifty support the ordinance although the mayor is opposed.  Lakeview Aldermen Helen Schiller of the 46th Ward and Tom Tunney of the 44th Ward support the ordinance while Aldermen Vy Daley of the 43rd Ward and Ted Matlack of the 32nd Ward are opposed.

Section 8

The federally funded project-based Section 8 program ties housing subsidy to the unit rather than the tenant.  In return for guaranteed operating subsidy, landlords who contract with HUD are required to keep their units affordable.  However, they are not required to stay in the program and may choose to opt out and convert to market rate rents or condominiums.  In Chicago more than 18,000 units are at risk, with approximately 4,100 units at risk in the Near North Side, Lakeview, and Uptown areas.

Illinois State Senate Bill 2329 (Federally Assisted Housing Preservation Act) was signed into law on July 14 and gives legal “right of first refusal” to project-based Section 8 tenants if their building goes up for sale.

Illinois State House Bill 4439 (Source of Income Protection for Housing Voucher Tenants) protects prospective tenants from discrimination by landlords in the voucher-based Section 8 program.  The bill will be re-considered during the fall veto session in November.

The Bush administration’s 2005 budget proposes cuts of more than $4 billion by 2009 in federal Section 8 funding.  In most markets the cost of housing has increased at a much higher rate than HUD’s inflation adjustment, effectively reducing the number of vouchers by failing to fully compensate housing authorities for the actual cost of the voucher.  Many housing authorities may have to back out of current contracts with landlords.

SRO

Besides project-based Section 8 housing, single room occupancy (SRO) buildings comprise the second largest group of affordable units in Lakeview, which has the fifth largest stock of SRO’s in the Chicago community area.  Tenants may be put at risk of homelessness by conversion of the building to market rate housing, by changes in the zoning laws, and by poor management by owners.

Chicago Housing Authority Plan for Transformation

The CHA initiated the ten-year Plan for Transformation in 1999 to meet three objectives: to renew the physical structure of CHA properties, promote self-sufficiency for public housing residents, and reform the administration of the agency.  The CHA will eliminate 13,000 units and rehab or rebuild 25,000 units by 2009.  Nearly all of the high-rise developments (a total of 51 buildings) will be demolished and replaced with mixed-income lower density communities.  Income ratios have been set so that future sites will have no more than 35-40% public housing.  The remaining units will be market rate and affordable housing.

$275 million of the $1.5 billion HUD promised in 1999 has been allocated so far.  If Congressional appropriations continue to shrink, the construction of replacement housing may cease.  Also, current estimates show a severe lack of public housing land available to reach the goal of 25,000 lower density units, with scattered site construction delayed by NIMBY lawsuits filed by non-public housing residents.  Independent research also indicates that demolition may be increasing homelessness as tens of thousands of public housing residents are moved out of buildings scheduled for demolition and forced into homeless shelters or double occupancy with family and friends.

Presbyterian Social Witness Policy:  1989 Statement – PC(USA), p.521

“The General Assembly recognized affordable housing as a problem affecting both low- and moderate-income people.  It called for the entire church to be involved in seeking solutions to the problem through a combination of public and private initiatives including:

1.       Advocating public policy that will:

      Fund acquisition and construction of housing by community development corporations and other non-profit groups;

      Develop new public and public-private initiatives that will increase the availability and affordability of housing for low- and moderate-income people, with a focus on long-term solutions;

 

      Stop the demolition and sale of public housing and fund full operating subsidies and capital grants for modernization and rehabilitation of public housing;

 

      Call for the full funding of legislation for emergency food and shelter efforts, rehabilitation of buildings for shelters, and transitional housing for families with children.

2.       Encouraging congregations, presbyteries, and synods to:

      Explore how resources, including investment funds and property, can be utilized to support the development of affordable, suitable housing for low- and moderate-income people;

Examine zoning ordinances and real estate practices in their communities that affect low-income and racial/ethnic people;

Consider developing long-term housing units with participation of other nonprofit entities; and 
Assist with temporary shelter for homeless people, while seeking permanent solutions to the problem.

Accomplishments

2004 Accomplishments of the Affordable Housing Task Force

Established a regularly-meeting Task Force with more than ten members.

Increased our activity in Lakeview Action Coalition through attendance at regular affordable housing committee meetings and at special LAC events.

Prepared a brochure describing the task force and providing information about affordable housing.

Created an Affordable Housing Task Force page on LVPC’s webpage that contains substantive information and educational material about affordable housing.

Organized and executed, with Joy’s help, LVPC’s first Affordable Housing Sunday.  Used the service to educate members of the congregation about affordable housing issues and to build interest in the Task Force.

Created and implemented an Action Alert system that informs interested members of the congregation and others of specific opportunities to act on Affordable Housing issues.

Prepared educational materials about affordable housing, including affordable housing issues sheet and affordable housing reading list.

Investigated building relationships with other Presbyterian congregations by inviting guest speaker and reaching out to strategically-identified congregations.

Researched the location of existing affordable housing in Lakeview and identified new development projects that contain affordably-priced units.

Drafted an article for the Chimes regarding the issue of affordable housing and Affordable Housing Sunday.

Made special financial gifts to Protestants for the Common Good and Lakeview Action Coalition.

Organized contacts by phone and mail to aldermen and local leaders regarding affordable housing issues.

Mobilized congregational members to attend rally in support of affordable housing set aside ordinance.

Action Alerts!

Would you like to be informed of specific action items that relate to housing in Chicago?  Enter the information below and you will receive periodic notices of Affordable Housing events sponsored by the Social Action Committee of Lake View Presbyterian Church.

Suggested Reading List

The following is a reading list which provides background and insight into the history and current issues concerning affordable housing in Chicago.  If you would like to suggest an addition please send an email it to webmaster@lakeviewpresbyterian.org and it will be considered by the Task Force.

Affordable Housing

The Washington Office of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has developed an advocacy resource on affordable housing. "A Stranger and You Invited Me In: Affordable Housing Advocacy for Presbyterians" includes information on government housing programs as well as simple advocacy suggestions, and features ways that congregations are involved in affordable housing advocacy and the campaigns for a higher minimum wage

Manuel Pastor, Regions That Work: How Cities and Suburbs Can Grow Together.  Offers a new vision for attempts to link cities and suburbs. The authors, using Los Angeles as a primary example, make the case for emphasizing equity, arguing that metropolitan areas must reduce poverty in order to grow and that low-income individuals must make regional connections in order to escape poverty.

 David Rusk, Inside Game/Outside Game: Winning Strategies for Saving Urban America. Argues that only focusing on programs aimed at improving inner-city neighborhoods with antipoverty programs -- playing the "inside game" -- is a losing strategy.  Achieving real improvement requires matching the inside game with a strong "outside game" of regional strategies to overcome growing fiscal disparities, concentrated poverty, and urban sprawl.

http://www.bpichicago.org/rah/rihi_pubs.html Business and Professional People for the Public Interest’s web page has a number of resources that describe the lack of affordable housing in Chicago and programs and legislative initiatives designed to address the problem. 

http://egov.cityofchicago.org/webportal/COCWebPortal/COC_EDITORIAL/
5YrHousingPlanBook_1.pdf  The 2004-2008 Affordable Housing Plan of the City of Chicago’s Department of Housing outlines the City’s strategy to preserve and increase the stock of affordable housing. 

Chicago Public Housing

Adam Cohen & Elizabeth Taylor, American Pharaoh: Mayor Richard J. Daley: His Battle for Chicago and the Nation.  Chronicles Mayor Daley’s rise to power and rule of Chicago. Several portions of the book describe the racial politics behind the construction of Chicago’s public housing.  

Roberta Feldman & Susan Stall, The Dignity of Resistance: Women Residents’ Activism in Chicago Public Housing.  History of resident activism at Wentworth Gardens public housing project.  The book describes the ways in which the residents’ identities as poor African-American women both circumscribe their lives and shape their resistance to government disinvestment in public housing and the threat of demolition.  

Lealan Jones & Lloyd Newman, Our America. Growing out of two award-winning National Public Radio documentaries, the authors tell the stories of living in Chicago's Ida B. Wells housing project. The book evokes the unforgiving world of these two amazing young men and their struggle to survive unrelenting tragedy.   

http://www.thecha.org/transformplan/plan_summary.html  Chicago Housing Authority’s web page contains an overview of the Plan for Transformation, CHA’s plan to redevelop and rehabilitate 25,000 units across Chicago. 

Useful Affordable Housing Links