City/Town: Lake Benton

Legislative District: Senate District 21

Party: Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party

Candidate responses in italics.

Q1: Housing plays a critical role in economic stability, health, and quality of life for individuals and families. However, disparities in housing continue to affect communities of color, people with disabilities, rural communities, and other historically underserved populations. What meaningful actions should be taken to acknowledge, address, and eliminate housing inequities and advance housing opportunities for all Minnesotans?

Housing should be affordable and available to everyone, no matter where they live or who they are. We need to invest in rural housing, repair older homes and bring empty homes back into use. This would help us create more housing for all those being effected by the disparity. Most importantly, we need to address the racial gap in homeownership. this is a problem we face in Southwest MN as well as the rest of state. State programs should be easier for small towns and everyone to use. A small city should not need a full-time grant writer to apply for housing money.

Q2: Supportive housing combines affordable housing with support services that help people who face the most complex challenges to live with stability, autonomy, and dignity. Supportive housing provides better outcomes and is fiscally responsible. What will you do to ensure community members who are unhoused or unstably housed receive the support they need to obtain or keep their own homes?

I support any policy that gives people a safe home and the support they need to stay there. Housing should be paired with services such as mental health care, addiction treatment, job help and other support when needed. We should also focus on preventing homelessness before it happens by helping people who are at risk of losing their homes. I would support funding programs that have a proven record of keep people housed and helping people become stable. For the rural areas, this would also include funding the above services so that they are accessible to all who need it.

Q3: Homeownership is a way to build generational wealth, provide family and household stability, and support community vibrancy. More and more Minnesotans are priced out of owning a home because of rising housing costs, including purchase price, homeowners’ insurance, and property taxes. What steps will you take to increase opportunities for renters and first-time homebuyers to purchase homes, condos, or cooperative ownership models?

We are currently facing a financial cliff for all Minnesotans. The best way forward is to focus on practical solutions and address the issues within our systems to increase opportunities for renters and first-time homebuyers. We should expand down-payment assistance and first-time home buyer programs. We also should make it a policy that the rental amount a family pays should be able to show that they can afford their mortgage and other bills – otherwise, many renters and stuck in a loop of renting vs owning. I also support programs that help people who have historically faced barriers to homeownership

Q4: In the last several years, bipartisan action to streamline building of new homes and apartments has passed in several states, including: allowing for multifamily buildings in select commercial areas, limiting parking requirements, allowing smaller homes on smaller lots, and more homes per lot in residential areas like duplexes, fourplexes, and accessory dwelling units. What reforms do you support to modernize zoning to both enable homes to be more affordable statewide and improve city tax bases?

That includes allowing duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, townhomes, and accessory dwelling units where they make sense. I support allowing larger lots to be divided when that can create more homes. We should also reduce unnecessary parking, lot size, and design rules that make homes more expensive to build. As well as, make the approval process faster and easier when a project already follows the rules. Another focus should be on how these policies affect already built houses from being utilized. At the same time, I believe rural communities should have a voice in how these changes fit their community. The goal should not be to make every Minnesota town look the same. The goal should be to give communities more ways to build the housing they need.

Q5: Despite housing being the largest cost in the average household budget, housing receives only a small fraction of the total state budget at just 0.3%. A lack of ongoing reliable funding for housing in Minnesota’s state budget has resulted in an undersupply of stable homes affordable to our workforce, our elders, and our families. In recent years, a constitutional amendment for housing, which would dedicate revenues from a sales tax increase to housing, has gained momentum at the legislature. What revenue options will you champion to more adequately meet our need for reliable funding for homes we can afford?

I support stable, long-term funding for housing instead of relying on one-time funding whenever the state has extra money and the Our Future Starts at Home constitutional amendment to create a dedicated source of funding for housing.

That money should help build and preserve affordable homes, support homeownership, prevent homelessness, and improve existing homes. I would also support housing bonds and tax credits that help bring more private and local money into housing projects. But we need to make sure Greater Minnesota receives a fair share of this funding. Housing money should also be tracked carefully so taxpayers can see where the money went and what it accomplished. I believe housing is not just a social issue. It is an economic issue. If workers cannot afford to live in a community, businesses cannot grow.

Q6: If you have other housing policy priorities, especially specific to your district’s housing needs, please share them here.

In Southwest Minnesota, housing is an economic development issue.

We have jobs, but we cannot grow our communities if workers cannot find a place to live.

We need more starter homes and workforce housing for teachers, nurses, childcare workers, tradespeople, and other workers our communities need. We also need more senior housing so older residents can stay in their communities and homes can open up for younger families. Many of our homes are older. We need to help homeowners and landlords repair and improve existing homes before we lose them. Small towns also need help turning empty and abandoned homes into safe housing. We need to make state housing programs easier for small communities to use. Finally, housing and infrastructure have to go together. A town cannot build homes if it cannot afford the water, sewer, roads, and other infrastructure needed to support them.