Action Alert: Tell your lawmakers to do their job and pass housing bills
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- Created: Monday, 22 June 2020 11:40
- Written by Andy Birkey
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Minnesota Housing Partnership joins Minnesotans in mourning the murder of George Floyd, and demands justice for him, his family, and his community.
MHP’s work to ensure that everyone has a home derives from the value that every human deserves dignity, respect, kindness and love. Racial disparities in housing are not accidental nor are they isolated. Redlining, racial covenants, and other denials of housing opportunity are part of the same systems of brutality that led to George Floyd’s death. The murder of George Floyd compounds the trauma felt acutely, and every day, by Black and Brown Minnesotans. This trauma is only being exacerbated by disparities in illness and death from COVID-19. The urgency of this moment cannot be overstated. These systems of oppression must be dismantled.
The pain and outrage we feel for the murder of George Floyd is a reflection of the continuation of centuries of injustice, inhumanity, and persistent institutional and systemic racism. MHP joins advocates and organizations seeking justice for George Floyd, and an end to systems that create and perpetrate disparity and brutality.
Anne Mavity, Executive Director, Minnesota Housing Partnership
An emergency grant from the Minnesota Housing Partnership (MHP) will help families in Lincoln, Lyon, Redwood, Cottonwood, Jackson, Nobles, Rock, Murray and Pipestone Counties keep their homes. The $50,000 grant, secured by MHP from the National Low-Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC), will go toward emergency rental assistance support for families affected by the COVID-19 pandemic who have lost income, or are otherwise unable to meet rent obligations, are at-risk of homelessness, or currently homeless. Greater Minnesota Housing Fund has agreed to act as fiscal agent for the grant as part of its statewide COVID-19 emergency rental assistance fund, and United Community Action Partnership, Inc., a social services nonprofit that serves southwestern Minnesota, will get the funds to people that need it most.
“The Worthington area is so hard hit by COVID-19 and we want to make sure we are helping to prevent homelessness of workers who are sick or are finding themselves without income for significant stretches of time and can’t pay their rent,” said Anne Mavity, executive director of Minnesota Housing Partnership. “We want to make sure resources are there as quickly as possible while we work with State legislative leaders to pass much needed housing assistance to help more families here in southwestern Minnesota and around the state.”
“This public health crisis has expanded a need that was already very acute,” said Angela Larson, Family Service Director at UCAP. “This grant will help families in our community retain their homes in the short term while leaders look for solutions over the course of the pandemic and its economic and housing impacts.”
For residents in Lincoln, Lyon, Redwood, Cottonwood, Jackson, Nobles, Rock, Murray and Pipestone Counties seeking rental assistance, contact the UCAP office closest to you or call the corporate office in Marshall, MN at 507-537-1416 to be connected to UCAP’s dedicated staff members. Not all people may be eligible for services, as eligibility differs for each program and all assistance is subject to availability of funding.
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