MHP presented the Yes to Invest in Housing: $2B in 2022 in the House Housing Committee. Executive Director Anne Mavity laid out the case for investing $1B to build and preserve more homes and $1B to provide rental assistance and down payment assistance. Testifiers included Bukata Hayes, Vice President of Racial and Health Equity at BlueCross BlueShield of Minnesota, Johnathan Weinhagen, CEO of MPLS Regional Chamber, and Bret Domstrand, Principal at Lakeville Area Public Schools. A recording of the hearing is available here. The Yes to Invest presentation was followed by a hearing of the Bring it Home bill, which creates a statewide rental assistance program for all cost burden households at or below 50 percent of area median income. MHP is a member of the Bring it Home campaign

In the A Plan to Solve Minnesota’s Housing Crisis, the House DFL proposes investing $1.8 billion in 2022 to build and preserve homes, provide rental assistance, to fund homebuyer preparation and downpayment assistance programs, and build and rehab homeless shelters. The Yes to Invest in Housing: $2B in 2022 effort influenced this announcement. Endorse the Yes to Invest effort to continue pressuring lawmakers to invest $2B for housing this session.

MHP offered an overview of the state of affordable housing in Minnesota during the Homes for All Coalition’s agenda  in the House Housing Committee. Video available here.

Source of Income Protections was heard in the House Judiciary Committee. Check out MHP’s SOI Protections factsheet to learn more. Endorse SOI Protections here.

Any day now, Minnesota Management and Budget will release the February forecast for the State of Minnesota and Governor Walz will have the opportunity to revise his Supplemental Budget.

We urge the Governor to support $300 million for Emergency Rental Assistance to ensure housing stability for Minnesota families.

RentHelpMN closed on January 28, 2022, with only three days' notice. Yet, Minnesotans continue to suffer from the ongoing pandemic in direct and indirect ways, and thousands still quality for and need emergency rental assistance to pay their rent bills and remain in their homes. 

The Twin Cities consistently ranks among the best places to live in the country but it also tops another list. In 2019, 24/7 Wall St. ranked them as the fourth worst metropolitan area for Black Americans. Part of this is due to housing disparities.

According to a NAACP report, three-quarters of white families own homes compared to one-quarter of Black families. Zillow found it to be the largest racial gap in the country.

The University of Minnesota's Mapping Prejudice project asserts Minneapolis was not particularly segregated before 1910. But a shift occurred in many neighborhoods through racial covenants—legal contracts embedded in property deeds to prevent people who weren't white from buying or occupying land.

"Redlining" was the practice of outlining areas with sizable Black populations in red ink on maps as a warning to mortgage lenders, effectively isolating Black people in areas that would suffer lower levels of investment than their white counterparts. (Brookings Institution)

As Black History Month comes to a close, MHP presents a social media series that does a deeper dive on the history these discriminatory housing practices in Minnesota, and how they have had ripple effects we continue to see in our housing research (and our communities) still today. Follow us or look out for the series on Facebook and Twitter for more.

*This map data was compiled by the Mapping Prejudice Project and shows the location of racial covenants recorded in Hennepin County between 1910 and 1955. Ehrman-Solberg, Kevin; Petersen, Penny; Mills, Marguerite; Delegard, Kirsten; Mattke, Ryan. (2020). Racial Covenants in Hennepin County. Retrieved from the Data Repository for the University of Minnesota.

Join Minnesota Coalition for the Homeless online March 9th-11th for a three-day event to advance key policy priorities that aid in the effort to end homelessness. Every year Hundreds of community members convene for a (virtual) day of advocacy, meetings with lawmakers, committee hearings, stories of impact and more. Homeless Day on the Hill is a free event. Read more here.

NLIHC has just released "Implementing Fact-Specific Proxy in ERA Programs: Key Considerations and Lessons Learned." The report examines the use of fact-specific proxies in U.S. Department of the Treasury Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) programs

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated housing insecurity for millions of households, especially for low-income households and people of color. The January 2022 data snapshot presents statewide indicators of projected need for emergency housing assistance. This data shapshot includes county-level data provided by the State of Minnesota relating to applications for Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) distributed by the program RentHelpMN. Read the report here. A complete copy of data, in excel, is provided here.

Check out MHP's YouTube Channel for webinars on such issues as the 2022 Legislative Session, Zoning Reform, Source of Income Protection, and using ARPA fiscal recovery funds for housing! 

On Feb. 17, the U.S. Senate passed a Continuing Resolution to fund the government through March 11, 2022.  The U.S. House of Representatives passed the Continuing Resolution Feb. 8.  This gives Congress an additional three weeks to negotiate the outstanding funding bills for certain agencies and has averted a Feb. 18 federal government shutdown.

"We all want kids to learn, adults to work, and more Minnesotans to become self sufficient - none of which is possible without stable housing. The House DFL’s effort to reduce costs and create more homes is a great start and I’ll be helping at the federal level." —Rep Dean Phillips

On February 14, MHP participated in a Valentine’s Day-themed day of action, encouraging members of Congress to support housing investments in a scaled down Build Back Better Act. Thank you to Congresswoman Betty McCollum (Twitter statement) and Congressman Dean Phillips (Facebook statement), Twitter statement) for showing their support for housing as part of this event. 

Read more and apply here.

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