Where you live determines so much about your overall quality of life. For many Latinos, housing segregation limits their access to quality education, healthcare, and opportunities and often limits them in what they can do for employment. In the city of San Francisco, Calif. (15.3% Latino population), city planners have been seeking input from residents on a new 130-unit housing project in the historic Mission area. According to CBS News, San Francisco is the fourth most expensive city to live in in the United States. In order to reduce health disparities, it is critical to address inequities in programs, practices, and policies. Join our site, connect with others, and get involved. The rising costs for housing (the median home price there is $820,000) have simply ...
In March 2016, President Barack Obama launched the Opportunity Project calling for technologists, local governments, and community groups to harness technology and innovation to expand access to opportunity for all Americans (17.6% Latino). The result? Non-profits, companies, and students built 29 new digital tools-during an 8-week software development sprint-using federal and local data to help communities access and navigate information to empower communities to solve problems in their everyday lives, such as affordable housing, quality schools, and jobs. Latinos often face social, environmental, and political barriers when accessing everyday opportunities, like healthy schools and safe places to walk and play. Equitable opportunity and easy-to-navigate information are ...
What happens when people get "priced out" of the homes they've lived in for decades? People like Luis Granados step up. Granados, Christopher Gil, and other leaders of the nonprofit Mission Economic Development Agency (MEDA) didn't stand by when a tech boom in San Francisco’s Mission District brought in higher-priced homes and threatened to push out lower-income families. They embarked on a mission to create 100% affordable housing in the area.
The rising housing costs in San Francisco
Since 1973, the Mission Economic Development Agency (MEDA) offers free financial services to lower-income families in San Francisco’s Mission District, a 30% Latino neighborhood where most rent their homes, said Christopher Gil, the group’s senior content marketing manager. The ...
A new KaBOOM! playground has just arrived to Marshall Meadows, an affordable housing community in San Antonio, Texas. With the help of 200 volunteers from Foresters, The Housing Community Services, Inc. and a team from KaBOOM!, kids living in and near Marshall Meadows now have a new place to play. Plans for the project started with a design day in June 2014, according to a news release. As part of the playground design process, children were asked to draw their dream playground. Designers used their drawings as inspiration for the new playscape. The playground is expected to serve more 25,000 children. "A community's well-being starts with a child's well-being," said Tony Garcia, president and CEO, of Foresters. "Playgrounds are important to communities, providing an open ...
Financial stress has been linked to numerous negative health concerns. The stress felt from financial pressure can affect appetites and sleep patterns and greatly impact overall physical and mental well-being. One of the most pressing financial stressors people deal with stems from paying for housing. IN rural areas, the difficulties of finding affordable housing is often exacerbated. However, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently invested over $74 million to build and preserve affordable rural rental housing for families across the country. In order to reduce health disparities, it is critical to address inequities in programs, practices, and policies. Join our site, connect with others, and get involved. “[The] USDA's multi-family housing program has ...
When the world shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic, jobs went virtual and educational institutions switched to online learning. Many people struggled to financially to pay for Internet to meet these demands. In response to the need for affordable internet access, the government established the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program (EBB Program) to temporarily help low-income households pay for broadband service through reimbursement and discounts. For a long-term solution to the internet service affordability problem, Congress created the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) to replace the EBB Program in late 2021. Funding for the program ended at the beginning of 2024, and the program provided its final month of assistance in April 2024, leaving thousands of ...
Latinos are the nation's largest minority, making up 18.5% of the population. This dynamic population is also helping fuel the red-hot housing market, even amid COVID-19. "The number of Hispanic-homeowner households rose by more than 700,000 to nearly 9 million in 2020, according to Census Bureau data compiled by the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals, an industry group. Those gains marked the biggest one-year increase in data on Hispanic homeownership going back two decades," the Wall Street Journal reported in April 2021. Let's explore the this surge in the Latino housing market, challenges, and the future of housing.
What's Causing the Surge in the Latino Housing Market?
The Latino homeownership rate has "increased more during the past several years ...
Close to 40% of Americans struggle to meet the rising costs of housing, and Latinos especially face hardship in affordable housing as the pandemic worsened inequities, says a new report. As the economy recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic, Americans are struggling with soaring home and rent prices, affordability issues, and the risk of eviction and foreclosure, according to The State of the Nation’s Housing 2021 from Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies. Latinos and other people of color are impacted on a greater scale. "Millions of households that lost income during the shutdowns are behind on their housing payments and on the brink of eviction or foreclosure," the report states. "A disproportionately large share of these at-risk households are renters with ...
California had an affordable housing crisis well before COVID-19. Now the pandemic is having a devastating impact on housing and homelessness. State leaders are continuing work to make a difference. For example, California Gov. Gavin Newsom's 2021-22 State Budget proposal has many short-term investments specifically targeted at housing and homelessness. "The state continues to make progress in addressing the housing availability and affordability crisis that has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic," the Governer's Office stated. "In addition to the $500 million for infill infrastructure, the Budget also proposes an additional $500 million in low-income housing tax credits to support low-income housing development. "The Administration is streamlining and reorganizing ...
