Welcome to CLPHA's Press Room
CLPHA experts welcome interview requests from print, radio, television, and online reporters and are happy to provide their insights on issues of public housing and related legislation and policy.
For media inquiries, please contact:
David Greer
Director of Communications
(202) 550-1381 or dgreer@clpha.org.
*Please let us know if you are working on deadline.
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To view all of CLPHA's press statements, click here.
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December 22, 2020
About the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities
The Council of Large Public Housing Authorities is a national non-profit organization that works to preserve and improve public and affordable housing through advocacy, research, policy analysis and public education. CLPHA’s 70 members represent virtually every major metropolitan area in the country. Together they manage 40 percent of the nation’s public housing program; administer more than a quarter of the Housing Choice Voucher program; and operate a wide array of other housing programs. Learn more at clpha.org and on Twitter @CLPHA .
About CLPHA’s Housing Is Initiative
The Housing Is Initiative, led by the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities, helps build a future where sectors work together to improve life outcomes. Housing stability is a critical first step to improve life outcomes for low-income children, families, and seniors; CLPHA’s Housing Is Initiative is based on the premise that sectors can better meet needs when they work together. Housing Is establishes, broadens, and deepens efforts to align affordable housing, education, and health systems to produce positive, long-term results. Learn more at housingis.org and on Twitter @housing_is.
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(202) 550-1381
For Immediate Release
December 11, 2020 |
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(WASHINGTON, D.C.) December 11, 2020 – The Council of Large Public Housing Authorities (CLPHA) called on the incoming Biden-Harris administration to address poverty, homelessness, and racial injustice by investing in public and affordable housing. These recommendations are among 52 proposals that CLPHA provided in a transition document to the incoming Biden-Harris administration.
“The Biden-Harris ticket’s decisive victory is a moral mandate to address the chronic problems of poverty, racial inequity, and housing insecurity,” said Sunia Zaterman, executive director of the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities. “CLPHA’s 52 recommendations are a roadmap to achieve these goals.”
Expanding the Housing Choice Voucher program is one of CLPHA’s top-line recommendations and a key plank in the Biden-Harris plan. Currently only one in four low-income households that are eligible receive housing assistance due to limited funding. We know that housing stability is central to economic mobility for low-income Americans, even more so during the pandemic and economic downturn.
Recapitalizing the public housing portfolio is also a top priority for CLPHA. "A capital backlog of $70 billion is putting the health and wellness of low-income seniors and children at risk," Zaterman said. “We call on the Biden administration to develop and implement a 10-year roadmap to ensure the long-term sustainability of this public asset.”
CLPHA also calls for expanding the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit and increasing operational flexibilities to better meet local housing needs. “These recommendations would result in significant investment in eradicating poverty and dismantling systemic racism,” said Zaterman.
CLPHA founded the Housing Is initiative to develop cross-sector resources of education and health five years ago. The Housing Is Initiative is calling for expanded coordination between federal agencies including the departments of Health and Human Services, Education, and Housing and Urban Development, and increased funding for research and data sharing.
Over the past four years, the Trump administration has proposed or enacted egregious rules that disenfranchised marginalized people, such as immigrants and transgender Americans. CLPHA urges swift reversals of these dangerous rules.
“The Biden-Harris administration has a real opportunity to improve the lives of low-income Americans. CLPHA looks forward to working with the administration to make it happen," Zaterman concluded.
About the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities
About CLPHA’s Housing Is Initiative
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(202) 550-1381
For Immediate Release
December 10, 2020 |
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(Washington, D.C.) December 10, 2020 – The Council of Large Public Housing Authorities (CLPHA) is proud to support the nomination of Congresswoman Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio) to be the 17th Secretary of the Housing and Urban Development Department. CLPHA Executive Director Sunia Zaterman released the following statement:
"Congresswoman Fudge is a longtime champion of affordable housing, urban revitalization, and infrastructure investment. She has demonstrated her leadership as a mayor, as a Member of Congress, and as the head of the Congressional Black Caucus. She understands that racial and economic inequities are deeply rooted, particularly in our housing systems, and that working across sectors is imperative. Her many years of work on economic justice issues such as food insecurity and education access can bring much-needed leadership to aligning systems and services to better meet the needs of low-income Americans. We look forward to working with Congresswoman Fudge in her role as HUD Secretary to address the growing need for COVID emergency rental assistance and safe, affordable housing."
About the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities |
The Columbus Metropolitan Library’s Martin Luther King Branch opened this month in Columbus’s Near East Side neighborhood. The new library is a result of Partners Achieving Community Transformation (PACT), a partnership between Columbus Metropolitan Housing Authority, Ohio State University, and other local stakeholders created in 2010 to transform and revitalize 800 acres of Near East Side.
The Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) broke ground on Oso Apartments, a 48-unit apartment complex in Chicago’s Albany Park. Financed with help from $10 million in CHA RAD funds, 100 percent of Oso Apartments’ units will be affordable rental housing for individuals and families.
The Housing Opportunities Commission of Montgomery County and partners cut the ribbon on The Lindley, a 200-unit high-rise in Chevy Chase, MD. The opening of The Lindley constitutes a net increase of 22 units of affordable housing in the neighborhood. You can watch a time-lapse video of The Lindley’s construction here.
The long-awaited Opportunity Atlas, published today by the Census Bureau in collaboration with researchers at Harvard and Brown, got top billing on today’s homepage of the New York Times’ data-driven digital property The Upshot. “Detailed New National Maps Show How Neighborhoods Shape Children for Life,” includes the new interactive mapping tool, some of the project’s main findings, and examples of the mobility work that public housing authorities are currently doing, and plan to do, with the data. In addition to quoting Raj Chetty, one of the project’s researchers, authors Emily Badger and Quoctrung Bui feature quotes and examples from CLPHA members Greg Russ, Executive Director of the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority, Andrew Lofton, Executive Director of the Seattle Housing Authority and Andria Lazaga also of SHA who each discussed how PHAs are using the data as part of their Creating Moves to Opportunity (CMTO) work.
Additional news coverage of the Opportunity Atlas includes an NPR segment during today’s Morning Edition broadcast that features interviews with Chetty and local officials in Charlotte, NC, who intend to use the data to shape future policy decisions.
Read the article and use the interactive maps on the NYT website and listen to the Morning Edition story on NPR’s site.
On August 9, HUD sent the 2017 Worst Case Housing Needs Report to Congress, providing national data and analysis of critical problems facing low-income renting families throughout the nation. The report, which is HUD's 16th in a longstanding series, chronicles an increase in severe housing problems, with the number of households considered to have worst case housing needs jumping from 7.72 million in 2013 to 8.3 million in 2015. HUD also reports that, since 2007, the U.S. has seen a 41 percent increase in severe housing problems, and a 66 percent increase since 2001. The Worst Case Housing Needs Report defines households with worst case needs as very low-income renters who do not receive government housing assistance and who paid more than one-half of their income for rent, lived in severely inadequate conditions, or both.
Using data from the 2015 American Housing Survey, HUD found that the economic benefits of an improving national economy are not reaching the lowest-income renter households and that overall severe housing problems are on the rise. The report acknowledges a large shift from homeownership to renting as playing a major role in the increase of worst case housing needs, noting that, "modest gains in household incomes were met with rising rents, shrinking the supply of affordable rental housing stock in an increasingly competitive market."
You can view the 2017 Worst Case Housing Needs Report by clicking here.
From the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority's website:
Last week, residents of Glendale and Minnehaha Townhomes joined MPHA staff in a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) study evaluating the impact of access to childcare and educational services among public housing families. This research may help inform future, more in-depth research on the importance and efficacy of onsite educational services among public housing developments and could encourage funding for such programming at the national level.
The study is evaluating six sites across the United States covering urban and rural communities, various regions, and levels of onsite or co-located childcare and educational services. Of the six sites in the study, two are MPHA public housing developments: Glendale Townhomes (with onsite, free childcare) and the Minnehaha Townhomes (which doesn’t have any educational services onsite).
The study is being conducted by Child Trends and Summit Consulting. Together, the group is interviewing dozens of families with at least one child under 13 years-old about their access to, arrangements for, preferences on, and use of financial support for childcare.
“We want to understand what it’s like for caregivers with children living in public housing communities to find and use childcare This critical support can be hard to obtain, even for families with ample resources due to unreliable transportation, concerns about the cost of care, mismatches between a program’s hours and caregivers’ work or school schedules, as well as the challenge of finding childcare options that they trust or that align with their cultural values,” said Ashley Hirilall, Site Visit Lead at Child Trends. “Our study explores how co-locating childcare services within public housing communities could make it easier for families and children to access these opportunities that aligns with their needs and preferences.”
With a location in the Glendale neighborhood—even sharing a building with MPHA staff offices—Parents in Community Action, Inc.’s (PICA) Head Start program offers low-income families childcare at no cost. This program intends to give low-income kids a “head start,” preparing them for elementary school with early childhood education focusing on cognitive, physical, and social-emotional development. For MPHA, this type of onsite educational service is unique to Glendale. Although a majority of MPHA’s families are housed through scattered-site housing (single family homes located throughout Minneapolis), Glendale has served an estimated 2,000 families over its 70-year history.
The Minnehaha Townhomes, located in the East Nokomis neighborhood, exclusively serve families referred by Hennepin County’s Coordinated Entry program. Compared to the Glendale Townhomes, it is only a fraction of the size, offering 16 units as opposed to Glendale’s 184. Although the Minnehaha Townhomes don’t offer onsite childcare or other educational services, residents do receive case management services through the county and other partners, have an onsite playground, and have access to ample green space.
“This study is vitally important and will give HUD the evidence it needs to shape policies to improve availability of federally supported childcare—policies that are informed by families that live in public housing,” said Sarah Cunningham, Project Director at Summit Consulting. “We are so grateful to the MPHA and PICA teams, and most of all the community members for taking the time to share their experiences, needs, and preferences for childcare, to improve HUD’s understanding and inform policies to advance stability and economic mobility.”
This study could prompt more research on the need for onsite educational services among public housing developments and aid in advocating for funding for programming. For MPHA, this qualitative data will provide a window into the impact of the Glendale area’s services on its residents and inform future partnerships and investments. Child Trends and Summit Consulting hope to have the study wrapped up by early 2025.
The agency is already very familiar with the intertwined nature of housing and childhood education. Knowing that safe and stable housing is the most significant out-of-school factor for predicting student success, MPHA pioneered a partnership with City of Minneapolis, Hennepin County, Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS), and the YMCA of the North to address homelessness with Stable Homes Stable Schools. This program has helped secure stable housing for more than 1,500 families since its 2019 inception.
From the Seattle Times:
Lexie Lee chose an apartment on the top floor. Hundreds of feet off the ground. Hopeful that it would be high enough to deter someone from breaking in.
Then, finally, she might feel safe.
“Even living on the fifth floor, I feel like Spider-Man is going to come through and open this door sometimes,” she said, motioning to her glass balcony door on a sunny day in May.
Lee, a thin, dark-haired 20-year-old, is learning to feel secure on her own after several attempts at living with foster families and a childhood she said included years of abuse. But thanks to a unique federal housing program for young adults exiting foster care, she’s able to take this journey without fear of the near-threat of becoming homeless, as many former foster youth face.
The Foster Youth to Independence program is offered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to help pay rent for young adults between the ages of 18 and 24 who are exiting foster care without a place to live — the situation for almost a quarter of Washington’s foster youth.
HUD officials recently announced a one-time investment of nearly $13 million this year that housing authorities can use to grow their funds for foster youth.
Seattle has been one of the leaders in using this money, which is distributed in the form of vouchers — essentially guaranteeing to a landlord that the government will pay a portion of rent. HUD officials highlighted the region’s success by announcing the investment at an apartment building in Yesler Terrace owned by the Seattle Housing Authority.
Seattle Housing Authority has issued 70 Foster Youth to Independence housing vouchers since its program launched at the beginning of 2022, according to Kerry Coughlin, spokesperson for the authority. Currently, 42 of those vouchers are in use, while 28 are assigned to people looking for places to apply their voucher.
The authority says that it has an additional 93 vouchers left to give out for this population.
“These are folks who have just had the deck stacked against them from the get-go,” said Sarah Birkebak, special purpose voucher programs manager for Seattle Housing Authority.
Read the Seattle Times' article "Seattle Housing Authority program helps foster youth avoid homelessness."
From the Cambridge Housing Authority's website:
CHA’s Resident Services department has taken a pioneering step lately towards digital inclusion with the recent launch of a specialized intergenerational computer training and internet access program for senior residents being served at select CHA properties. Thanks to a generous grant from Google, this initiative has opened doors to a world of digital opportunities for the elderly members of our community.
The program’s success is evident in the enthusiasm shown by residents, leading to the implementation of two consecutive six-week training sessions. Each session comprised 12 workshops facilitated by proficient upper-level Work Force Program youth interns. These interns, equipped with expertise from the Tech Goes Home platform, collaborated closely with the Work Force’s Career Development Specialist, James Pierre (pictured above), and the Service Coordinator at Millers River Apartments, Yaw Adjei-Koranteng. Together, they meticulously crafted modules tailored to the unique needs of senior residents who may have limited experience with computers and the internet.
Previously, a successful cycle of this program ran at Manning Apartments in Central Square, Cambridge.
The trainings were designed to cover the essentials of internet navigation, while also emphasizing the practical applications and security measures crucial for safe online experiences. Recognizing the importance of personalized attention, each cohort was limited to a maximum of 12 seniors. This ensured that every participant received the guidance they needed to thrive in the digital landscape.
Upon completion of the program, each graduate was presented with a new Chromebook, generously provided by Tech Goes Home. These devices serve as gateways to continued learning and connectivity, empowering seniors to stay engaged and connected in today’s digital world.
Feedback from participants has been overwhelmingly positive, with residents expressing gratitude for the newfound knowledge and confidence gained through the program. Many noted significant improvements in their ability to utilize the internet and the Google suite of programs effectively.
Through initiatives like CHA’s computer literacy program, supported by Google and other partners, we are bridging the digital divide and empowering seniors to embrace technology with confidence. As we celebrate the achievements of our recent graduates, we look forward to continuing our mission of digital inclusion for all members of our community.
From the Housing Authority of Baltimore City's press release:
Today, the Housing Authority of Baltimore City (HABC) joined with elected officials, McCormack Baron Salazar (MBS), development and community partners, and residents to celebrate the completion of Phase 1 of Perkins Square, formerly known as Perkins Homes, providing 103 new mixed-income housing units.
Perkins Phase 1 is part of the mixed-use, multi-phase redevelopment of the Perkins, Somerset, Oldtown (PSO) Transformation that is made possible with the support of $40 million in Choice Neighborhood Implementation grants awarded to HABC since 2018. The total PSO redevelopment includes one-for-one replacement of the Perkins public housing units interspersed with workforce and market rate units.
The Perkins Square community will encompass 796 of the total 1,651 new mixed-income units being developed across the entire PSO. MBS is the lead development partner for Perkins Square, working in concert with Beatty Development and Cross Street Partners.
“Providing affordable and low-income housing is critical for our communities,” said Janet Abrahams, HABC’s President and CEO. “HABC, along with its partners, has collaboratively demonstrated a commitment to neighborhood revitalization through redevelopments like Perkins Square.”
“We thank Mayor Scott and HABC for the opportunity to support the transformation of Perkins where families and children may thrive,” said Vince Bennett, President, McCormack Baron Salazar. “One of the greatest needs in our cities is high quality affordable housing and through public-private partnerships and leveraging public resources and combined with private debt and equity, the choice neighborhoods program can help achieve great outcomes and support community resiliency.”
The community includes a mix of replacement public housing, additional affordable housing, and market-rate rental housing. Phase 1 has accessibility and vision/hearing-impaired units within a range of one, two, and three-bedroom apartments. Amenities and features include internet access, community kitchen, in-unit washer and dryer, on-site leasing center and supportive services office, computer lab, a fitness center, underground parking, and a playground.
As part of the ribbon-cutting celebration, HABC, MBS, and partners hosted a block party to welcome back Perkins Square residents. The festivities included guided tours of common areas and staged units, food trucks, music, games for all ages, and vending tables for community partners and local businesses to provide information and resources. Participants included state and local officials, development team partners and representatives from the Perkins Tenant Council, City Springs School and residents.
Phase 1 is one of nine phases for Perkins Square. On its heels, will be the completion of Perkins Phase 2, set for delivery in Fall 2024. That phase will feature 156 mixed-income rental units, with 76 set aside for legacy Perkins residents.
Originally built in 1942, Perkins Homes had outlived its useful life such that its complete demolition was necessary. Construction for Phase 1 of Perkins Square began August 2022, led by Commercial Construction, a local minority led firm.
Kevin Johnson, CEO of Commercial Construction, said "This project has been a beacon of opportunity, putting Baltimoreans to work and opening doors for numerous MWBE firms. We are proud that our team prioritized local minority partnerships, reflecting our commitment to community and economic empowerment. The quality of construction goes beyond physical structures—it respects and uplifts the dignity of every resident, setting a new standard for what affordable housing should represent.”
The project, designed by Hord Coplan Macht, has received the 2022 American Institute of Architects Chesapeake Bay Chapter Honor Award, the 2022 American Institute of Architects Maryland Chapter Unbuilt Award, and the Maryland Building Industry Association Award for exceptional affordable housing design.
Visit the PSO Transformation page for more information about the entire project.
From NBC 4 Los Angeles:
Vanessa Bryant joined Nickerson Gardens residents Monday for a ribbon cutting ceremony to celebrate the opening of refurbished gym at the public housing community in Watts.
Nickerson Gardens, managed by the Housing Authority of Los Angeles, was chosen for the project by the widow of Kobe Bryant and the Lakers. The decision was made, in part, because it's the former site of the Boys and Girls Club where Kobe Bryant hosted his "Mamba League" youth basketball program.
"The site is a special location for my family," Vanessa Bryant said. "He used basketball to teach life lessons to young boys and girls.
"It serves as a reminder to all the boys and girls who play here that they are loved."