🏡💚 This Year in Green Social Housing
December 15th, 2023
‘Tis the season for taking stock of the last year, reflecting on what’s happened, making best-of lists, and gleaning lessons and insights from all the fights that have been won and lost. Far be it from me to offer a 2023 Wrapped for green social housing given how new we (the GND Coalition) and I am to this work, but as I I look back at some of what I’ve seen moving in the social housing landscape this year, here are a few things that stand out to me:
1. We have a social housing law in California
With the signing of SB 555, California passed the first state social housing legislation in the United States. That is a cause for celebration. Yes, it is only a study bill, and much work remains to be done in implementation and seeing that through, but it represents the culmination of an enormous amount of organizing, education, and policy work over the past few years to learn more about the concept of social housing, and how it can and should play a vital role in addressing the housing crisis.
2. The concept of social housing is growing across the country
California is not the only state where social housing is taking off. In fact, the California GND Coalition isn’t even the only GND coalition that has prioritized social housing. The Illinois Green New Deal coalition also has a social housing campaign, and is working with progressive Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson to bring their vision to reality.
Social housing concepts and models are being developed through a number of different local, city, and state initiatives. Seattle passed a ballot measure in February to create a Seattle Social Housing Developer (SSHD), led by the House Our Neighbors Coalition. Cities and states have been looking at a model pioneered by Montgomery County, MD that uses a revolving loan fund for mixed-income housing development. Attempts to replicate this idea are active in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Minnesota, and probably a bunch of other places I haven’t seen. (Interestingly, the Montgomery County model is also somewhat controversial in terms of how much that should be the model for social housing, but I’ll save a deeper dive into those tensions for another time.) Perhaps the biggest initiative is in our own state of California, where Measure ULA is set to put hundreds of millions of dollars from high-end real estate taxes into social housing.
National organizations are also increasingly identifying social housing as a priority, including the Alliance for Housing Justice, the Center for Popular Democracy, and People’s Action’s Homes Guarantee campaign. A national landscape survey of social housing efforts is set to be released in early 2024 — I’ll be sure to share that when it comes out.
The movement for social housing is growing, and it grew a little more this year because…
3. We have a green social housing campaign for the GND Coalition
As a coalition, we made the decision to prioritize a climate & housing justice agenda with a 3-5 year green social housing campaign. This itself is also a cause for celebration: making decisions is hard! Making decisions in a coalition is especially hard!
The next phase will actually be putting this into action. That will require us to build alignment on our vision for green social housing. In some ways, making the connections between climate / environmental justice and social housing is relatively new — since we’ve chosen this campaign, I’ve heard many people (including legislators) say to me. “I’ve heard of social housing, but not green social housing” (and that’s of the minority of people who know what social housing is). Putting the word “green” in front of social housing opens the door to discussions on climate and housing justice, but we’ll need to actually define what we mean when we say green. Inside (or underneath?) the word green is packed a whole range of issues and topics, debates and tensions. We’ll also need to think strategically about the pathways we can use to move toward that vision.
But because these ideas are still emerging and not rigidly defined, we have the opportunity to begin unpacking these terms and asserting the ways that we can simultaneously address the climate and housing crises. And luckily, we’re not alone. More and more groups are prioritizing work on social housing in California, including other statewide formations like Housing Now and the Million Voters Project. And many others (including many of you) have contributed to ideas and campaigns at the intersection of housing and environmental justice in the past.
So, we’ve got our work cut out for us next year. But at the end of 2023, I’m feeling inspired by the work that’s been done so far, and excited for the work to be done in the years to come with all of you. 💚
Some signs we made in 2023
WHAT WE’RE READING
New Tools Are Helping More Tenants Than Ever Fight Eviction and Rent Debt (Jacobin) — I will almost definitely write more about this in 2024, but this gives a great overview of some of the tenant organizing tools and tactics happening in California right now
L.A. is fast-tracking affordable housing. Some say those projects are pushing them out (LA Times) — really great article showing some of the dangers of building affordable housing without guardrails and tenant protections to ensure low-income renters aren’t displaced to make way for new construction
These Californians live in affordable housing. Why did their rent skyrocket? (CalMatters) — I’ll probably write more about this next year too! So much to learn!
Social Housing Goals in State Housing Allocation Plans — A 50-State Survey - Poverty & Race Research Action Council
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This is the last newsletter for the year — see you in 2024!
