$250M initiative aims to create healthier families through affordable housing
28th January 2019 · 0 Comments
By Ryan Whirty
Contributing Writer
With eyes on New Orleans as a potential beneficiary, Enterprise Community Partners Inc., a non-profit based in Maryland, is hoping a new, $250 million initiative aimed at utilizing the power of affordable, quality housing will create healthier families and stronger, more vibrant communities.
By establishing broad, far-reaching partnerships in the community and employing focused, data-driven research, the Health Begins with Homes initiative will provide $250 million in funding over five years “to promote health as a top priority in the development and preservation of affordable homes and to elevate homes as an essential tool for improving resident and community health,” according to a press release announcing the effort last week.
Brian Rahmer, vice president of Health and Housing at Enterprise Community Partners, told The Louisiana Weekly that the Health Begins with Home initiative is rooted in a basic but key aspect of healthy communities and strong families.
“We know that housing in and of itself can be a fundamental determinant of health,” Rahmer said.
Noting “the tremendous burden on the healthcare industry in general” facing the country and its communities, Rahmer added that the Health Begins with Home program can hopefully relieve and ultimately lessen the cost, in economic and structural terms, of creating healthy communities overall.
“Ultimately, we’re looking at opportunities for Enterprise to play a significant role in helping to connect service providers and residents,” he said.
Rahmer stressed the importance of establishing direct, intimate links between Enterprise’s partners and the families who can benefit from the initiative.
“The way that we can engage our community partners with the residents themselves will be a big factor in whether we’ll be successful,” he said.
The Health Begins with Home initiative has the potential to make a substantial positive impact on New Orleans and its residents if community organizations and governmental leaders join and apply Enterprise’s efforts and funding.
The Health Begins with Home program will focus on four key areas:
• Conducting research to establish and apply the connection between quality, stable, affordable homes and healthier results for residents;
• Awarding grants to area non-profits to fund housing community health efforts and to strengthen housing-and-health care partnerships;
• Providing technical assistance to align resources with opportunity, employ data-driven decision-making, highlight best practices and advocate for smart policies;
• Developing and preserving health, well-designed and affordable homes by connecting capital from healthcare organizations, institutional investors and social impact funds.
Enterprise Community Partners has established coordinated efforts in 11 cities or geographic regions across the country, including a Gulf Coast office based in New Orleans, which opened soon after the devastating 2005 hurricanes.
Monica Gonzalez, the senior program director for Enterprise’s Gulf Coast office, said she and her staff have already established connections on both a state and local level with healthcare providers, government officials, city development authorities, social-service offices and non-profits in and around New Orleans.
Gonzalez stressed the importance of examining and defining such criteria as geophysics and green technology as a way toward healthier families and communities.
She said that as the Health Begins with Home initiative launches, she already sees substantial potential benefits the effort could have on the New Orleans area. Gonzalez said that by working with such organizations as the American Diabetes Association to study and employ links between affordable, green housing opportunities and healthy outcomes for residents, real progress is already being made by Enterprise and its partners in the Crescent City and beyond.
“We’re really making a connection between health and housing, and we’re seeing how that can really make a positive impact on our work,” Gonzalez said.
Mary Ayala, program officer of National Initiatives at Enterprise Community Partners, told The Louisiana Weekly that if targeted efforts in New Orleans and other regions are successful, “hopefully we can replicate that success across the country.”
Cashauna Hill, executive director of the Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center, welcomed the launch of Enterprise’s Health Begins with Home program, saying such efforts could absolutely benefit New Orleans.
“We’re encouraged to see this initiative because we understand better health and life outcomes as one of the primary benefits of policies, like the Smart Housing Mix, that reduce segregation,” she said.
Hill added that one facet of New Orleans’ improving residential base that could be boosted by the Health Begins with Home initiative are working families trying to find mixed-income housing in more affluent, and healthier, neighborhoods.
“We know that ensuring that luxury buildings include some units affordable to the average worker will mean opening up some of the more exclusive neighborhoods in this city, which also happen to have some of the highest life expectancies and best access to jobs and amenities,” she said.
Mayor LaToya Cantrell was an advocate for affordable-housing initiatives during her time serving on the City Council. Requests for comments to Cantrell’s office for this story were not returned by press time.
This article originally published in the January 28, 2019 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
