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The House and Senate have released their 2018 bonding bills, and we need your voice! 

The Senate bonding bill:

• $30M – Housing Infrastructure Bonds  (HIB) 
• $5M – General Obligation Bonds (GO)

The House bonding bill:

• $50M – Housing Infrastructure Bonds  (HIB)
• $6.7M – General Obligation Bonds (GO) 

The action alert below is cross-posted from Homes for All endorsing organization, Minnesota Coalition for the Homeless.

The bonding bill in the House includes $50 million for Housing Infrastructure Bonds and $6.7 million in General Obligation bonds for public housing, which is less than half of the Homes for All 2018 ask.

Housing is a critical infrastructure investment for communities throughout Minnesota, and this funding is not enough. As part of the National Housing Week of Action, sponsored by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, Homes for All will host a rally and open mic in the State Capitol Rotunda for residents to share their stories and make our case for urgent investments across the housing continuum, from homelessness prevention to rental housing to homeownership. However, we realize that not everyone is available to attend the rally itself, so we have an action alert for you!

We know that the House bonding figure is NOT ENOUGH – and we need your voice!

Please call your Representative and your Senator and ask them to support the Homes for All bonding request.

**Find who represents you here.

Here is a script to guide your call:

“Hello [your representative]

My name is [your name] and I live in [your city]. I’m calling to ask for your support of the Homes for All bonding request; $140M in bonds for housing and to ask that you encourage House and Senate leaders to do the same. Where we live impacts everything; please support our full ask and make sure affordable housing is a priority across Minnesota.

Thank you.”

Feel free to personalize why safe, quality housing impacts you and your community.

Let Matt Traynor know if you’ve made your call: matt@mnhomelesscoalition.org

Valley shared her story, below, at Homeless Day on the Hill on March 6, 2018. Valley is currently a Resident Representative on Aeon’s Board of Directors. Homes for All MN shares housing stories to to show lawmakers the challenges Minnesotans are facing when it comes to having a safe, stable and affordable home. By sharing your story, you — like Valley — are playing a key part in gaining the support and understanding of elected officials and furthering Homes for All’s mission to advance housing stability for all Minnesotans. Read Valley’s story below, and join her in sharing your story. Thanks for supporting Homes for All!

I know first-hand the importance of affordable homes. For me, having an affordable home provided a new beginning. Without it, I would be back out on the streets. I would still be an addict. I would probably be dead.

I started doing drugs as a teenager. I had come from a good home and was spoiled as an only child. But I was overprotected. So I started venturing out and hanging out with my cousin and her friends. I started getting high at the age of 14 and by 16, I was very active in street life. I had joined a gang, I was involved with prostitution. I was selling, using and stealing drugs and spent some time in prison because of all this.

When I was 18, my parents put me out, so I looked to others for family. I got married twice in two years and had my first child at the age of 21. My relationship with my second husband was very abusive though, and this threw me even deeper into the drug life.

This phase of my life lasted over 30 years, and there were few long periods of sobriety during this time. Within this 30-year period, I had two more children. But I lost custody of all three because of my drug use. I felt like a ghost during these years — like I had no real identity and I was a hindrance to society.

I finally sought help after a night that changed me. I was in the hospital at the time because I was addicted to morphine and would admit myself pretending to be in pain. One evening while I was lying in the hospital bed, I knew that I was dying. Everything in the room became black and cold. I couldn’t physically move my body, so I couldn’t press the nurse’s button for help. When the room suddenly became light and warm, I frantically started pushing the nurse’s button and told the doctor with tears in my eyes that I needed help because I was addicted to morphine and cocaine.

I detoxed in the psychiatric hospital and continued with treatment after being released. Quitting cold turkey was hell, but I’m proud to say that I’ve been clean for 15 years now.

The only problem was that I was homeless. I knew that if I couldn’t find stability that I wouldn’t stay clean, so I stayed at the Harbor Lights Salvation Army and was blessed with a case manager. She helped me apply for social security and connected me with Aeon. I applied to two apartment homes and 30 days later was accepted at The Continental. I’ve been living with Aeon ever since then.

In the last 15 years, I have started to find myself and feel like a person again. I’ve slowly began to see and love myself again, and this helped me want to re-connect with my family. I am blessed to say that I have reunited with all of them.

I’ve also become more active with my community at Aeon. There are still people who are turned down for housing or are forced to live with slumlords because there aren’t enough homes for everyone. This made me want to become active on Aeon’s board and this year I shared my experiences at Homeless Day on the Hill.

It feels good to make my voice heard, but there’s still so much work to do. There are still people in charge who don’t understand the need for affordable homes, and that’s troubling. Without my home, I wouldn’t have had the stability I needed to create this life for myself. And so I continue to look for ways to get involved and to help with this issue in any way that I can.

Homes for All MN is hosting a Tweetchat to 

Don’t worry; it’s simple! A Tweetchat is just a specific time period during which we focus our conversation around a particular topic and hashtag to raise awareness and visibility. On Thursday, April 19, from 12-1 p.m., we’ll join forces to elevate the housing stories of Minnesotans and advance our call for #Homes4AllMN.

Our Tweetchats typically capture more than 100,000 impressions on social media — and this chat is particularly exciting because we’ll be adding our energy to the national #OurHomesOurVoices movement. We know the data is dire — more than 580,000 households paying too much for housing and 9,000 homeless on any given night¹ — but numbers can’t convey the true urgency of the issue in Minnesota. We need lawmakers to hear the stories of individuals and families who struggle with housing stability in their communities.

Will you join us by committing to be on Twitter during the chat and sharing stories from your organization or community?

We’re reaching out to you because we’d like to focus on stories not statistics — and we know you’ve worked closely with your stakeholders, resident or community to gather those stories to advance affordable housing. Would you be willing to share some images, quotes or links to blog posts to elevate those voices to a larger audience — and make the case for #Homes4AllMN?

Here are some questions that we’ll use during the chat to keep the conversation flowing:

• What types of challenges have your residents or community members faced in finding safe, stable, affordable housing?
• Once they’ve secured a home, how have their lives changed?
• How have those changes impacted the wider community?   
• Why should lawmakers invest in #Bonds4Housing and #Homes4AllMN?  

If you can join us as a co-host — actively participate during the Tweetchat and invite those in your network to share their stories as well! — please contact Rose Teng. Again, here are the details!

• What: #OurHomesOurVoicesMN Tweetchat
• Date: Thursday, April 19, 2018
• Time: 12-1 p.m.
• Where: On Twitter with hashtag #OurHomesOurVoicesMN and #Homes4AllMN
• The Homes for All communications team will be tweeting together at Lutheran Social Services after the coalition’s monthly meeting, which begins at 10 a.m. and ends at noon. Feel free to join us after the meeting from noon – 1:00 p.m.! We’ll have snacks 🙂 

Co-hosts

• Minnesota Coalition for the Homeless – @MNHomelessCo
• Minnesota Housing Partnership – @followMHP
• Twin Cities Habitat for Humanity – @tchabitat
• Avenues for Homeless Youth – @AvivoMN
• Solid Ground – @SolidGroundMN
• Avivo – @AvivoMN

__________________________________________________________

¹http://mnhomeless.org/minnesota-homeless-study/homelessness-in-minnesota.php

Tom’s story was shared by Alliance Housing, a Homes for All MN endorsing organization. Homes for All MN collects and shares housing stories to to show lawmakers the challenges Minnesotans are facing when it comes to having a safe, stable and affordable home. By sharing your story, you play a key part in gaining the support and understanding of elected officials and furthering Homes for All’s mission to advance housing stability for all Minnesotans. Join Tom in sharing your story, and thanks for supporting Homes for All!

Tom is 75 years old. He has lived at our rooming house at 2011 Pillsbury Ave. since January of 2015. Before finding a place with Alliance, Tom spent three years living in his car, after five years of camping out in the Minnesota cold. With 30-year-old felony staining his record, finding affordable housing was nearly impossible. Having spent many years in prison, Tom only has seven years of work experience, which provide him with just enough in social security and other benefits to make ends meet. On top of rent, Tom has regular medical expenses that come along with the health conditions he is faced with as he ages.

If it wasn’t for Alliance Housing, Tom would be one of many aging adults who live day to day, not sure of where they will sleep that night. He would be left entering weekly lotteries for a shelter bed, only to end up in a crowded room, on a cot or a mat on the floor.  2011 Pillsbury provides people who are screened out elsewhere a room to call home. Whether it’s just a temporary transition or a permanent residence, our rooming houses and shared duplexes provide housing affordably and safely, regardless of what you did last month or last year.  

60% of the men and women who live at Pillsbury are 55 years or older.  Their bodies are 10-15 years older than their actual age due to past homelessness and un- or under- treated illness.  Soon many will need a few more conveniences, like an elevator, than Pillsbury provides.  Alliance Housing was able to secure $5.1 million in Housing Infrastructure Bonds from MN Housing in 2017.  It will break ground on Minnehaha Commons in summer 2018 – 44 studio apartment homes in a three story building with an elevator.  Rents due to public funding will be low enough for residents on a fixed income to support and there will be rent subsidies to assist.

Homes for All MN is once again asking the MN Legislature to authorize housing infrastructure bonds.  These resources were essential to keep rents at Minnehaha Commons low enough for low wage workers, those on a fixed income and those without incomes.  They will be the lynch pin to build or renovate additional units of housing that can become homes to adults and families with the lowest incomes and many barriers to finding and retaining affordable housing.