The AHF Healthy Housing Foundation provides affordable housing to low-income individuals including families with children and those previously unsheltered or homeless. Learn about the foundation’s scope and meet some of the people who make it all work on this week’s episode. AHF’s Housing is a Human Right division carries out a multi-pronged, community-based approach: Protect tenants through rent control and other tenant protections; Preserve existing affordable housing, not demolish it to build luxury housing; and Produce new affordable housing through the adaptive reuse of existing buildings and cost-effective new construction.
Housing as a Public Health Mission
How AHF is helping change the conversation around housing and human rights
GUEST BIO:
Dominique Eastman is the Regional Property Operations Manager for the Healthy Housing Foundation.
Susie Shannon is the Policy Director for Housing is a Human Right.
Mark Dyer is the Vice President of Operations for Corporate Real Estate and Housing.
CORE TOPICS + DETAILS:
[2:03] - Finding Rooms for Those Who Need Them
Understanding housing as a human right
AHF has recently been buying up vacant properties for the purpose of adaptive reuse—taking existing buildings and infrastructure and converting it into affordable housing for people who are low-income or unhoused. AHF also advocates on behalf of that housing, helping ensure that people are moved into housing quickly so they can begin to experience a stable environment.
[4:09] - Getting Strategic with Building Purchasing
About AHF’s strategy for buying living spaces
AHF focuses on large, empty older buildings—including SROs or vacant residential hotel buildings. There are approximately 10,000 vacant rooms in Los Angeles, and AHF focuses on finding them, acquiring them, improving them, and providing them as housing for unhoused people.
[7:52] - Advocacy First
How AHF is taking steps to protect unhoused or low-income people
AHF’s advocacy efforts relating to rent burdened or unhoused people have included running a national campaign to lift the ban on rent control. They’ve also released a campaign of full-page ads in the LA Times highlighting vacant buildings and how they could be used to house people in need.
[18:55] - How to Get Involved with AHF’s Housing Efforts
Want to contribute to making housing a human right? Here’s how
Dominique stresses that she has an open door policy where anyone can come and be provided with opportunities to contribute. You can also visit healthyhousingfoundation.net or housinghumanright.org, or email HHF management directly.
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The AIDS Healthcare Foundation is the world’s largest HIV/AIDS service organization, operating in 45 countries globally. The mission? Providing cutting-edge medicine and advocacy for everyone, regardless of ability to pay.
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