The city of Boise is one of 17 cities to receive a grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that aims to preserve and maintain affordable housing. $6.7 million dollars of the $16.6 million total has been allocated to Sage Mobile Home Park to preserve existing housing. The grants included in the total 16.6 million are the SIPPRA (Social Impact Partnerships to Pay for Results Act), Youth Homelessness Demonstration Project, and HUD Preservation and Reinvestment Initiative for Community Enhancement (PRICE) Awards.
Nicki Olivier Hellenkamp, the director of Housing and Homelessness Policy for the city of Boise, emphasized the importance of investing in current housing structures.
“The goal behind the price grant is to look at preservation of affordable homes, and specifically of manufactured housing,” Hellenkamp said. “When we think about housing affordability we often think about bringing new affordable units online through construction, but what we really have is what some people describe as a ‘leaky bucket’, where we’re pouring in these new affordable units, and it’s great to have new homes online that are affordable to Boiseans, but we’re also losing units through holes in the bucket.”
Hellenkamp explained that a mobile park home closing or increasing the rent could displace current residents.
“Manufactured housing, in particular, was chosen for this grant as needing investment because oftentimes people living in mobile home communities are living in an especially precarious situation because they typically own the home that they’re living in, but not the land underneath it,” Hellenkamp said.
While rent for mobile homes can be potentially cheaper than an apartment of a similar size, Hellenkamp noted if a property owner decides to sell, it can put mobile homeowners in a stressful situation. Additionally, it can be difficult to move older mobile homes or find other communities in the area to relocate to.
While Hellenkamp explained that the city of Boise didn’t have a concrete answer as to where the rest of the funds would be allocated yet, she Hellenkamp explained that critical infrastructure needs are a top priority. This would include maintaining pipes, roads and other utilities.
Hellenkamp said a detrimental effect of an unaffordable housing market is losing a sense of community.
“So much of the pain of the housing market that has become increasingly unaffordable is the pain of losing people who make up the fabric of our community,” Hellenkamp said. “Back in 2021 when you saw rent spiking really dramatically, I don’t know if there was a person in Boise who didn’t have a story about ‘my kids’ childcare worker had to move. Or, the barista who I talk to every day’ — I think we all saw what it meant when there wasn’t a way to preserve the affordability of people’s housing, and what that does to a community in terms of just creating loss.”
Jessica Abbott, the executive director for Corpus Christi Commons, sees the results of an unstable, unaffordable housing market daily.
“We’re in a situation right now where costs are just going up and up,” Abbott said. “We’ve seen a big jump in not just our people that are unhoused, we’re seeing that uptick for us and our numbers of people that are right on that cusp, they’re financially unstable, they barely have a roof over their head right now and it’s rent or food.”
“Long term, I would like to see affordable housing — we need more housing units,” Abbott said. “When it comes down to it, homelessness is a housing problem. Affordable housing isn’t $1,200 for an apartment — not with the wages that are here.”
Abbott said “affordable housing” is often used as a catch-all when she believes it needs to be clearly defined because the meaning changes for individuals in various economic situations.
While supportive housing can be a viable option for some unhoused individuals who have medical needs, Abbott explained it is a nuanced issue and it can feel like a loss of independence.
“A lot of people refuse to go into supportive housing because they’re grown adults. They don’t need to be told what to do or when to check-in,” Abbott said. “It’s like giving them housing but that dignity kind of goes away, and so some people refuse to go into those situations. I think you have to have a mix of what is going to work.”
Abbott explained that after conversations with Mayor Mclean and Hellenkamp, she continues to advocate for “wrap-around support” for unhoused individuals.
“I would like to see that [support] happen too for those folks that do get housed and then they fall out of it quickly because they don’t have the skill set to be on their own,” Abbott said. “They need to learn how to budget they need to learn how to get around. Using some of that money to help create those wraparound programs and services, or to really help educate so that they’re successful.”
Vanessa Fry, director of the Idaho Policy Institute and Associate Research Professor for the School of Public Service has been involved in housing and homelessness research for over a decade. Fry co-created a Housing Dashboard which aided Idaho in allocating $50 million for workforce housing.
Fry shared in an email interview with The Arbiter that she believes the biggest issue facing the city of Boise in regard to housing is supply and demand.
“Demand for housing increased at a faster rate than Boise and surrounding communities have been able to increase supply. Thus, due to the law of supply and demand, when there is greater demand than supply of a good, in this case, housing, the good will increase in price to the point where the market will not accept the cost (aka there are no buyers),” Fry wrote.
Fry quoted colleague Gregg Colburn, author of “Homelessness is a Housing Problem” who wrote, “Without addressing the housing problem communities will continue to see individuals and families facing housing insecurity and homelessness.”
For Boise citizens who want to stay informed about how these funds will be distributed, Hellenkamp said that the organization understands how “dire” the current housing situation is and that the city is working to start allocating those funds as quickly as possible.
