Some of Truckee Meadows Regional Efforts to Address Homelessness and Lack of Affordable Housing in 2018/19

A compilation of regional updates provided by One Truckee River's Partnership Coordinator, Iris, and the 2018 Housing and Sanitation Working Group:Northern Nevada Adult Mental Health Services (NNAMHS) Campus: Washoe County is working to develop the NNAMHS Campus to serve 200+ currently homeless women, children, families, elderly, and pregnant women. If successful, this will open up space at the Volunteers of America (VOA) shelter for currently homeless men. The county anticipates opening this facility in the summer of 2019. The image to the left was part of a larger presentation (linked here) given to the Washoe County Commissioners on October 9, 2018 by Amber Howell, Washoe County Director of Social Services. Case Managers: Washoe County currently supports three case managers in the region, and hopes to add six more for a total of nine case managers in the region. The county pays each collaborative agency $80,000 per case manager. The county is working to secure $480,000 within the current fiscal year to add six more case managers by June 2019.  Community Housing Land Trust: In April 2018, the Community Foundation of Western Nevada created the Community Housing Land Trust to receive donated land that can be used for affordable housing. The Village on Sage Street: The first project under the Community Housing Land Trust is the Village on Sage Street, which consists of 200 single room units costing $400/month. The Village is being operated by VOA and applications are now being accepted here. Residents are anticipated to move in by December 2018. After this, the Community Foundation will use the Community Land Trust to create additional housing options, including studios, one- and two-bedroom apartments, and single-family homes. Below are the conceptual designs for the project, which can be found at this link.Affordable Housing Trust Fund in Washoe County: ACTIONN is a nonprofit currently advocating for the creation of an Affordable Housing Trust Fund in Washoe County. This fund will support “the rehabilitation, repair, and/or production of affordable housing and housing related support program to the residents of Washoe County.” The proposed source of funding is through the Supplemental Government Services Tax. The state of Nevada created a statute to allow Washoe County to create a Supplemental Government Services Tax, but Washoe County has yet to create it. ACTIONN is proposing an increase of the Supplemental Government Services tax by raising “annual vehicle registration by 1 cent on each $1 on the depreciated DMV valuation.”  They estimate this tax increase will generate $15 million annually to affordable housing projects.” More information can be found here.  1915 (l): The Division of Health Care Financing and Policy (DHCFP) is working with stakeholders to develop a proposal to identify funding sources and design a tiered level service package of Medicaid habilitation services for permanent supported housing under 1915(I) authorities.  Hope Springs: Local nonprofit NV Hopes, with support from the City of Reno, is working to develop Hope Springs, a village with 30 individual units striving to serve 60-120 individuals a year. NV Hopes is working on a capital campaign now and anticipates starting construction at the end of 2018. The conceptual design and model for the project, shared to the right, that can be found here.  Truckee Meadows Healthy Communities/Enterprise Community Partners/Truckee Meadows Regional Planning Agency: The above groups are creating a regional study to address housing affordability. Several strategies have been created and the coalition is now seeking stakeholder feedback.  

    • Strategy 1: Support production of more rental housing that is affordable and accessible to low-income households, particularly those earning less than half of the area median income.  
    • Strategy 2: Support development of more diverse housing options for renters and homeowners throughout the region.  
    • Strategy 3: Help more residents access home ownership opportunities.  
    • Strategy 4: Preserve the affordability, while improving the quality, of existing affordable rental and home ownership options.  
  • Strategy 5: Protect residents from housing displacement.  

More information can be found at https://www.tmaffordablehousing.org/  The City of Reno allocated $1 million to increase affordable housing. The image to the right is part of a larger presentation given to the Reno City Council on October 10, 2018 by Elaine Wiseman, Housing and Neighborhood Development Manager, describing the City of Reno’s efforts to address the lack of affordable housing. The whole presentation can we found here.   Downtown Reno Partnership is launching its ambassadors program in downtown Reno. A recent article about this work can be found here. Truckee Meadows Housing Solutions: A few of Nevada Youth Empowerment Project's (NYEP’s) board members started a  organization to develop low income housing that will target youth and seniors (30-40%AMI). This new non profit is called Truckee Meadows Housing Solutions. The first project is a 9 unit Intergenerational Community, where 5 units will be designated for CLP graduates and 4 units will be designated for senior housing. TMHS will partner with RHA to select appropriate seniors for the site and will partner with NYEP for site management.  A second project, an 8 bed shared housing site to provide low income housing to poor students, is also in the works. Both projects are 100% private funded. Some entities working around these issues in the region:  Local Government: Washoe County Social Services, City of Reno, City of Sparks.  Groups: Community Homelessness Advisory Board (CHAB), Reno Area Alliance for the Homeless (RAAH), Silver State Fair Housing Council.  Nonprofits: Volunteers of America, NV Hopes, Community Foundation of Western NV, The Life Change Center, ACTIONN, the Eddy House, Northern NV Veterans Resource Center, Restart, RISE, The Empowerment Center, the MOST Team, United Way of Northern NV and the Sierra, Committee to Aid Abused Women, Crisis Pregnancy Center, Casa de Vida.  Others: Praxis Consulting Group LLC, Conrad N Hilton Foundation.  Churches: Catholic Charities of Northern NV, Reno-Sparks Gospel Mission Inc. St. Vincent's Residence and Dining, The Salvation Army Church, Interfaith Hospitality Fam PRM, Grace Church Reno's HopeFirst program.

Effortsaffordable housing, homeless, homelessness, Reno, Truckee River