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July/August 2018 - In This Issue:
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Our Biggest Loan Ever
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| Preliminary concept of McEvoy Apartments on San Carlos St. |
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In late July, Housing Trust closed its biggest loan: $15.85 million to First Community Housing for a 300+ home development called McEvoy Apartments!
This is notable both because of the size of the loan as well as the forward-thinking concept and location: at the corner of McEvoy and San Carlos St, the proposed apartments will be about a half mile from Diridon Station, 3/4 of a mile from the VTA Race light rail stop, and adjacent to the Los Gatos Creek bike trail - making it a true transit-oriented development.
The timing of this announcement came when
a MidPen Housing project in Redwood City began to move forward. It made us smile because the loan we made to MidPen for that project - $11.2 million - was made in late 2016 and, at the time, was the biggest loan in our history!
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Come to On the House September 24th!
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| Friends, Food, & Fun at 2017's On The House |
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Our fall event that brings friends together and celebrates another year of creating affordable housing opportunities in the greater Bay Area is back - and you're invited!
On the House is taking place at SP2 Communal Bar & Restaurant in downtown San Jose from 5:30pm to 7:30pm on Monday, September 24th.
And join us in our social media campaign - called #HomeInPictures - which is very simple: find an old photograph of yourself in or in front of the home you grew up in, share the picture on
Twitter,
Facebook,
LinkedIn or another social media platform with the link to the
On the House invitation and the hashtag #HomeInPictures (be sure your privacy settings on FB are set to 'public'!) and ask two friends to do the same. Then join us at On the House and see the pictures displayed.
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| Housing Trust Communications Manager Michael Norris - at home in Connecticut in 1981 |
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This campaign - and this event - is our chance to bring attention to the simple fact that everyone deserves a safe and happy home to grow up in. And while Housing Trust has no idea what trendy home features today will be considered dated or cringeworthy 30-plus years from now, we do want all of our neighbors to feel secure in their homes and make memories they'll be able to fondly look back on. All of our families and all of our recollections will be different, but the feeling of being at home is one everyone should share.
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Affordable Housing on the November Ballot!
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| Housing Trust CEO Kevin Zwick, addressing the Non-Profit Housing Association of Northern California to discuss the housing measures on the November ballot. |
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It's an election year, and while there were already a lot of reasons to participate in democracy and vote this year, several ballot measures just made it all the more imperative.
There are a lot of housing measures on the ballot in California - and some apply to specific cities and towns so no matter where you live take notice. San Jose, for instance, has a $450 million affordable housing bond on the ballot in November - which, if passed, would go a long way toward fulfilling Mayor Sam Liccardo's goal of creating more than 25,000 new homes in the city. It was among the many measures discussed at the Non-Profit Housing Association of Northern California's meeting of 40 affordable housing organizations in mid-August.
If all of the discussed measures are passed it would mean an additional $7 billion for affordable housing. The two major bond measures on the state level are Proposition 1 and Proposition 2 - both of which got a great summary from our friends at SV@Home -
click here to read about Prop 1 and 2. There will be more info coming on how we can all take action on these measures as we get closer to election day - so be sure to
follow Housing Trust on Facebook and
Twitter for updates!
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Guardino Scholarship Winners Head to School
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| Sumayia |
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The Guardino Affordable Housing Scholarships are granted each year to high school seniors living in affordable housing and attending college as freshmen after graduation. Four $3,000 awards were given this year and we were fortunate to meet one of the recipients in our office: Sumayia.
Born in Bangladesh and having immigrated to the U.S. at the age of one, Sumayia's family moved six times in three years - living everywhere from sofas in relative's houses to shabby apartments in difficult neighborhoods -before the finding an affordable home at Elena Gardens in San Jose.
Thanks to the on-site computer lab she embarked on a journey of learning and teaching -most recently as a volunteer mentor at the EAH community center. As the president of the Muslim Student Association in high school, she helped raise of $500 in humanitarian aid to help Syrian refugees. Sumayia is first in her family to attend college and began attending UC Berkeley in August 2018 to obtain a BS in civil engineering.
She hopes to use her degree at Engineers Without Borders -a nonprofit that helps communities around the world build sustainable infrastructure. "This scholarship doesn't just help my education and success," she says, "it saves my family the extra stress as they wonder how they will send their own daughter to college."
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Small Homes, Big Impact Gets Boost from SVCF
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ADU Program Manager Vianey Nava leading a Housing Trust accessory dwelling unit workshop
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Housing Trust's ADU
program got a big boost over the summer thanks to a grant from the Silicon Valley Community Foundation.
The operating grant will help further our work in the program, which launched in early 2018 to help educate and provide funding for homebuyers willing to build an ADU on their property.
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Empower Homebuyers Program Update
In our last newsletter we announced that Housing Trust has been named the administrator of the County of Santa Clara's Empower Homebuyers - the 2016 Measure A first time homebuyer down payment assistance program.
The program is still aimed at launching in the fall with the goal of assisting approximately 250 households - with incomes that do not exceed 120% of the Area Median Income - over five years. We'll be posting updates as we get closer to the launch date.
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