A forum Thursday morning hosted dozens of community members passionate about resolving Central Florida’s affordable housing crisis.
State, county, and city leaders committed to partner with nonprofits and the private sector to reach tangible solutions and strategize an action plan for more affordable housing.
The forum “Pathway of Hope: Breaking the Cycle of Poverty'' was hosted by the nonprofit United Against Poverty Orlando at the UCF Downtown campus and provided a diverse panel of perspectives and expertise. The timely discussion focused on data, current efforts, and necessary next steps.
As the need continues to grow
UP Orlando is a nonprofit that serves people living under the 200% federal poverty line with a low-cost grocery center that, according to the organization, helped families put an aggregate of $5.5 million back into the economy last year. UP Orlando also guides individuals to job skills training and long-term employment to help increase household income.
Executive Director Anjali Vaya said the forum’s goal was to garner support and establish solidarity around affordable housing.
“People say, ‘Not in my backyard.’ Well, you know what? These are hardworking residents of Central Florida who are all, like us, trying to make their ends meet. We have to be better.
"We have to come up with solutions. That’s why I started this conversation to, hopefully, get the community to consent. As the county and city representatives said today, this is a bigger problem, and we all need to be paying attention and getting involved with it.”
According to Vaya, her organization’s biggest contribution to the conversation was the sobering numbers that reflect the working families getting help every day. She said people who get food assistance put the money they save toward one thing: keeping a roof over their heads.
“It's the data -- we're all seeing that trend upwards. We're on calls every day navigating these individuals, and so it's important for us that the community realizes this is like a volcano that's erupting right now. And that these conversations need to really come out into the community.”
Economist Sean Snaith was on the panel. He says the affordable housing campaign is more aggressive now than it was years ago, growing in urgency and support.
“I think the situation got more egregious because of COVID-19 policies, and what that did to the economy just really caused this problem to flare up. And now you can't ignore it. When your rent goes up $300 this is not just an irritation, it’s a major problem,” he said.
The problem may have peaked already
Snaith said he was relieved to learn how much Orange County had been doing to help alleviate the region, including thousands of county-approved affordable units currently in the works.
Mitchell Glasser, the county’s Housing and Community Development director, said local government officials were committed to resolving the housing crisis well before the pandemic.
“One of the things that I was able to share with the panel that they didn't realize is how much Orange County Government has committed to dealing with affordable housing and how much of a financial commitment they've made to those issues,” he said.
According to Glasser, in 2019, Orange County established the framework with the “Housing for All” 10-year action plan, which led to the Affordable Housing Trust Fund Plan, committing over $10 million a year for 10 years.
“And we've been able to leverage that money with a lot of other private-sector money to make affordable housing a reality in terms of numbers that start to make a difference,” Glasser said. “Our red-hot rental market has attracted national developers to come and build units here, to the point where now we are catching up with that demand. So, we hope that not only the rents flatten out, but we are hoping that they actually start to drop.”
Glasser said he understands the challenges of a world that doesn’t pay what it charges to survive. He urged community members to support affordable housing solutions.
“There's no silver bullet to solve this whole problem,” he said. “But I think what you start to take away is the exuberant housing cost that we face and how income is not kept up. You know, it's not the same person you could imagine getting food assistance as it was 10 years ago — it's your working class citizens that need help. And I think we need to have citizens show up in support of these affordable housing projects.”
Other panelists and speakers included Congressman Maxwell Frost, Oren Henry, City of Orlando’s Housing and Community Development director, Amy Donley, director of UCF's Institute for Social and Behavioral Science, and Ron Piccolo, Associate Dean at UCF’s College of Business.
Lillian Hernández Caraballo is a Report for America corps member.
