September 3, 2020
“Our members who are developers are working closely with our housing agency about how to reconfigure the reserves we’re required to have while supporting our tenants,” Fernando Martí, co-director of the San Francisco-based Council of Community Housing Organizations, said in an interview. “The way we approach it is we have to figure out how to keep buildings going and keep tenants in place.”
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August 31, 2020
“The necessity of having to pay 25% of your income works for some people but for other people, it’s impossible” says Fernando Martí, co-director of the Council of Community Housing Organizations. Watch the entire segment here.
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August 28, 2020
New Op-ed: Thank you to these San Francisco elected leaders for raising up Housing for Educators! While the pandemic rages on, educators are still in dire need of housing and community-based organizations must prioritize providing this affordable housing.
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August 23, 2020
The change [to SB 1085] came in the wake of unanimous opposition to that provision of the bill by the Board of Supervisors, the Council of Community Housing Organizations, and affordable housing advocates citywide.
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July 23, 2020
Big tech loan funds for housing are a good first step, but what's really needed is deep equity investment and a commitment to ongoing revenue sources. “One common approach for large tech companies has been investing in low-cost loans to affordable-housing developers. While that financing is helpful, there is more need for down-payment grants for these projects to cover upfront costs, said Fernando Martí, co-director of the Council of Community Housing Organizations, a coalition of affordable-housing developers and advocates in San Francisco.”
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July 21, 2020
“Peter Cohen, co-director of the Council for Community Housing Organizations, said the RHNA goal should be to promote more housing of all kinds in suburban and smaller cities while focusing on affordable development in cities like San Francisco, Berkeley and Oakland, where many low-income families have been replaced by wealthier professionals.” To learn about the RHNA process and how it will affect Bay Area housing, read more below.
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July 16, 2020
“Assembly Bill 1703 would require most owners looking to sell residential rental property to give the property’s tenants, as well as designated groups like nonprofits, the opportunity to make the first offer to purchase. ‘If you mapped where most homes were lost, and who lost them, they were Black and brown communities,’ said Peter Cohen, co-director of the Council of Community Housing Organizations, one of more than 40 groups that sponsored the bill and brought the concept to the state Capitol, where Assemblyman Richard Bloom (D-Santa Monica) wrote and introduced it.”
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July 16, 2020
“Under the changes, the program set forth by last year’s Proposition E will specifically require 10 percent of affordable units built to contain three bedrooms while allowing higher heights and allow smaller lots of as little as 8,000 square feet to be eligible. Prop. E, approved in November with 76 percent of the vote, allows 100 percent affordable housing to be built on public land.”
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July 14, 2020
“The COVID crisis has exposed just how critical housing is for our communities. We all should be looking forward to how we build a stronger Bay Area that is just, affordable, and inclusive so we can recover and thrive together.” Read the Op-Ed above on why this big RHNA number matters and where all this housing should go.
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July 14, 2020
“Laws that give tenants and nonprofits a chance to compete with private investors could be an important tool to stem the tides of eviction, displacement, and gentrification, Fernando Martí says. That’s why groups like CCHO are supporting the introduction of a bill that would implement a statewide Right of First Purchase (similar to TOPA) in California.”
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