Engaging with nonprofit affordable housing building owners to understand the impacts of COVID-19 and develop community-based eviction prevention strategies in neighborhoods that are disproportionately affected by housing and health inequities.

Philadelphia has long faced an affordable housing crisis that has led to housing insecurity and health inequities for Black and Hispanic communities across the city. The disproportionate impacts of COVID-19 on people of color have further entrenched disparities driven by structural racism. This project, led by Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) Philadelphia, will develop community-based eviction prevention strategies in neighborhoods that are disproportionately affected by housing and health inequities. LISC has spent more than 40 years supporting historically disinvested communities in the city, including by supporting the creation of 9,194 affordable homes and 2.7 million square feet of commercial space.

LISC will facilitate listening sessions that focus on eviction prevention and housing stability strategies with nonprofit building owners in the Eastern North and West Philadelphia neighborhoods. LISC will convene a final meeting of nonprofit building owners and other local organizations to discuss project findings and policy recommendations based on the listening sessions and data from LISC’s 2022 report on nonprofit affordable rental housing 15-year projections.

The data will demonstrate the connections between housing stability, property conditions, and rental subsidies and illustrate how to support neighborhoods of opportunity through eviction prevention and stable housing. LISC will use the data collected in this project in the design of its 2023 Non-Profit Preservation Initiative to support grants and recoverable grants for properties in neighborhoods with higher rates of evictions and loss of affordable rental housing. It will also share the findings with local agencies, practitioners, and researchers, including Drexel University’s Urban Health Collaborative, the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency, the Philadelphia City Council, Pennsylvania state legislators, behavioral health practitioners, and the city departments of Public Health and Behavioral Health.