Affordable Housing – Opportunities and Challenges to Creating More

Amount Awarded: $500.00

Academic Year: 2021-2022 

Implementation: October – December 2021

The purpose of this project was to educate Western students and the community about the affordable housing crisis facing residents of Washington State. A key focus for community development is ensuring affordable and accessible housing. In fall 2021, students in Dr. Laninga’s Community Development course used the SEJF funds to learn more about the challenges and opportunities facing the development of affordable housing and to share this topic with the wider campus community. The class, consisting of urban planning majors and graduate students in Environmental Studies, attending a Washington/Oregon American Planning Association session on missing middle housing and learned how three cities in Oregon have changed their regulations to allow for increased densities in traditionally single-family zones. 

The funding was also used to bring a guest speaker from Mercy Housing Northwest, a nonprofit organization involved in developing affordable housing projects in Whatcom County, to campus. The speaker talked about efforts to create affordable housing on Bellingham’s waterfront that will not only provide housing, but also include space for early childhood education and a local food hub.