CONFRONTING A HOOSIER HOUSING CRISIS ADDITIONAL SPEAKER CONFIRMATION - NEXT WEDNESDAY @ 1PM Prosperity Indiana and CHIP are excited to announce that Dan Emmanuel, Senior Research Analyst with the National Low Income Housing Coalition, has been confirmed as a featured speaker at next Wednesday's press conference. New analysis released from the Indiana University Public Policy Institute shows 40 percent of evictions in Indiana occurred in Marion County in 2016, although the county only accounts for 14 percent of the state's population. Indianapolis and two other cities in Indiana are in the top 20 nationwide for eviction rankings. The time is now to analyze new findings and hear from providers and advocates about urgently needed policy solutions. Join us! Click here to register! What: Press conference and community conversation When: Wednesday, June 5, 1-2 p.m. Speakers:  Dan Emmanuel, Senior Research Analyst, National Low Income Housing Coalition (newly confirmed) Jessica Love, Executive Director, Prosperity Indiana Dr. Chelsea Haring-Cozzi, Executive Director, Coalition for Homelessness   Intervention & Prevention (CHIP) Dr. Breanca Merritt, Director, Center for Research on Inclusion and Social Policy at the Indiana University Public Policy Institute Where: Horizon House, 1033 E. Washington St., Indianapolis, IN 46202 Why: According to available data from Princeton’s Eviction Lab, Indianapolis is second only to New York City in terms of number of evictions. The press conference will feature new eviction research findings from the Indiana University Public Policy Institute and a conversation with advocates about needed reform to federal and state policies that are leaving Hoosiers behind.  Prosperity Indiana and CHIP will discuss policy proposals to reduce housing instability and homelessness for Hoosier households. These include revisions to state landlord-tenant laws and the need for the enactment of a national Affordable Housing Task Force and a National Housing Stabilization Fund. This event represents an important opportunity for local affordable housing and shelter providers to discuss the scope of local challenges related to evictions impacting those they serve.

Get to know Angela Byers, Community Development Outreach Manager at First Financial Bank!

Tell us how you first got involved with your organization? Or how did you get started in this work?

Like a lot of people, I fell into the banking industry many years ago. At the time, I hadn’t planned to have a career in banking but I really enjoyed learning how the banking system worked and how it impacts everything. I fell in love with lending and helping people become financially empowered through credit building & repair, reviewing the entire financial picture and offering suggestions to help save or make more money. That morphed into specifically working with struggling families through volunteering with community organizations to provide budget & credit classes, debt management, identifying and preventing scams and so much more. As Community Development Outreach Manager with First Financial Bank, I am afforded unique opportunities to fuel my passion for individual and family financial empowerment.

What are the three words you would use to describe your organization?

Client-Advocate, Giving, Different

Which of Prosperity Indiana’s five values: empowerment, integrity, impact, social justice or collaboration, speak the most to you and why?

It’s hard to choose only one which speaks to me the most so I won’t do that, Collaboration & Social Justice. It is important to affect positive change we must know what the issues are and work together to resolve and make an social justice impact. Everyone should be afforded the same opportunities to be successful and how much money we have or do not have should not be indicative of one’s success. Everyone should have the opportunity to be educated, have a good job, own a home, and retire comfortably.

What did you want to be when you grew up?

I wanted to be a teacher and in some ways though it’s not my trade I became a one.

What do you do when you aren’t working?

I enjoy volunteering for many organizations, spending time with family & friends, and working in my yard.

Prosperity Indiana is coming to YOU! We're bringing our annual Regional Member Meetings to SEVEN different locations around the state. Both Prosperity Indiana members and non-members are invited to join us for an Opportunity Zones Workshop - presented by attorneys from Ice Miller - about pairing opportunity zones with other funding opportunities to maximize impact, followed by lunch and our regional meeting.  Northeast - Fort Wayne, May 23 West - Terre Haute, May 29 Central - Indianapolis, May 30 East - Muncie, June 13 Southwest - Evansville, June 18 Southeast - Jeffersonville, June 20 Northwest - Hammond, June 26

A new report - American Neighborhood Change in the 21st Century: Gentrification and Decline - from the Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity at the University of Minnesota Law School captures growth, low-income displacement, low-income concentration, and abandonment from 2000-2016 at the census tract level and depicts aggregated population and housing change in two categories of neighborhoods:

The report finds that:

Click here to access the interactive map. 

The report also includes details about metro-level neighborhood change about the nation’s 50 largest metropolitan areas. Indianapolis ranks 45th of the nation’s 50 largest metro areas in terms of the spread of concentrated poverty and abandonment.

The report’s summary for Indianapolis says:

“Gentrification is effectively nonexistent in the Indianapolis metropolitan area, while the region – and especially the city of Indianapolis itself – suffers from widespread and ongoing poverty concentration and neighborhood abandonment.

“About 57 percent of Indianapolis city residents live in strongly declining neighborhoods, as do about 72 percent of low-income residents (defined in this report as those below 200 percent of the federal poverty line). While the overall population of these areas has fallen modestly since 2000 – about 4 percent – the low-income population has grown over 50 percent. These changes have been accompanied by racial change, as the black and Hispanic population of those neighborhoods has grown by 49,000, and the white population has dropped by nearly 80,000, indicating significant white flight.”

Click here to read the full summary for Indianapolis.

The Central Indiana Community Foundation is seeking applicants for a Director of Major Gifts and a Not-For-Profit Sustainability Officer. Click the links below for the full position descriptions and to learn how to apply. 

Director of Major Gifts

This full-time position represents the Foundation with assigned constituencies and directs efforts to cultivate and solicit major gifts and philanthropic engagement for the dynamic new initiatives of the Foundation. This position requires outstanding communication, organization and customer service skills.

Not-For-Profit Sustainability Officer

This full-time position, will provide premier financial, relationship and endowment fund management for CICF’s not-for-profit fundholders and work closely with development staff to grow assets, respond to requests for proposals and make sales presentations to organizations. This position requires strong knowledge of the not-for-profit community, excellent organizational, analytical and evaluation skills as well as outstanding customer service skills. 

Registration Is Now Open!

Underwriting a multi-family affordable housing development is complex. Add an Affordable Housing Program (AHP) grant from FHLBank Indianapolis, and its member bank partner to the funding sources, and the alignment of underwriting standards for key stakeholders may create a more complicated financing structure.

In the Underwriting Affordable Housing Workshops, we will walk through the changes in a proposed housing development finance structure as affordable restrictions are layered into the funding source stack. Whether you are a financial institution submitting an AHP grant for a housing partner or you are an affordable housing developer/consultant, you should be confident in preparing for the underwriting portion of the funding process.

That’s why FHLBank Indianapolis is offering an Underwriting Affordable Housing Workshop.

2019 Underwriting Affordable Housing Workshop - Indianapolis, IN

LOCATION

FHLBank Indianapolis - Indianapolis, IN

6/4/19 - 1:00 PM - 4:00 PM ET

This workshop will walk through the unique attributes of affordable housing from a lender and funder’s perspective

Click Here to Register

Benefits

Understand how bankers, investors, and soft funding source providers analyze an affordable housing real estate transaction.

Who should attend

Bankers, developers (non-profit and for profit), community foundations, housing development consultants, attorney, architects, and typical development team partners.

Prosperity Indiana is seeking a reduced full-time (1,200 hours, eight month term) AmeriCorps member to help Indiana nonprofits fill capacity gaps and use data to tell the story of their impact. 

Organization Overview: Prosperity Indiana supports a network of individuals and organizations - community-based nonprofits and government entities - by providing capacity, financial resources, expertise, and connections that make community development work in Indiana. 

Duties:

Qualifications: Candidates must possess organizational and leadership skills, verbal and written communication skills and work both independently and as a team player. They should have an interest in asset-based assessments and utilizing metrics to inform the delivery of outcomes, and preferably have experience with research methods, tool design and validation. Candidates should also have an understanding of communications strategies and storytelling to connect data with impact, as well as an understanding of community economic development and nonprofits. 

For more information, please contact Carey Craig at ccraig@prosperityindiana.org, or at (317) 565-7751.

In this series, we're getting to know our members on a personal AND professional level! Keep reading to learn more about a few of your exceptional peers in the community economic development industry!

Anne Mannix, Neighborhood Development Associates, LLC

Tell us how you first got involved with your organization? Or how did you get started in this work?

After graduating from college, I was a case manager with an after care program for a state mental hospital. We worked with chronically mentally ill persons who were living in nursing homes and boarding homes.  I could see that the people were being exploited and felt powerless to do anything. So I decided to go to a city planning program. That was a little too removed from the action for me. So I secretly transferred my internship to a public housing authority that was doing a lot of real estate development and I loved it.  This meant taking a chance because I could have lost my scholarship and living stipend if the state administrators found out what I did. I worked at the housing authority and several community development organizations for about 15 years. In 1997, I wanted to do more varied projects in different cities so I started Neighborhood Development, a consulting organization.  

What’s kept you there?

I like helping people by providing affordable housing.  It is challenging and at the end it is exciting to see the projects get built.  Occasionally I get to talk to the people that live in the developments and that is a great reminder of why we all do our work.  

What are you seeing on the horizon that we’re not paying enough attention to?

The baby boomers are retiring and new leadership is emerging.  We need to maintain the pioneering spirit and commitment of those who started community development. I have faith that this transition will work out.

What changes are coming to your organization over the next year?

I am planning to reduce my workload and focus on working with groups in South Bend.  Christine Deutscher, a coworker is taking over and doing all work outside of South Bend.  

Which of Prosperity Indiana’s five values: empowerment, integrity, impact, social justice or collaboration, speak the most to you and why?

I think collaboration is the most relevant for Prosperity.  Collaboration is critical to the success of any project. Many people have taught me so much and I hope I have put some of that back out to the community.

Who/what inspires you?

Last night I went to the annual meeting of South Bend Mutual Homes, a resident housing cooperative.  The residents are starting to build community and to get to know each other. One resident has a rough way of talking and another resident said “She’s not mad at you.  She just talks like that.” One of the men in the group had organized a day long recreational outing for the other men who had not been active before. It was a little chaotic but people were at home and talked about things that mattered to them.  Other things that inspire me are watching our Mayor Pete Buttigieg put his campaign together and watching South Bend grow from what was called a dying city to a city that is growing and grappling with issues.

What was unique about your childhood?  

My family lived in several different cities including Tulsa, Houston, North Stamford CT, Bangkok and Tokyo.  I learned to adapt to different environments and to be flexible. In between semesters in college, I took the bus around Bangkok exploring the city and that was a great adventure.

What did you want to be when you grew up?

I didn’t really know.  My family did not expect me to work and I didn’t see many people in their workplaces.  When I was in high school, I worked in a hospital and I wanted to be a nurse but that would have been a disaster since I was terrible at chemistry and anatomy and physiology.  The nurses I worked with told me that I should be a lawyer since I argued too much and wouldn’t get along with the doctors. I never became a lawyer but they were right.

What do you do when you aren’t working?

I like working on our old house, working in the yard, and trying to get some exercise, either biking or walking with a friend.  Also I like to cook, spend time with my family and have four new grandchildren to hang out with.

What talent or superpower would you most like to have?  

I would like to be one if those people who is good at accounting and is a perfectionist.  

What do you collect?  

I have a collection of cat statues and also a teapot collection.

What would you sing at Karaoke night?

I Am Woman of course.  Also Learning to Fly with lots of audience participation.  This would never happen but it is nice to think about.

Doris Sims, Housing and Neighborhood Director, City of Bloomington

Tell us how you first got involved with your organization? Or how did you get started in this work?

I have worked with the City of Bloomington for over 30 years in two departments, Human Resources and in the Housing and Neighborhood Department (HAND).  I have primarily worked in the HAND Department over my career with the city. I returned as Director of the department through the appointment of Mayor John Hamilton when he became mayor in 2016.  

What’s kept you there?

I love working in the field of community development and housing because it touches so many people lives in various ways.   I feel that our name of Housing and Neighborhood Development speaks to the variety of activities and programs that make up the department.  From housing counseling, public service agency assistance, working with Bloomington neighborhoods, historic preservation activities, and providing housing assistance to developers, not-for profits, and the local public housing authority to build, renovate, and provide housing assistance, is some of the things we do.  In addition, the department runs a very active housing inspection program for the more than 21,000 rental units located within the Bloomington community.

What changes are coming to your organization over the next few years?

Like so many communities, the city is looking at ways to provide more affordable housing. One of the most exciting projects that will happen within the next 2-3 years is the redevelopment of the current hospital site which is located near our downtown area.  The city acquired the 24 acre site of our current hospital which is in the process of building a new facility. A study has already been undertaken which outlined the potential redevelopment of the site into housing and office space. I am looking forward as the HAND Director to being a part of the redevelopment of the site to bring affordable housing along with other economic development to the city.   

What is your favorite indulgence?

My favorite indulgence, or more like an obsession is shoes!  I “LOVE” shoes. I have over 200 pairs!! In my spare time when I am not shopping for shoes, I like to scrapbook.  It is so much fun to look back over different memorable events in my life through the scrapbook pages.

Tysha Hardy-Sellers, Edna Martin Christian Center

Tell us how you first got involved with your organization? Or how did you get started in this work?

It’s hard to believe that I was hired at Edna Martin Christian Center 11 years ago! After years in media, corporate, government roles, and time spent growing a business, I realized that whatever my role, an activity, initiative, or project would lead back to the near-northeastside Indianapolis community where I was born and raised—Martindale-Brightwood. I was looking for ways to directly contribute to the community and saw there was an Executive Director position open at EMCC. After researching and learning that the agency had deep roots in social justice and meeting with the board and feeling the strong support of individuals not only locally, but across the nation due to its affiliation with the American Baptist Churches, which included Martin Luther King Jr as a leader, I knew this was a place I wanted to call my professional home.

What’s kept you there?

Although great strides have been made increasing community resources, developing assets, amplifying community voice and increasing involvement, there’s more work to do. I look forward to working with a cross-section of community partners to affect change Our community goals are to address educational attainment, economic mobility, infrastructure improvements, reduced crime, increased community connectivity.

Why do you do what you do?

Access to opportunities and guidance to best leverage those opportunities are critical to success at an individual, family and community level. I was gifted with people who provided access and guidance. It’s my turn to do the same. Together, with partners who share the same values, we’ll keep working to make our vision a reality: Neighborhood where individuals and families have everything they need to learn, live, work and play in a peaceful, connected, and thriving environment.

What are the three words you would use to describe your organization?

Collaborative, Enterprising, Regenerative

What do you wish other people knew about your organization?

Since the late 1930s, EMCC has always been involved in community services and well as community development.  In the past, we focused our communication on our programs and human services, but we’ve also been instrumental in project development, placemaking and enterprise launches. We are now highlighting both areas— community services (people) and community development (place) by using a collaborative model with inclusive approaches to developing thriving communities.

What are you seeing on the horizon that we’re not paying enough attention to?

More underappreciated communities are saying enough. We’ve communicated our thoughts to those who said they are here to help with no lasting results realized or results financially benefiting those with resources and not for the community.  Locally, statewide, and cross the nation, more communities are committing action to getting things done on their own terms and using whatever available resources to do so. Quality of Life strategies flow through community supported projects with genuine wins for residents, businesses, and visitors.

What changes are coming to your organization over the next year?

Our  agency, part of the Martindale-Brightwood Collective Impact team, is launching 7 significant community initiatives: Martindale-Brightwood Education Zone and Scholar Housing (Education options and Housing); Martindale-Brightwood Food Resource Network (Food access; Health); Community Voice News Network (communication and connectivity); 25th Street Corridor (new community development and evaluating existing community assets);   the PACE Community Recovery Resource Center (mental health and safety); and the Community Solutions and Entrepreneurship Center (business ownership and increased community opportunities to solve social issues); and EMCC’s Leadership & Legacy Campus (education options, entrepreneurship programming; food access; senior services; and public recreation).

What can you imagine in 5 years if your organization is successful?

For People:

For Place:

Which of Prosperity Indiana’s five values: empowerment, integrity, impact, social justice or collaboration, speak the most to you and why?

All of the five values resonate with me personally and align with the mission and vision of the agency. Our core values are leadership, equity, inclusiveness, honor, accountability, and ethics and integrity in service. We carry those out through collaboration, connectivity, and pursuit of excellence.  

On what efforts would you like to collaborate?

• Affordable housing

• Micro-enterprise

• Workforce development

• Educational options

• Re-entry supports

Who/what inspires you?
People who are problem solvers, visionaries, and have the moxie to move conversation to strategy and action.

What might someone be surprised to know about you?

I’m deaf, but my lack of hearing is actually a superpower- I’m learning to listen more.

Beach or mountains?

Why not both?

We are excited to announce that we are re-launching our Affinity Group online forums, but this time, we are connecting on Facebook! We have created Facebook groups EXCLUSIVELY for Prosperity Indiana members. These communities are meant to be places where members can share resources, ask questions, and connect with others in the field.

Interested in Management & Leadership, Affordable Housing, Individual Development Accounts, or Human Services? We have a group for that!

Groups are organized around different topics of relevance to our membership. Maybe you have expertise in a subject, or you just want to learn more - we encourage all levels of experience and knowledge to join. All you need is a willingness to learn and share!

Join a group (or multiple groups!) today and help us start the conversation!

Click here to view the full list of forums you can join!

And, if you haven’t already, make sure to like our page so you stay up-to-date on all of the latest news and events from Prosperity Indiana and the community economic development field!

Honored and excited, I drove to Mitchell, IN last month to deliver the John Niederman Rural Leadership Award to David Miller, CEO of Hoosier Uplands, a Community Action Agency, Area Agency on Aging, licensed Home Health Care and Hospice agency, and Community Housing Development Organization serving Crawford, Lawrence, Martin, Orange and Washington Counties. David was unable to attend our 2019 Summit where we officially recognized our annual awardees, so delivery of his award was a good excuse and opportunity to learn more about one of our members. New to Prosperity Indiana and the community development industry, I was about to meet the man that John Niederman himself described at the Awards Luncheon by saying “this award could just as easily be named the David Miller Award.”

Located in the heart of Mitchell, I met David at the Hoosier Uplands office. We drove to lunch and then stopped by the Mitchell Opera House, which Hoosier Uplands restored, and then visited Serenity Now, a mental health clinic that Hoosier Uplands operates in Bedford, Ind. I learned the history, saw patients in the waiting rooms, and met the staff. And I was moved. For three hours, David and I talked about community development, life, challenges, commitment, and action, and I left that day changed for the better.

It became clear to me that day that Hoosier Uplands leads the community with integrity, high expectations, and a call to action. Their mission statement reads in part “All endeavors are pursued with the client in mind, never forgetting the value of every human being or the importance of our responsibility to the public which we serve.” And it’s obvious they do just that.

I am incredibly proud to work for Prosperity Indiana and want to learn more. This year, I am visiting member organizations every month and highlighting my experiences in this newsletter. Please let me know if you are interested (rodonohue@prosperityindiana.org), and I’ll get it on the calendar!

Rita O'Donohue
Relationships Manager

P.S. John Niederman… you were right!