Housing was the talk of the town in Allen County yesterday.
Specifically, how to get more.
In the morning, Atlas Community Studios and McClure Company hosted an online “visioning session” to collect data on housing needs.
And in the evening, the Renaissance Design Group (RDG) and the Kansas Housing Resources Corporation (KHRC) facilitated a public meeting at the North Community Building in Iola.
Quite a few residents were in attendance, with over 30 tuning in online in the morning, and about 40 coming to the community building in-person. Another 30-plus watched the evening’s community meeting virtually.
Representatives from all four organizations were brought to town by Thrive Allen County. The primary purpose of the meetings was to collect data so that an action plan might eventually take shape.
During the evening’s community meeting, residents formed break-out groups to discuss local housing needs, then shared their findings with the larger audience.
The conversation was guided primarily by Amy Haase, principal urban planner for Renaissance Design Group.
Here are some of the key items that were listed by community members, and that were reported by multiple groups:
•Need for housing at all income levels
•Attunement to workers who are currently commuting large distances who might relocate
•Improving the availability of house financing
•The importance of recruiting builders
•Developing new models of shared ownership
•Providing incentives for rehabilitation
•Encouraging partnerships between industries that could provide assistance
There was also discussion of the need for regional strategies and partnerships, and attention to the economies of scale.
The representatives from RDG and KHRC said that they would take the qualitative data they’d received on Wednesday, then return to Iola later in 2021.
At that time, the organizations plan to give a presentation to the community on how to move from diagnosing local housing issues to taking concrete action.
