Access Homes and COR Housing

Access Homes and COR Housing: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

Access Homes and COR Housing: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Katie:
Welcome to a City of Redding podcast. In today's episode, we connect with the Reading Housing Authority and a local nonprofit Access Home to talk about the housing shortage and how reading is using some unique solutions to address these issues in our local community.

Steve:
Nicole Smith, community development manager with the Redding Housing Authority, fills us in on how the city works with community partners to make projects happen. Don Smith, Tim Scarborough and Saxon E Harmony from Access Home are just some of the community partners who have been working in this space for years to help provide income eligible housing for Redding and the larger Shasta County population.

Katie:
The Team and Access Home also touches on the 3D printed home in Enterprise Park and their role in the process. This podcast was recorded a little while ago, but great progress has been made on the 3D printed homes since our conversation. We are looking forward to celebrating its opening with Access Home very soon. And with that, we'll turn it over to Nicole.

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
My name is Nicole Smith. I'm the housing manager for the City of Redding.

Steve:
Thank you, Nicole. We are excited to have you on the podcast today and maybe we could just kick things off with the term Redding Housing Authority is essentially one of the departments here in the city. Can you just explain what exactly is the Redding Housing Authority?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
Well, you know, in the housing division, we actually have two parts to the housing division. One part is the Redding Housing Authority. And the other side of our shop here is the Housing and Community Development Division. And so the Redding Housing Authority is a corporate public entity under the laws of the state of California. And our housing authority in particular runs the Housing Choice voucher program for the City of Redding, the PHS program, which is the family self sufficiency program, as well as a plethora of cottage programs that are associated with the Housing Choice voucher program. On the other side of things, the Housing and Community Development Department handles entitlement funds such as community development block grant funds, Home Investment Partnership funds, plethora of other state funds, grant funds that we have to produce, rehabilitate, develop housing in our community.

Katie:
And is that housing period or is that affordable housing?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
It would be we tend not to use the term affordable housing. We prefer to utilize the term income eligible housing. Basically all of the programs that we have and the housing that is produced by any of the dollars that we receive for our department must be eligible to income qualified individuals or families.

Katie:
And then also maybe you can just tell any listeners who are unaware what is the housing choice voucher program?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
The Housing Choice voucher program is a rental assistance program that is funding funded by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. It is essentially an entitlement program. Each year we received we are receiving somewhere around $10 Million a year to provide rental assistance for income qualified persons in the community to rent housing from a private landlord. Essentially what happens is we pay a portion of their rent directly to the landlord and the client would pay a portion of the rent directly to the landlord.

Steve:
And with regard to income eligible housing on that same thread, what exactly is income eligible housing and why is it important for the community.

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
As far as each program that we have has an income eligibility criteria to it? And it could be different depending on the program. For example, the housing choice voucher program, an individual or family must meet the income guidelines, which is set at 50% of median income, for example, or a family of one is presently $1,392 a month. And that would be gross income. Another example for a family of four that would be $2,313 a month to qualify, for example, for the Housing choice voucher program. Other programs, depending on the source of funding, can have higher income guidelines. For example, any projects that are funded with community development block grant funds or CDBG. In order to be eligible for an income eligible unit, you'd have to be at 80% or below of median income.

Katie:
And why are these programs important for our community? You know, a lot of people say we shouldn't have so many of these programs or that it's unfair in some way. I mean, why is it important for a community to invest in income eligible housing?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
Building multifamily housing in the community is expensive, and if you are not infusing affordable housing dollars into the mix, multifamily housing isn't being built. The return on investment just isn't there for private developers and it's important for the community. I mean, all housing is important for the community, especially right now. We have. Extremely low vacancy rate. There really isn't a lot of housing available in the community. It's really, truly supply and demand. We have a lot of demand for our housing. Housing really, I mean, especially multifamily housing really isn't being built. And unless it's for the most part involved with some kind of subsidy from the government. If you look at the large complexes that are being built right now, you're looking at Kennett Court Apartments, phase one, two and three. You're looking at Louden Lane Senior Apartments Center, a Hope apartments, Alturas crossing apartments. All of them have some form of government loan or subsidy involved with the construction of those multifamily units.

Steve:
Nickel For these income eligible properties, I'm imagining that the process can be confusing or overwhelming for some folks. What resources does the Housing department offer and what's the best way for someone to navigate the process to find out if they're eligible and what those next steps might be?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
Most of the housing complexes that are presently being built have what are called project based vouchers associated with the project. And and those are actually housing choice vouchers that we project base to a complex and typically that's utilized for the developer to show they have local commitment when they're going and applying for funding through the tax credit allocation committee at the state of California. So even though these projects have project based vouchers associated with them, they are site based waiting lists. So if you are interested in renting a unit from any one of those projects I previously mentioned, you would contact the apartment complex and update on the waiting list. There's going to be a waiting list. Put your name on the waiting list and when you come to the top of that waiting list, the property management firm would determine your eligibility as well as your income screening for the landlord criteria to rent the unit.

Katie:
So to switch gears a little bit, I mean, these two topics are related and we'll get to that. But we wanted to talk about the emergent three D and the three D house that was built in Enterprise Park in collaboration with the City of Redding, Housing and Access Homes. From your perspective, what does Emergent three D technology mean for reading and and income eligible housing in general?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
I think that given the fact that there is a vacancy rate that is somewhere around 1.4% in our community, any type of housing that we can produce that will help alleviate the need for affordable housing or income eligible housing in our community is definitely a plus. I think that because it's a different kind of technology, I think people shy away from that. And for example, when we were going through the process to determine if we could actually utilize our community housing development organization dollars to help develop this property, it took an incredible amount of time for for HUD to approve the project because they just were not sure about this type of housing because it was new, seemed complicated to them. They weren't sure if it wasn't eligible type of housing. We did work through that, though, and at the end of the day, HUD approved the project and we were able to utilize those funds to build the project. Now, as I understand it, there are difficulties getting young, young people into the trades and we're we're coming up where baby boomers are starting to retire and there aren't young workers coming into the fold for those types of jobs. And on that note, I really see this as a draw to maybe draw those folks into these types of trades. You know, it has a real technical aspect to it, and I believe that would be a great especially young folks that are involved in computers, computer design, utilizing, you know, technical type things in their life would really be drawn to this sort of trade. It's a brand new trade, and I think that is a huge positive and. For the community. The more people you can draw into those trades, the better off we're going to be. I think that any way you can produce more housing, the better off we're going to be. So if you could do it more quickly and a more efficiently and at less cost, I think that can only be positive for our community.

Steve:
And I think there's some real excitement around this project, given that it's the first onsite 3D printed home in California and we can't wait to see the finished product. Can you talk to us a little bit about that partnership between Access Home and the City of Redding, Who owns a house? How was the project funded? I know you mentioned that a little bit just now. What other specifics might be helpful for folks to better understand the scope of this project?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
Well, Emergent 3D had met with the city manager's office and with the prospect of utilizing this new technology to print 3D housing, the type of construction then really intrigued the city manager's office. And since housing is a division of the city manager's office, we are interested to find a project where we could utilize this type of construction. Mark Krist and I, who is our associate project coordinator for the housing division, and I were sitting down and basically discussing this, this new type of construction and trying to figure out what project would fit this new type of construction. And over the last few years, we had been in contact with the Community Services Department with regard to their park coast homes. And in the past, Community Services was really looking at utilizing a manufactured home for their park host homes. And we kind of couldn't come together with regard to how to finance it at the time. We we had not accumulated enough funds to to help them build that type of housing. And so when Mark and I were contemplating what to do with this and knowing that we had our community housing development organization or funds set aside for this project or for any project for that matter, we just felt that it would be the light bulb kind of went on at the same time between the two of us, and we said this would be a great project as a photo project. And so we contacted Community Service and asked if they would be interested in this new type of construction for their park host home. And they were very interested. And Access home in the past had also been in contact with community service to essentially be the operating provider for the park host home. And so it really just kind of all fell into place at the same time. We were interested, Community Services was interested, Access home was interested. And so at that point we had a meeting with Don and Jamie and Construction and Emergent 3D to to talk about how we could utilize this 3D printing of a home for the Park host project.

Katie:
Wow. Well, I know that's it's a pretty exciting thing for reading to be the first onsite 3D home build in the state of California. And you were just mentioning that it took HUD quite a long time to agree that the project was a good one. Do you think that reading has paved the way for the rest of the state? Do you think HUD is more likely to fund projects of this type in other places in California because we have it here in Reading?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
Oh, absolutely. Our problems with providing or constructing housing is not only in the city of Redding, it's across the state. And so I think that if this is something that can be done in an efficient manner and constructed quickly at pricing that is at or below normal normal construction costs, I think this would only benefit all of California. You know, we have a housing shortage in the state of California. We have a lot of homelessness. And as I understand it, 3D printed technology. They can do multifamily housing with it. They haven't gotten to that point yet. We're still in the sort of trial and error portion of the development of this type of construction. And but I believe once the procedures get dialed in for the 3D printing, I think there's no limit to what they can do with that type of technology.

Steve:
Well, maybe that's kind of the silver lining. Of this housing shortage a little bit, that it's almost forced local entities such as such as yourselves, as well as HUD, to kind of think outside of the proverbial the construction box, I guess, and and think of new and innovative and maybe more cost effective ways to to address some of those housing shortages that maybe wouldn't have been or would have been too cost prohibitive or lengthy to push through in the past.

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
I would agree in your own mind, it's it's a challenge to get past looking, past traditional construction. But I think we have to I think it's a necessity. And, you know, necessity breeds innovation and we have to have innovation to get beyond where we're at right now, which is we don't have enough workers to build housing. We need housing. And something has to happen to to help alleviate that issue. To get beyond, we need to be innovative. We need to look toward new and exciting ways to do something. I mean, that's what our honestly, that's what our country was founded on.

Katie:
So innovation and I do want to ask a couple of questions around housing shortage specifically. I mean, we hear we hear it a lot that there's a housing shortage. You mentioned a percentage earlier. I can't remember what what it was 1.2.

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
Or 1.4% vacancy rate in the city of Redding.

Katie:
So how does that compare to the state? And then also what makes a housing shortage? Like how do we fix this? Is it just building a lot more houses or how did we get to the place that we are now?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
Well, that's a real big issue as far as how we got here. And I think part of it is, as with a lot of communities, in years past, there have been laws or regulations in place that made it difficult to build housing. You know, you have NIMBYism not in my backyard, communities that that don't want a particular type of housing in their community. And I think the state has really tried to take a leadership role at the state level to get rid of some onerous regulations, requirements of local jurisdictions to housing in general, to building housing in general, and especially income qualified housing. For example, they passed a law that's called SB 35. If you meet certain criteria for a project where it would be considered income eligible housing or affordable housing, you have the ability to not have to go through the entire sale process. They consider it ministerial. You don't have to go through the process and the state has done a number, a number of things like this to to help facilitate the building of more housing in our state. Lily Toy planning Manager probably would be able to give you more information about that. But you know, it's it's things of that nature. It's the labor shortage. It's a number of issues with regard to the building of housing, which is driven up the cost. Of course, now we have supply chain issues. You can't get all of the items that you need to build a house. And some general contractors are waiting months to get their materials to build housing. And this is just something that's relatively new, of course, since the pandemic. But it all comes together. It all makes one big mess. I mean, as far as being able to produce housing.

Steve:
And in your role in housing, do you have reason for optimism for the future of housing, both income eligible housing and otherwise? Here in Redding.

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
I'm fairly optimistic about it, I think, although I think, as I've heard, we were heading into a recession. And so of course that's going to put the damper on the ability for the private industry to build housing. I think it's going to get worse before it gets better. I think a couple of things will happen. I think depending on the population and how many people move into California, how many people leave California will play a part in the availability of housing. Of course, if you decrease the demand, then you have more supply in particular to to our area of the state. You know, you typically have a lot of people that want to move to our area. And I personally don't necessarily consider San Francisco, northern California, but you have. People that are leaving higher cost areas and moving in comparison to a lower cost area such as Shasta County. And so that increases the demand. You know, you have employers or you have other entities in our area that is is a is a draw for people to move here. And so that, you know, creates a demand for housing.

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
And we are on the I-5 corridor. And so you have not just people that are looking to rent or buy housing. This is a draw for the unsheltered because we have fairly good weather. We are on an I five corridor. Shasta County is is good to its people that live here. And so that's a draw for people to come to our community. It's a desirable place to be. And when you have desirable amenities, people are going to want to be here. And so knowing that we probably should get ahead of that and continue to try to develop housing in our community, all types of housing, I mean, there isn't any one type. You know, I think that somebody mentioned to me, you know, aren't you concerned about all of the affordable housing being placed in downtown? And my answer to that is why not? What is the issue with affordable housing? I think we need all kinds of housing in our community. We have all different types of families and persons in our community. There needs to be a lot of different choices when it comes to housing.

Katie:
And from your perspective, how does reading compare to some of our neighboring cities? Are we struggling with a housing shortage as much as they are? Are we kind of better positioned or doing some long term planning? How do we compare?

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
What I would say is I don't think that we are any different than any other area of northern California. I would have to tell you that we are doing an incredible job of trying to produce income eligible housing. And to be perfectly honest, it's because of three things. It's because the release of our project based vouchers for development. It is our community development block grant disaster relief funds that we received in response to the Carr fire. It is also having affordable housing developers that are willing to take the time and effort to compile the funding to actually build income qualifying housing.

Steve:
I think it's really important for the community to know all the hard work that's been going in from the Housing Department on all the things you guys are doing to to address some of these community concerns. There's a lot happening behind the scenes that they're not aware of.

Nicole Smith, COR Housing Authority:
Yeah, and you know what? And there really is we have so many different types of programs. We have so many things that we're doing. You know, we're dipping our toe into the homeless issues and and trying to not necessarily be like a provider of services. That's that's really not our role. That's really the county's role. But really what we want to do is we want to take on more of a leadership role to help facilitate, bring different agencies together, kind of bring everybody together to get a real true plan of attack to to our homeless issue here.

Steve:
Thanks, Nicole. Next, we will turn it over to Dawn, Tim and Saxony from Access Home to learn more about their efforts with income eligible housing and Shasta County and specifically the three D printed home projects here and ready.

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
This is Dawn Smith. I'm executive director with Access Home. My role here with Access is very diverse. We currently have a very extensive portfolio that I oversee all of our homes for that and then our board of directors back in January of 2020, expanded our target population to expand the underserved population to include our workforce housing, housing for seniors, veterans, etc.. So Tim and I and our board of directors and our team here, we've been actively pursuing activities to help fulfill that vision with possibly bringing some new housing type housing ideas to Shasta County.

Saxonny Carmony, Access Home:
My name is Saxony Kamani, and I'm board president for Access Homes. I'm the liaison between the board and the staff members. So Don and her team and we basically are just there to kind of oversee the projects that Don and her team have, make sure they make sense from an outside perspective that we're really upholding the principles of what access home stands for and that we're providing affordable. Housing to our underserved populations here in Shasta County.

Tim Scarborough, Access Home:
All right. My name is Tim Scarborough. I'm the project manager for Access Home, and I was pretty much brought on board because Exosome is starting to do some building developed properties. And so I help oversee that and work with the general contractors and their project managers, as well as any other partnering agency, just to make sure that those projects go smoothly and go according to plan.

Katie:
Thank you, everybody, for being with us here today. I thought the first question could kind of start on a high level view for Dawn. What exactly is access home for somebody who's never heard of that before? What is your organization and what do you do in the community?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
Access Home is a nonprofit H-2, which is a housing development organization, and we come up with creative ideas for target populations for living. Some of our homes are communal living. Some of our homes are supportive living and independent living models and and again, I shared earlier that we're going to be pursuing other housing activities, which means we're going to be offering more housing for for families and for our community as a whole.

Steve:
And on that note, with it being a nonprofit, how is access home funded?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
Various streams. We originally were founded for a need. The clients who are of far more than regional center is they developmental centers. And the state hospitals were closing the ladder men Act was surfaced or was was birthed and from there the clients needed somewhere to live. And so our founder, Val Jones, got really creative and came up with our our models. We've been very successful with them. And again, a lot of our homes at this time are housed with clients from far north. But we also have private citizens living in our homes as well. And we again are looking to expand that to the larger population.

Katie:
And so then just to clarify on that piece of if you're a community member who may be in need of housing, can they come to you directly or do you really work through organizations?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
We are not mandated to have a referral process. This is new for us. Like at this time, I we have one unit open and I believe our property manager has like ten applications for it. And so I ask her to hold it at that and to go through those and select someone. But once we get the houses up and going, we've purchased a few different lots of land throughout the county and I think a combination will be about 100 homes in combination with the three lands, pieces of land. But we are in the very early stages of developing those and hope to be able to share more about that very, very soon.

Steve:
And within that structure, so does Access Home own the home itself and then rents it to those members in the community who might qualify for the housing?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
Right.

Katie:
And then it sounds like you're larger than just reading specific. What region do you serve?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
Our bylaws permit for us to operate anywhere in the state of California, but we are housed our home bases here in Shasta County and reading right on the back side of City Hall right here on Park View. And it keeps us pretty busy. So we would really like to get a really good formation set and model set here, home base and then possibly branch out. We do have homes in Butte and Tehama County at the moment and again, we would like to move further south or east or west. But again, home base just has such a need here in our community and we see it every day and we're really committed to making a difference here in Shasta first and then go from there.

Steve:
Fantastic. And Tim, maybe I'll turn this question over to you. In an earlier episode, we connected with Emergent 3D to talk about the first 3D home being built on site in California, right here in Redding in Enterprise Park. How is Access Home connected with the emergent three D project in Enterprise Park?

Tim Scarborough, Access Home:
Yeah, so basically it's a partnership with the City of Redding Access Home, Donna Jamison, Construction and then also Emergent 3D. And so we are designated as the owner operator of those first two projects, the first one going in at Enterprise Park and then the second one at John Auto Boat Ramp. Most people know that as the Bonny View boat ramp still. And so our job not only overseeing as it's being built and keeping tabs with all of that, but then we will as an organization be making the selection for the park hosts who will live in those homes. And then we'll continue to monitor and manage it after that.

Katie:
And then maybe we could just talk about for a second like what is a park host and what makes this opportunity a good fit for your organization. What's the type of person that you're looking for to fill this particular role and why is that need there?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
We don't have a specific. Person or family and mind. We're looking for someone who's income qualified, who has the ability to use good judgment and. Every morning, each morning. It's a commitment to getting up and going in and locking the gates at the parks and at the boat ramp, and then also unlocking the bathrooms and just having a presence there. We don't want anybody to police the park or the boat ramp. We just are looking for someone to have a presence there and develop a rapport with the public as they come out and visit the park to the boat ramp. And in addition for that, at night it would basically be the reversal to do a lot check and make sure the parking lots are empty before locking the gates and then bathrooms and locking all of that up and again, reporting anything unusual or out of service. And a Parks and Rec team may have overlooked, maybe they didn't notice because it's still daylight outside. They may not realize that a lights out or something just to be eyes and ears on the ground. And also for enterprise Park, it's really it's a fantastic park. It's very active for our community. And the Parks Park and Rec also offers reservations for specific areas of the park, for parties or family reunions or various events. And so the park host for Enterprise Park will also have the responsibility to ensure that those reservation signs are placed appropriately. And again, just have a presence there in a sense of community.

Steve:
And Dawn through the nature of those roles. Do they then I guess live cost free in the housing because they're responsible for those park duties?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
That's the goal, or very, very minimal. Each family is different and unique. There are a lot of say a lot there is criteria and it's it's income qualified, which would be low income. And then we do suggest or recommend encourage for a second source of income, whether that be a part time job, that would not conflict with the park host responsibilities or another source of income such as Social Security for retirement or something of that nature. But again, we we don't have any specific you have to meet this box really. It's open at this time and we'll know when we meet that right person, hopefully or family that this will be it. And I'm scheduling a time to meet with our veterans reps through the ED office this week. They came to our open house and they have some veterans that they have in mind as well. So certainly want to entertain the idea of that possibility for our veterans.

Steve:
On the topic of three D printed homes, what's what's the draw for Access home? I mean, obviously this is a really unique opportunity being the first onsite here and state and it sounds like there's a few three D homes that will be printed soon. How does that fit into the business model with Access Home and why was I was that such a draw for you guys?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
It was a draw. We were very actually went on as Jamie and Matthew first came to me. There's a little story behind it. I said, No, it just seemed too farfetched for us. And my daughter has seven adopted children from seven up to early twenties and was my night for dinner that night after my meeting here with Don and Matt. And I just very quickly, I went to their house to ask him what they wanted for dinner that night and nobody would talk to me. So I sent out a group text and it was like, Oh, grandma's here. And so I was so annoyed with that that that situation. When I went home that night, I kept replaying that. And I remember Matthew saying during our meeting that the future is right here. And it's true. Our future generations are very tech savvy. And so I got to thinking about it, and we had some board members who have since retired and what I went to them, they said, no, it was too big. And then I asked them to rethink it and to please reconsider, because it does seem like it's a great opportunity for our community and to be on the cutting edge and the pioneers for this is really exciting. I'm not a contractor or a construction person, but just from from my observation, even with the homemade enterprise park, there were a lot of learning curves for a lot of different stakeholders for that house, and it's just really exciting to be part of it.

Katie:
Agreed. It is a very exciting new construction method. I'm not sure if this question would be better for Dawn or Tim, but you mentioned the NADO boat ramp project as well as the one that's in Enterprise Park going on right now. Are there other projects on the horizon with Emergent three D and Access Home?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
There is. We have a multifamily units going up on St Mark's, which is off Lake Boulevard, and there will be four three bedroom, two bath homes developed there and those are committed to a specific community partner. I'm not at liberty at this time to to share who that is. I believe the plan is from Régionale. They'll go up there and start those homes.

Steve:
What does the future of affordable housing look like in our community?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
That's that's the million dollar question. I think if we all have the answer to that, I will say for Access Home, we're very supportive of our partnering agencies who are bringing the micro shelter. And the tiny transitional housing to Shasta County and to all of the north state, not just exclusively for Shasta. I'm a member of our NorCal S.O.S. Advisory Board, and we do get together each month and and strategize. And our goal is to offer housing solutions. So we're very supportive of of the transitional and temporary homes, but we want to offer the permanent housing component. After that, a person has maybe gone through their program or walk the steps and is really housing ready, and we want to embrace those individuals and families.

Saxonny Carmony, Access Home:
I'd like to jump into I know that with COVID and everything that's gone on over the last few years, we've noticed that there's also a need just not on the target demographics that we've focused on before people with disabilities, homelessness, but also the middle class, right? Like we've all suffered. There's been inflation. Everything is so expensive. I know a couple of months ago it was hard to even find housing. So we're we're broadening our horizons and really making sure that we can provide affordable housing to everybody within the community. And I think it will have a huge impact on the households, on the economy. So we're just we're kind of looking at a more broad perspective and seeing what we could do to all different demographics of Shasta County, too. So we're really excited. We have some big projects and funding ideas. So we're hoping that as things go on and we see how these three RD homes go and other projects that we're working on, that we'll be able to provide some good solutions to the issues that are going on in Shasta County right now in terms of housing.

Steve:
And for those community members listing, what's the best way for the community to help with the Shasta County housing crisis if they want to get involved or want to lend their assistance in some way, shape or form, what's what's the best way for them to do that?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
Well, they could certainly call our our administrative office at 530224 2800. And then also on our website, there's a you can contact us on the website too. And we do respond to those messages as quickly as we can. I don't know if we're going to be doing another open house or not. We have quite a turnout here last week. So again, we'll work. We have like two and one half pages of names and phone numbers. So we'll work down that and see if we'll need to host a second one for rationale. But hopefully with one of the families from this list, we'll be able to make a selection.

Katie:
And I know Access Home is not the only organization in our local area really trying to tackle this issue. That really is it's a national issue. Are there any other community partners that you regularly work with either to generate funding or partner with on projects.

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
At this time We have far Northern has been one of our big supporters from other regional center for our developments with them. The city of Redding has been phenomenal. I we appreciate them so much more than words can even express. The city has been just fantastic, very supportive, willing to think outside the box. So again the team at the housing and planning over at the city's just been wonderful to work with. And then on a smaller scale, we have received some small donations from from partners and partnering agencies. But we're we're really looking at some new ideas that we've not done before, and that's to help our homes. Some of them not have the rent or the deed restrictions on them. So with that, we'll have to get more personal funding or do more loans. So that's what the plan that we're looking at, because as Saxon had earlier stated, we want to reach that broader population and include our workforce families in it as well. And we have those deed restrictions. We're only allowed to rent to the target population that that grant fulfills. So not to say that we're not looking, we certainly are. If you have any funding opportunities or know of any place, send them our way. But we're we're really just at the drawing board. But we have some great plans and we have a few great partnering agencies that want to come on board with us. But it's too soon to disclose those.

Steve:
Well, we thank you for the hard work you do in the community. I know it's it's making a real difference and we're super appreciative. Is there anything else that we haven't talked about yesterday that you want to be sure we cover?

Dawn Smith, Access Home:
If you don't mind, I always I have the gift to talk. Sometimes it gets me, but I would just like to share that we've talked about Emergent 3D and Dona Jamie and Construction. I really have to say that I was most impressed with Co bod. That's the manufacturer of the three D printer and their team. They came out and spent about a month. I and I will admit that my mind was very closed. I grew up in a construction background and five generations of various trades in the construction industry. And I will tell you, I had a lot of concerns about replacing jobs. We're not going to need electricians anymore, yada, yada, yada. And I will tell you, I don't mind being wrong. And on this time, I really didn't mind being wrong. I was educated. They had a young gal here. She's not really that young. Her name's Sophie and she's she leads the team for CO. And she was sharing with me how she wishes that we could not we but as a whole how we could integrate our today technology, what they're bringing forth and are today's contractors and vendors and their specialties. We need electricians, we need plumbers, We we need drywall. We you know, we need all of the stuff that still builds a house, the printers building the walls. It's not building. We need cabinets. We need everything that goes into the home. And so I really like to, if nothing else, have a walk away with that, that we're not trying to this the concept is not to replace anybody or their jobs. It's to help offer an additional housing solution and a way to do it. And I was again, really, really very impressed with board and their level of professionalism and wanting to make that inclusion for the current workforce as well.

Saxonny Carmony, Access Home:
I just want to say thank you to the city of Redding, thank you to Don and her team and Donna, Damian and his team. I think that this is really exciting times. I think we're going to see a lot of growth and development and community engagement and seeing everybody really come together. So we're just really proud and excited to be a part of that and just see where the next few years take us with all of this.

Tim Scarborough, Access Home:
Yeah, and I would just echo what Don and what Saxony said, You know, as far as as we're moving forward, as we're looking at solutions for affordable housing, one of the things that one of the things that the 3D printed House has done is it has actually brought more awareness in the community regarding affordable housing and the need for it. And so it's created a buzz that I think is very positive and it's got people's focus and attention on that particular need in our communities.

Katie:
As a reminder, we are really looking for community feedback for this podcast. If you have questions, comments or suggestions for episodes, please email us at podcast at City of Redding dot org. We'd love to hear from you and incorporate those questions into future episodes.

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