MC: Of course. Actually, my interest in homelessness and housing goes back to my years as a homeless teenager in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, in the late 1990s.
I had actually left home at the age of fourteen, in 1995, and I was homeless for about two years, in the shelter system, eventually in my own apartment at the age of sixteen. I was legally emancipated in 1997, a legal adult at sixteen. All of this was nearly twenty years ago.
I went on to pursue advocacy around homelessness and housing issues when I was in college, and I really have to credit the National Coalition for the Homeless for inviting me to their policy conferences in 2002 and 2003.
A lot of people don't understand how the daily struggles faced by millions of people--simply to afford housing on a monthly basis--are actually a public policy issue. People have come to accept the idea that housing costs are determined by the private market - but even that is a policy decision. There are things governments can do to bring down the costs of housing--rent control, public housing to compete with the private market, subsidies and investments, land banks, smart land use decisions, smart use of federal dollars, Housing Trust Funds, tiny houses--there's no shortage of solutions.
What I'm saying is, the fact that we have millions of homeless families, and millions more struggling with the burden of housing cost - is a policy choice, a failure of action, and sometimes the results of actions (like demolition approvals).
Sometimes people ask why I'm working on something as technical-sounding as Impact Statements. But I really believe this is the right procedural tool to focus our attention on the policy-related causes of people's day-to-day struggles to pay their rent.
I am moved to act by my personal experiences, and I want to help people understand the connection between our shared experiences around housing - and the democratic government that has failed us.
JB: Thanks for sharing your own story. It's easy now to understand your particular sensitivity to this issue. How did you go about getting the Model Bill adopted in Atlanta? What are the steps involved in making this happen? And are those skills easily transferable to other municipalities?
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