[The following final update was written by the organization and then sent to us for further sharing.]

LA Voice’s Faith in Housing Program Leads YIGBY Movement

LA Voice is proud to share that the “Yes In God’s Backyard” is alive and growing in Los Angeles County! With support from LA2050 and the Goldhirsh Foundation, our Faith in Housing program has been working to expand the pipeline of congregations and faith communities who are interested in building affordable housing on their land. By creating effective partnerships between congregations and developers, this innovative solution helps to mitigate the affordable housing and homelessness crisis, while also allowing congregations to serve a community's needs as well as increase their economic sustainability. It also ensures that congregation-owned land remains under community control and does not enter the speculative market.

LA Voice’s Faith in Housing program helps congregations by guiding their discernment and visioning process, providing site analysis and feasibility studies, and coordinating developer selection. We are currently working with 54 active congregations—with a potential yield of 5,239 housing units and one congregation, Inglewood United Methodist Church, expects to break ground on 60 units in the first quarter of 2025.

Two other congregations, East Whittier United Methodist Church and Immanuel Presbyterian Church, moved to the stage of issuing a request for proposal (RFP) for prospective developers, and we anticipate several more to be released soon. We are also working with a consultant to assist three sites experiencing delays due to being historical properties.

One of the lessons we have learned over the course of this grant was how important it is to be as candid as possible with interested congregations about the length of the process and the potential obstacles that may be encountered throughout. We have solved for a good portion of this by implementing the educational cohort program.

Faith in Housing staff have held two educational cohorts each year, with a total of 24 congregations participating during the LA2050 grant period—as well as more than 7 non-congregational groups currently joining the Fall 2024 cohort to learn more about the process. Each cohort includes a four-session, interactive curriculum through which interested congregations receive information about the design, financing, and construction processes. The cohort model streamlines the process and—with its built-in, face-to-face contact over a sustained period—has also resulted in congregations staying more involved and actively continuing the conversation after cohort meetings conclude.

Throughout the vetting process, many Los Angeles County faith communities faced restrictive zoning ordinances, experienced lengthy rezoning delays, or had to abandon their projects. To provide options for smaller sites or those with more limited financing, the Faith in Housing program expanded project offerings to include an alternative accessory dwelling unit (ADU) option—secondary residential units that are either expansions or free-standing structures sharing lots with larger residences. We also reduced the barrier to entry by commissioning and sharing designs for ADU. We currently have ADU projects in progress for five congregations, including Inglewood United Methodist Church, Restauracion LA Church, Chatsworth United Methodist Church, Story Church, and United University Church.

The number of eligible congregations interested in exploring options for building affordable housing has grown significantly—thanks in large part to the October 2023 passage of SB4, the Affordable Housing on Faith Lands Act, which eliminated the need for site-by-site zoning. This has created additional opportunity for the Faith in Housing program to reach new faith communities.

As a result of SB4, Faith in Housing has received even broader media coverage in the last six months, including:

• The New York Times (April 27, 2024): What Would Jesus Do? Tackle the Housing Crisis, Say Some Congregations
• Spectrum 1 News video (June 11, 2024): A House of Worship Becomes a Home for Angelenos in Need
• LAist (August 14, 2024): Why the Catholic church plans to develop affordable housing in LA, and how they aim to do it
• KCRW (August 28, 2024): Laguna Beach church plans to build rare affordable housing
• LA Times (September 1, 2024): Affordable housing on church parking lots? A new law makes it easier to build
• Bloomberg (September 24, 2024): Why Turning Churches Into Housing Is So Hard

LA Voice has also expanded the reach of this work beyond Los Angeles County through an apprenticeship program that features monthly virtual sessions as well as in-person tours of demonstration sites. Recent participants have included representation from Oakland, CA; Denver, CO; Eugene, OR; Houston, TX; and Spokane, WA. We are also working to replicate a technical team to provide additional capacity in guiding new faith communities through this process. Lastly, Faith in Housing continues to share and receive best practices with others, through participation in national groups of faith housing advisors and developers, including Gone for Good authors/RootedGood, and Faith Property Professionals.

LA Voice is deeply appreciative of support from LA2050 and looks forward to further building on the momentum for this project throughout Los Angeles County, the state of California, and beyond.