Helping Neighbors Find Affordable Housing

As Executive Director of NeighborWorks Alaska, Jim MacKenzie admits it can be challenging to explain the multifaceted types of work the Anchorage-based nonprofit performs.

“We are kind of a complicated organization. It’s really hard sometimes for folks to get their head wrapped around what we do,” he said. “We are very much a neighborhood organization and we are very much in our community. And we are happy to be involved in trying to come to solutions with some of the biggest problems our community is facing right now, which is housing and homelessness.”

A History of Helping

For more than four decades, NeighborWorks has been looking at ways to provide affordable housing for those who need it most. Today, that work includes:

• Managing more than 1,000 affordable housing rental units across Anchorage.
• Offering supportive housing for individuals facing homelessness. NeighborWorks features case managers, community partnerships and programs that help address the roots of homelessness and seek to get people on a path to financial independence.
• Providing homeownership and financial counseling to assist individuals in learning about their finances and how to manage them.
• Home modification grants for homeowners. 

That comprehensive approach is a direct response to the challenges many Alaskans have in finding affordable housing or who may be at risk for homelessness. NeighborWorks recognizes there is rarely a one-size-fits-all solution to providing affordable housing because there are so many variables that may lead people to require assistance.

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“Because these are really complicated circumstances, it’s not simply just putting four walls around a person. You have to make sure that that person has the skills, the knowledge and the support to be able to stay in those four walls. We know that to keep people housed successfully, it’s not just handing someone a key. It’s making sure that the supports are there day in and day out.”

– Jim MacKenzie, Executive Director of NeighborWorks Alaska

 

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Helping Neighbors from the Start

Helping neighbors was the reason that the organization began in 1980 when a group of citizens gathered around a kitchen table to look at ways to improve neighborhoods in Anchorage. Affordable, safe housing was the focus of the organization’s founders and it’s still the mission at NeighborWorks.

Today, the organization has more than 60 employees. The supporting housing team alone provides assistance to nearly 700 individuals facing homelessness. And while NeighborWorks has expanded to meet the growing needs of the community, helping people remains at its core.

“When people come to us, we walk them through from the start to the finish. Once they’re in a specific program and we’re able to stabilize them, help them get their basic needs met, teach them how to be a good tenant and come up with a budget, then we’re able to identify other programs that are less intensive case management and just basic rental assistance,” said Laura Cox-Wilson, Director of Supportive Housing. “We utilize that ‘moving on’ strategy with their case manager to get them into a position where they can sustain their housing on their own without any assistance from us, or the community.”

Partnering to Help Alaskans

Community is crucial to their clients’ success. NeighborWorks has partners that provide a variety of different types of assistance, from landlords who offer affordable housing to organizations like Alaska Housing Finance Corporation that provide funding sources, access to supportive housing programs, homelessness assistance and much more.  

“It can’t work without collaboration and AHFC is probably the biggest partner we have, whether it be in supportive housing or our property management or an entity to talk to that understands what public and affordable housing entails,” MacKenzie said. “There are infinite problems, infinite challenges and finite resources, so there’s no margin for us not to be working together. It is critical that our community come together because this issue of housing and homelessness is not going to go away.”

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Learn more about NeighborWorks Alaska and how it’s helping Alaskans find affordable housing options.