Today is the first day of the Willamette Week’s 2023 giving season – yahoo! Our Just Future is thrilled to be part of the Give!Guide again this year, our region’s most popular giving campaign, along with 250 other terrific non-profits that make our region a better place. You’ll find Our Just Future (formerly Human Solutions) in the “Home” category again this year, because access to affordable housing for everyone is our top goal! When you make a gift to Our Just Future, you help us support people seeking affordable housing and economic security so they can have the housing security that everyone in our community should have.
BONUS! Today is one of the Give!Guide’s BIG GIVE DAYS, meaning that when you donate $10 or more, you could win an overnight stay at a beautiful SCP Hotel in Oregon (SCP hotels have a unique focus on personal wellness, social good, and the environment). One donation means three chances to win at three beautiful destinations! Thank you for considering a donation today – we so appreciate your support!
PS: Exciting announcements in our fall newsletter, including our new affordable housing community and a terrific book we think you’ll love!
https://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Participant-Badge.png15001500Alycia Duranhttps://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Our-Just-Future-fka-HSI-logo.pngAlycia Duran2023-11-01 13:48:032023-11-02 15:10:37Cheers! 🎉 It’s Give!Guide Season
Last week we celebrated the opening of our newest affordable housing community, The Aurora, which adds 93 much-needed affordable rental apartments to the Rosewood neighborhood of outer SE Portland. We beganwelcoming residents this summer andare excited for the building to be fully occupied this fall.
This new affordable housing community furthers the vision of Portland voters who passed the Portland Housing Bond in 2016. Bond funds provided core funding to design and build this beautiful and relevant new housing community, the kind of permanent solution for families experiencing homelessness our community desperately needs.
What’s Special About The Aurora?
Here are some notable features of The Aurora:
93 Affordable Apartments with a mix of one-, two and three-bedroom apartments for people with low and very low incomes, many exiting homelessness.
16 Permanent Supportive Housing Units designed for families with children transitioning out of homelessness. This type of apartment is an important answer to our homelessness crisis because they offer targeted supports to help residents stay housed.
Wraparound Services to help residents maintain their housing and overall wellbeing. LifeWorks NW and Our Just Future will provide a range of on-site services, including behavioral and mental health counseling and connections to other providers to meet residents’ specific needs.
Resident Amenities. Residents will have free high-speed internet access in every apartment and throughout the building, a multi-use community room for activities and events, lobby lounge space, an indoor play area for kids, laundry room, outdoor play area and courtyard, and off-street parking.
Solar Panels to Keep Cost and Impacts Down. Residents with low incomes benefit when utility costs are lower, as they can be with solar, and our entire community benefits from renewable energy. These panels offset 50 tons of CO2 annually!
We are thrilled to welcome Elsa Natal to Our Just Future as our next Director of Affordable Housing. Elsa brings a depth of experience developing affordable housing in our region that is already boosting our production and growing new opportunities, which is exciting for us and our community.
Building affordable housing is a core part of our work here at Our Just Future, because we believe that housing is a human right and that homelessness is a housing problem. Adding more affordable rental apartments to our community is one important tool in our fight to end homelessness, because the severe lack of housing in our area is the most significant cause of the rampant housing insecurity and homelessness our neighbors are experiencing.
Meet Elsa:
Elsa’s professional mission is to provide affordable housing to those who need it most, promote housing security and build equitable communities, which aligns perfectly with Our Just Future’s vision of vibrant, healthy neighborhoods where all people can share in the security, hopes and advantages of a thriving, supportive community.
Building affordable housing is a complex endeavor. Elsa’s two decades of experience doing this work means she is able to manage the 19 affordable housing communities we already own and operate, move our current projects forward, and create a pipeline of future opportunities. As a large organization channeling public and private funds into this work, it is our responsibility to add as many new affordable units as possible as quickly as possible, and having Elsa leading our housing development team means we can live up to this big responsibility.
Importantly, Elsa is also deeply committed to and practiced in social justice work, which is essential here at Our Just Future, where addressing the racial injustices of our housing system is a top priority. Given our nation’s past when it comes to racist housing policy, those of us doing this work must prioritize racial justice, for there is no housing justice without racial justice. Plain and simple. Elsa’s experience and commitment to racial justice is inspiring – and we are so happy to have her as a part of the team! We can’t wait to see what we can accomplish next.
https://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Our-Just-Future-fka-HSI-logo.png00Alycia Duranhttps://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Our-Just-Future-fka-HSI-logo.pngAlycia Duran2023-10-23 17:20:422023-10-23 17:29:00Meet Elsa, OJF’s new Housing Director!
https://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/YEA-materials_The-Aurora-construction-square.png10801080Alycia Duranhttps://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Our-Just-Future-fka-HSI-logo.pngAlycia Duran2023-05-19 12:17:342023-05-19 12:25:43Building A More Just Future Takes All of Us
https://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/OJF-Email_volunteer-opportunities_header-scaled.jpg10242560KrystalEhttps://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Our-Just-Future-fka-HSI-logo.pngKrystalE2023-01-01 07:52:442023-01-03 10:03:12Ways to Get Involved in January
https://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/YEA-Nick-fish-horizontal.png6191546KrystalEhttps://ourjustfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Our-Just-Future-fka-HSI-logo.pngKrystalE2022-12-30 06:00:492022-12-29 08:50:12Lack of Housing, Key to the Crisis
Thanks to community support, we’re able to take many approaches to housing stability, because people are different and need a range of tools to thrive.