Minnesota affordable housing nonprofit hopes to raise $65 million amid 'general distress'

CommonBond Communities, the affordable housing giant that owns more than 7,000 units in 60 cities, is trying to raise $65 million to enhance its aging housing stock. The capital campaign, dubbed "Framing the Future," will be the biggest capital campaign in CommonBond's 53-year history.

Its goals:

1. Continue to fund Advantage Services, the division of CommonBond that helps residents with housing stability, which includes paying utilities, accessing food, navigating school systems and other everyday tasks.
2. Enhance the nonprofit's aging housing stock and continue to construct new housing to supply the region's demand for affordable rentals.
3. Advocate for policies that support affordable housing at the Legislature.

"The multiple pandemics of public health, financial hardship, racial reconciliation and public safety implications, all of these things have kind of conspired, and there's a general distress and greater need among a lot of people that we're seeing show up across our portfolio regardless of income level," said CommonBond president Deidre Schmidt.

Signs of increased hardship among CommonBond's residents are showing up in subtle ways.

Before COVID-19, about 85% of residents paid their rent by the fifth of the month, but today 85% of residents pay within the last five days of the month, said Schmidt. Anecdotally, Advantage Services coordinators are hearing more from residents who say they have to choose between making rent and feeding their families.

The costs of hiring private security and installing Virtual Blue monitoring software are up at all buildings, while public safety systems continue to struggle with staffing following the murder of George Floyd. And portfolio-wide, CommonBond's balance of overdue rent this year is more than $1 million.

Funds from the capital campaign will not be used to offset unpaid rent, said CommonBond spokesperson Katie Selph, but will help staffers continue to offer eviction prevention services.

Before COVID-19, public funding would cover 10% of Advantage Services, while CommonBond and its regular donors would co-pay the remaining 90%. But due to increases in operating costs and loss of rental income over the past four years, CommonBond's ability to pay its portion of Advantage Services has "pretty much evaporated," said Schmidt.

"Our ability to continue to offer services like we do now is really dependent on our ability to fundraise in a way like never before," she said. "So the first thing people should understand about the campaign is that if they like this concept of investing in people, not just bricks and mortar, that's where their donations are going."

The capital campaign has raised $57 million from its regular institutional donors. By launching it publicly on Friday, CommonBond officials hope to appeal to regular people looking to help reduce homelessness.

Ken Petit-Rivard, an Advantage Services coordinator, said he spends most of his time helping residents get a handle on their bills before they snowball into bigger crises that could threaten their housing.

"So I have a lady who has a light bill, right?" he said. "Part of her housing is that she maintains her electricity. Through COVID she fell behind, so she's made the effort to come into the office once a week, we go through her stuff, and she managed to get on a payment plan now where she's able to pay a small amount and maintain her housing. So we got electricity, we do [food stamps], we'll do any services with the county."

Petit-Rivard is based at Whittier Community Housing, 2609 Blaisdell Av. S. The original Whittier was a 40-unit apartment more than a century old that was recently renovated as part of a project that also added 45 new units.

As part of a tour of the Whittier's new addition that CommonBond offered the Star Tribune this week, officials showed off bright multibedroom units with new kitchen fixtures.

Schmidt said her message to the nonprofit's 13,000 residents is that they are working on getting improvements done like the work that was recently finished at the Whittier, where people who had been living in a historic property maintained their leases while the units were upgraded with new flooring and windows. The $65 million won't be enough to do the same across all of CommonBond's buildings, but it will help them continue to work systematically across the portfolio, Schmidt said.