Santa Rosa Metro Chamber Receives Prestigious Award for Housing Fund
The Santa Rosa Metro Chamber proudly announces a prestigious recognition received for its Sonoma County Housing Fund program at the Western Association of Chamber Executives (WACE) awards ceremony held in Anaheim early February. Representing chambers of commerce from approximately 20 states across the western United States, the event brought together industry professionals and leaders to celebrate excellence and innovation in the chamber industry.
The Santa Rosa Metro Chamber (SRMC) continues to emerge as a standout among its peers with its commitment to strengthening the local economy and promoting and improving the community through its many quality programs. The “Outstanding Chamber Program” award for the Sonoma County Housing Fund recognizes SRMC’s dedication to fostering economic growth and enhancing the quality of life in its community.
The Sonoma County Housing Fund (SCHF) is an initiative of SRMC in partnership with Housing Trust Silicon Valley (HTSV), a nonprofit community loan fund that works to improve the quality of life for low-income people in the greater Bay Area, including Sonoma County. In 2019, SRMC identified the opportunity to accelerate housing development by helping to finance “pre-development” costs. These development expenses are often very difficult or expensive to finance, presenting a significant obstacle for otherwise financially viable projects to begin construction. HTSV provides all lending and loan services for the program.
In early 2020, with seed investment from Kaiser Permanente, SRMC quickly launched the fund to help finance three projects that would create 250 affordable housing units. This initial success led to additional investment from Kaiser Permanente and Community Foundation Sonoma County. Based on the agreement with HTSV, the housing fund is able to bring in nearly four times the amount of capital from Silicon Valley to match locally raised investment.
SCHF has now funded seven projects, providing new homes for hundreds of families throughout Sonoma County, with several projects already repaying their loans allowing more projects to move toward financing. Investments in these seven affordable housing developments have produced 583 homes. Based on the average household size (2.5) in Sonoma County, project leaders estimate 1,457 individuals have benefited from this initiative. Based on local average income, many people who are critical to the health of our community will qualify for housing in these projects. For example, social service workers, teachers, childcare providers, many starting first responders, construction workers, restaurant and retail workers will have access to these and future projects.
The seven projects to date include:
- Stony Point Flats (Santa Rosa). 50 units.
- Siesta Senior Apartments (Unincorporated Sonoma County). 92 units
- ACME Apartments (Santa Rosa). 77 units
- Shiloh Terrace (Windsor). 134 units
- McNear Lofts (Petaluma). 92 units
- Pullman Lofts Phase 3 (Santa Rosa). 74 units
- 200/209 B Street (Santa Rosa). 64 units
Housing—the lack of affordable and workforce housing in particular—is perhaps the most significant impediment to our region’s economic success. No one organization working alone is going to solve it. SRMC is proud to partner with local organizations like Generation Housing and Burbank Housing among others. At the same time, SRMC takes accountability for what it can do in moving together collectively to address the issue of affordable housing development in pursuit of building a sustainable, inclusive economy for all in Sonoma County.
“If our kids are going to have a good education, we need to make sure our teachers can afford to live here,” said Peter Rumble, CEO of the Santa Rosa Metro Chamber of Commerce. “If our technology companies are going to thrive, we need to be able to recruit engineers. If we are going to be able to care for our aging population, our hospitals need to keep nurses and caregivers living here. If our tourism industry is going to continue to be the envy of the world, we need to make sure there is a thriving workforce in our community. All of this comes back to creating housing throughout Sonoma County. While the Sonoma County Housing Fund isn’t the single solution, it is an important step forward. And with the results we’ve seen so far, I’m hopeful we will be able to raise even more capital for the fund so we can build on this success.”
The Chamber welcomes additional investment in the fund, as well as inquiries from interested affordable housing developers. For more information about the Sonoma County Housing Fund, please go to the Chamber’s website at santarosametrochamber.com/programs/sonoma-county-housing-fund/
