IMPROVING OUR EXISTING HOUSING STOCK

guest opinion by Yarrow Brown

Housing quality is key to community health and economic development, but it’s often overlooked in rural communities.

What is housing quality? It’s the physical conditions of a home that contribute to the health outcomes of individuals. Edgar Camero’s blog post titled “Pathways to Improved Housing Quality in Rural Places” at Change Lab Solutions caught my eye, and it’s an appropriate time to focus on our aging regional housing stock and what we can do about it.

Aging housing stock—units built before 1980—is a housing quality issue that impacts rural households whether they own or rent. In rural communities, more than half of all households—an estimated 9.4 million households—live in units that were built prior to 1980, according to the article by Camero. Our region’s shares of renter-occupied (31.6 percent) and owneroccupied (30.3 percent) housing units built prior to 1970 are slightly higher than the state averages of 25 and 22.7 percent.

The recent 10-county Housing Needs Assessment (HNA) noted this as a threat or weakness to meeting our housing needs. The HNA pointed out an extremely low vacancy rate in our region of 0.7 percent (a healthy market should be 4-6 percent). This means we have so few housing options available, many who have the means are stepping down, and many who are lower income are forced to live in poor quality conditions because of the tight inventory.

The HNA also demonstrated that a notable portion of the households live in housing that’s considered substandard, including overcrowded housing or units that lack complete kitchens or plumbing. Nearly 2,000 occupied housing units are overcrowded, and over 1,200 units lack complete kitchens or plumbing facilities.

Three of our 10 counties have overall shares of overcrowded renter-occupied units of at least 5 percent: Wexford, Missaukee, and Kalkaska. These overcrowded renter-occupied units are higher than the regional figure of 3.2 percent and Michigan’s 2.9 percent. Missaukee also has the largest share—30 percent—of overcrowded owner-occupied units. Regarding incomplete plumbing or kitchens, Charlevoix County has the largest share (5.1 percent) of renteroccupied housing with this issue, while Grand Traverse County has the largest share of owneroccupied housing with incomplete plumbing or kitchens at 4.1 percent.

Aging housing stock can exacerbate poor housing conditions in rural places, which in turn affect the lives of households and entire communities. Rural communities face a range of housing quality issues from inadequate water access to faulty plumbing, high heating costs, poor ventilation, leaking roofs, and mold. Deferred maintenance leads to higher costs for the needed improvements.

Three levels of programs can help preserve our housing stock, which local communities can consider. These include proactive rental inspection programs, regional or countywide housing rehabilitation programs, or federal funding programs.

I want to suggest we look at rental inspection programs, which are a practical solution for our northwest Michigan communities to improve and conserve their housing stock. Communities can create a Proactive Rental Inspection (PRI) program that aims to protect tenants from substandard housing conditions by monitoring and identifying housing quality issues before housing stock begins to deteriorate. It can also help our communities monitor the year-round and short-term rentals to create a balance and ensure sufficient year-round housing.

Proactively inspecting rental housing helps keep people in their homes, focuses on improving housing quality, and protects the tenants’ well-being. It also allows municipalities to tailor housing inspections to address specific local issues and take the burden of initiating requests or complaints off the tenant.

Lastly, these programs help preserve community stability and property values by requiring maintenance of housing properties around housing and set goals to help bring more resources to our region to meet our incredible need for housing. But we need local governments to understand their housing stock and ensure both home ownership and rental units are property maintained for the overall health and wellbeing of our community.

Yarrow Brown is the executive director of Housing North, a 10-county housing agency serving northwest Michigan.

How Was Your Summer Vacation?

I bet it was better than this couple's. Alan Stevens, 50, of Hull, England, booked a surprise 17-day trip for his wife's birthday to the Dominican Republic for late June. When they arrived, however, it was clear the resort's "five-star" rating was a mistake. Hull Live reported that while at the resort, Stevens and his wife observed a variety of alarming behaviors. "When we went out to the pool for the first time, we saw guests smoking weed in the pool, people having sex in the pool ... one woman being sick all over herself in the pool, and another guest actually defecate in the pool -- it was disgusting," Stevens said. "We were approached by people offering us drugs about 10 times in the 17 days we were there. A woman fell from a balcony while we were there, and we walked past and saw her body hidden under a sheet. ... We had no idea what was going on." He continued: "When we were out one day, I saw a man knocked clean off his motorbike. I just burst out crying because on top of everything else that had happened, it was such a shock." The travel company Stevens worked with offered 200 pounds in vouchers and counseling credits, which Stevens called "a joke. This was 100% the worst holiday we've ever been on."

Maryland's Kimberly "Kimycola" Winter has eructed her way into history with a Guinness World Record, United Press International reported on Aug. 2. Winter broke the previous record for loudest burp (female) with a 107.3-decibel growler. That's louder than a blender, an electric handheld drill and even some motorcycles. She prepared for the event with breakfast, coffee and beer. Winter said to achieve the big belch, she takes a deep breath and tries to "manipulate that into something monstrous and magical." She admitted she loves to shock strangers with her burps. "I love to be

Suspicions Confirmed

The Hangzhou Zoo in eastern China has gotten a big bump in visitor numbers this week -- 30% more, to 20,000 a day! -- since Angela the Malayan sun bear went viral. Reuters reported that Angela captured social media attention when she stood up on her hind legs and stretched her neck out to look at visitors. In fact, her behavior was so humanlike that people thought maybe the zoo had dressed a worker up in a bear suit. "After we saw the video on the internet, we specially took the high-speed train from Suzhou to come over to see the bear," Qiang Ming said. "If this is fake it deserves an Oscar for special effects," said one commenter. But no! Angela is "definitely not a human. Our zoo is government-run, so that kind of situation would not happen," the

Unconventional Weapon

Jennifer Colandrea, 42, of St. Petersburg, Florida, was charged with domestic battery after an incident on July 31, The Smoking Gun reported. As her ex-husband, Brian Drummond, 42, slept in the home they share, Colandrea allegedly violently ripped his CPAP machine off his face, causing a cut on his lower lip, and started arguing with him. The two divorced in 2009 but have been sharing a home. Colandrea was released on her own recognizance and ordered to stay away from Drummond.

Molehill, Meet Mountain

Cedar Point Shores Waterpark in Sandusky, Ohio, was the scene of what might have been a routine dust-up between patrons on July 27. But, as The Smoking Gun reported, it developed into much more. Cops responded after a woman allegedly called a child a "brat" and "fat ass" and pushed him off a floating toy. She identified herself as Jennifer Lee Miller, 67, and said she was a "Christian woman, a grandmother, and she wouldn't do such a thing," police said. After officers gave her a warning and left the scene, they determined that the woman had given them a false name; she is really Janet Nale of Taylor, Michigan, and she was arrested for obstruction. "She lied about all her information and had no reason for doing so," one officer said.

Wait, What?

Bob Blankenship of Ormond Beach, Florida, wants some answers after a May incident where he discovered airplane parts, including a windshield, in his yard, News 6 reported. Blankenship lives near the Ormond Beach Airport and is used to the noise, but pieces of fiberglass and metal falling from the sky concerned him: "It could fall on anybody out here," he said. "Just think if it fell from 300 feet. What's the impact going to be? Probably cut you in two." Blankenship determined which plane had been flying over and contacted the airport, leaving his contact information. Later, he got a message from the pilot: "Hey, this is Douglas and I'm over in DeLand and I lost a piece of my airplane yesterday. ... I'm wondering if I can connect with you and come and get it." No, said Blankenship. He reported the incident to the FAA, which claimed that "the falling aircraft part situation is being taken seriously by our organization," but he's unsatisfied with their slow response. "The next time it could be somebody's life," he said.

Rude

British Columbia real estate agent Mike Rose is out on his ear in Kamloops after he was caught on video swigging milk straight from the bottle at a home he was showing. Canoe reported on July 28 that Rose was waiting for his clients to arrive for a showing; after slaking his thirst, he returned the milk jug to the refrigerator. Rose apologized, saying his behavior was out of character and he was "unusually dehydrated," but his clients replaced him and he was ordered to pay a $22,500 fine.

Sporting News

During a friendly soccer match on July 21 between Gateshead and Dunston in England, players and spectators were astonished as men wearing balaclavas drove a hearse onto the pitch, the Independent reported. Just before 8:20 p.m., the funeral car and a Subaru made their way onto the field, where they spun around in circles as their occupants threw leaflets from the cars. The drivers of the hearse left that vehicle on the pitch and hopped in the other car, which drove away. Officials were forced to call off the match. Northumbria Police said four men had been arrested and remained in police custody. "Disorder will not be tolerated in the community," police said. "Enquiries continue."

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