Housing and health are closely linked. Building off successful health care and affordable housing partnerships, Enterprise developed a series of issue briefs, Services in Housing: An Opportunity to Strengthen America's Public Health Infrastructure. The series explores the role that housing-based services play in strengthening our public health infrastructure, and how they can advance health equity.
Enterprise interviewed affordable housing practitioners and health care partners working in housing-based services to develop the briefs, which also reflect our experience partnering with Medicaid managed care organizations and as an affordable housing owner and operator.
The Services in Housing issue briefs, produced with funding from Wells Fargo through the Housing Affordability Breakthrough Challenge, build off the Gulf Coast Housing Partnership’s Health + Housing innovation, one of six winning ideas selected from a pool of nearly 900 proposals. The Health + Housing innovation is creating new financing options for health insurers, including Medicaid managed care organizations, to build affordable homes with integrated health and social services.
To explore how Medicaid managed care and housing partnerships could be extended to housing-based services, Enterprise partnered with Dynamic Solutions to develop this series:
• The Role of Affordable Housing Services in Moving the U.S. Towards Achieving Health Equity introduces the role housing-based services play in affordable housing developments.
• Growth Opportunities for Service Delivery within Affordable Housing and Medicaid Partnerships explores the types of partnerships affordable housing providers are forming with Medicaid managed care organizations.
• Possibilities for Synergy and Policy Alignment in Medicaid and Low-Income Housing Tax Credits examines how states can incentivize collaborations between insurers and affordable housing providers applying for those two programs.
A recent Enterprise webinar shared learnings and perspectives of colleagues and partners working in housing-based services and explored connections between health and housing. Services in Housing authors Mary Ayala, Enterprise’s senior program director for National Programs, and John Sullivan, senior program director, Gulf Coast, were joined by Amanda House Harris, senior director, Community Impact & Resident Engagement at Enterprise Community Development, and Romi Hall, director, Healthy Homes and Communities at NeighborWorks America, to share experiences on the value of housing-based services and the role of housing providers in enhancing resident health.
Enterprise hopes learnings from these issue briefs contribute to more partnerships with health insurers and affordable housing providers.
Additional Resources:
From Silos to Collaboration: Building a Health Partner Investment Strategy, NeighborWorks America and Center for Community Investment, October 2022.
Resident Services Funding & Delivery Models Among Affordable Housing Non-profits, Joint Center for Housing Studies, July 2022.
Promoting Health through Housing Investments, Enterprise Community Partners, March 2021
Housing Affordability Breakthrough Challenge, Gulf Coast Housing Partnership
