Take The Healthy Housing Local Action Challenge

Addressing Health Hazards in Homes

Everyone deserves to live in a safe and healthy home but, unfortunately, health hazards are still common in homes across America. NLC’s Healthy Housing Local Action Challenge gives municipal leaders the tools to take advantage of investments through Housing and Urban Development, the American Rescue Plan Act, and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to make generational changes in the health and homes of their residents.

The Healthy Housing Local Action Challenge helps cities focus on five key areas:

  • Lead
  • Asthma triggers 
  • Affordability 
  • Climate change 
  • Workforce capacity 

When you take the Healthy Housing Local Action Challenge, you’ll receive support and tools to better mitigate housing health hazards for your residents. Plus, you’ll receive national recognition for your work.

Whether you’re already addressing your community’s healthy housing needs or are in the initial stages, when you accept the Local Action Challenge you’ll get: 

  •  Support in the form of a structured framework to accelerate your work, plus peer learning, technical assistance and more 
  • Tools to identify needs, implement changes and evaluate the impact of reducing home-based health hazards such as lead and asthma triggers 
  • National recognition at every milestone along the way to becoming a Healthy Housing Change Agent  

Use the form on this page to take the Healthy Housing Local Action Challenge and do your part to make sure your residents’ homes have a safe and healthy future. 

How the Action Challenge Can Help Your Community

IDENTIFY & ASSESS HOUSING NEEDS

Action Area 1

IDENTIFY and ASSESS healthy housing needs.

  • ACTION: Needs Assessor 1.0
    Complete a healthy housing needs assessment to understand the current housing landscape and barriers to changing unhealthy housing conditions.
  • ACTION: Community Engager
    Engage multilevel community stakeholders to assess existing resources and current gaps in healthy housing resources, policies and enforcement.
  • ACTION: Findings Disseminator
    Identify a research or data partner to analyze city or neighborhood trends and disparities in health and housing outcomes.
  • ACTION: Support Identifier
    Engage community leaders, agencies and organizations who serve underrepresented communities to collaborate or apply for grants or other funding.
POLICY IMPLEMENTATION

Action Area 2

IMPLEMENT a policy, program or practice that improves healthy housing.

  • ACTION: Advocate Identification
    Identify and engage with city leadership or council members who prioritize housing or health issues to find an “advocate.”
  • ACTION: Commitment to Sustainable Solutions
    Propose a policy, program or practice and garner input and shared support from stakeholders.
  • ACTION: Roadblocks and Consequences Identifier
    Engage stakeholders and/or decision-makers to ascertain likely barriers and unintended consequences.
  • ACTION: Timeline and Goals Identified
    Once there is shared agreement on the proposed policy program or practice, commit to the implementation approach.
  • ACTION: Tenant Community Outreach
    Conduct tenant outreach to inform tenants of proposed changes and/or new policies, programs or practices and their current rights and resources.
IMPACT EVALUATION

Action Area 3

EVALUATE the impact of the implemented policy, program, or practice and SHARE that information with other cities interested in doing the same.

  • ACTION: Accountability to Equity
    Collaborate with stakeholders to determine the impact that the program, policy or practice has on improving health and racial equity.
  • ACTION: Evaluator
    Utilize available data and resources to understand the effectiveness of the implemented healthy housing program, policy or practice.
  • ACTION: Needs Assessor 2.0
    Assess current gaps and community needs after implementing a policy, program or practice.
  • ACTION: Teacher
    Disseminate successes and lessons learned.

Share this brief overview with municipal leaders and encourage your town to Take the Challenge today!

Download the complete Healthy Housing Local Action Challenge Brief for in-depth information on the challenge framework.

Take the Healthy Housing Local Action Challenge

Name(Required)
City/State/Zip(Required)

The Healthy Housing Innovation Cohort

The National League of Cities Center for Leadership, Education, Advancement, and Development (LEAD) is proud to announce the launch of the Healthy Housing Innovation Cohort. An initiative of the Health & Wellbeing team, the Innovation Cohort seeks to support cities, towns, and villages as they develop innovative solutions to improve service delivery for local healthy housing programs, advancing health and equity through a cross-sector systems change process. 

The following eight (8) cities and villages have been selected through a competitive process to participate in this exciting opportunity: 

  • Baton Rouge, LA 
  • Concord, NC 
  • Harrisonburg, VA 
  • Kansas City, MO 
  • Lake City, SC 
  • Maywood, IL 
  • Montgomery, AL 
  • San Luis Obispo, CA 

Multi-disciplinary teams from each city will work with the NLC project team throughout the cohort. The initiative’s first phase is a three-month Problem Refining and Solutions Focus Bootcamp, culminating in an in-person convening. Following the Bootcamp, each city will develop innovative solutions through a collaborative design process with a leading technology provider. NLC is proud to partner with City Health Dashboard, FindHelp, and Tolemi, among others. We recognize these partners for their commitment to this cohort and for providing their services pro bono throughout the initiative. At the end of the design process, the teams will share their progress, with the top team being awarded a $50,000 prize for sustainability and continuity. 

This initiative is made possible with the generous support of our technical assistance partners the National Center for Healthy Housing, Green & Healthy Homes Initiative, ChangeLab Solutions and our generous sponsors at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Office of Lead Hazard Control and Healthy Homes.

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