I set out to gather support internally at Fahe to develop and implement a more strategic and impactful advocacy and education effort: a state focused strategy that could win Fahe organizations more financial resources for their housing work. Both advocacy strategy and organizational strategy were required concurrently to build up our advocacy presence.

Organizational Strategy

 Given my existing responsibilities, progress on organizational strategy was essential, so I built support among executive team members and the board of directors for how additional staff resources could unlock the power of the network of Fahe member organizations leaders. We could do more to win at the state level with focused staff support: a federal policy manager who also worked well with the Fahe member network. Their ability to manage the federal policy cadence and fire drills could create more capacity for our longer term organizing, feeding back into the state level issues.

Those efforts in building internal consensus were successful: in early 2019 I hired the federal policy manager. And in 2019-2020, we leveraged victories in sustaining federal funding to tell a more powerful advocacy story, raising additional philanthropic investment to support that new federal position.

Advocacy Strategy

That organizational growth and federal win allowed me to create a 2018-2021 advocacy plan and focus on in-depth conversations with each state’s organizations about their goals. In facilitated meetings, I worked with our Fahe members in each state to prioritize their state needs.  For example, in Tennessee, Fahe member organizations agreed to survey community partners about the construction workforce as a precursor a potential workforce development programmatic and advocacy push.

Unfortunately, the March 2020 pandemic shutdown commenced. We focused on the recovery funding coming to the states. Analyzing the situation, I thought that many states (the same goes for local governments) who did not have a lot of extra capacity would welcome input on how to effectively leverage this funding to help their communities. We provided information on the benefits of investment in housing for these states: for workforce; for stable, prosperous communities; for housing’s effect on education of children.

Executive Level Organizational Strategy

In the meantime, my department’s success prompted Fahe to create a new position of Executive Vice President for Advocacy, which our CEO asked I step into.  I now supervised three departments—policy advocacy, communications, and leadership development—all with hiring needs, as well as helping guide the overall organization.

Upon moving into the executive role, I was able to hire my former Director of Advocacy position. Filling this role meant that we could continue robust state focused advocacy strategies and execute on tactical day-to-day work.

Major State Advocacy Victories

 Working in politically diverse states, I led our team to focus our message on a mix of education around the importance housing for attracting a workforce and for economic growth, in addition to more traditional quality of life metrics that many nonprofits embrace.  The strategy showed results early: In 2021 and 2022 our local leaders were getting on the agenda at key governor and legislative meetings. We grew our credibility with government leaders as the team educated these leaders.

Through our support of our local leaders and success in moving forward, I showed the staff how to build confidence in our network of local community development leaders’ own voices and in their ability to implement an advocacy campaign. These local leaders knew how to tell the story of their organizations’ impact, and with dedicated support staff of my team providing strategic and operational support—such as a plan, timeline, and action steps—they were increasingly seizing the initiative. They spoke up at our meetings with government leaders, leaning into the story of their work.

We partnered with allies to strengthen our numbers, adding to our coalition with the public housing association, and the NeighborWorks groups. Our empowered leaders, supported at each step by my team, won additional meetings and relationships with key decision makers in both states where we continued to make our case. In 2023 (Tennessee) and then 2024 (Kentucky), over $30 million was awarded for new housing.

The Impact

Fahe member organizations and allies are already putting this money to use constructing and repairing homes for residents across these two states. Their operating environment at the state level has shifted, with millions of dollars for some Fahe organizations.

The nonprofits in the network can leverage state funding with private, philanthropic, and federal dollars, greatly expanding their ability to build homes and hire more staff to attend to that increased construction capacity. For example, a home in a small Appalachian town might need $40,000 in additional investment to make it affordable for a nonprofit developer to build and a local income qualified resident to buy – the rest of the financing can come from USDA or HUD loans and smaller grants like from the Federal Home Loan Banks. A $2 million investment in flexible dollars in that local Fahe member nonprofit can build dozens of homes over a few years that would not otherwise be built, and this has follow-on affects for economic development.

From sole advocacy staffer in 2017 — building this strategy, hiring the team, and executing on the overlooked state opportunities led to impactful results. Hundreds will be able to know a home because of this work enabling Fahe’s collaboration.