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Todd Pitman

RFP: Housing Finance Consultant

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Request for Proposals

Project Overview
Hope Community’s Community Ownership Project provides training and one-on-one support to aspiring
owner-occupant landlords. Many nonprofit developers own small multi-family properties (2-4 units) and
are interested in selling to their current tenants or other Community Ownership Project graduates.
However, given that these units are often financed as part of a larger portfolio, many funders need to be
involved in the unwinding of these structures.

Hope seeks to establish a precedent and develop a model for unwinding the subsidies attached to small
multifamily buildings within larger portfolios, allowing them to be sold to their current tenants or other
low- and moderate-income buyers. We seek a consultant with affordable housing expertise and
knowledge of the local funding environment who can work directly with entities that have debt and/or
other regulatory requirements on these properties to understand how we might separate them from
larger portfolios as needed and, ultimately, sell them directly to community members. As a
test/demonstration project, the consultant will work with Hope and its partners on a collection of small
multifamily properties in South Minneapolis.

Goals and deliverables

  • Meet with relevant stakeholders
  • Understand limits and opportunities – under what conditions can these properties be separated from the larger portfolio and sold?
  • Work through the particulars of creating an approval path for these conversions of rental to ownership out of their existing debt structures
  • Create a model for sale of small multifamily units that are financed as part of a larger portfolio to their current residents or other low -income buyers, with a preference given to graduates of Hope’s Community Ownership program
  • Time permitting, gain approvals from relevant stakeholders for sale of the properties
  • Strategize with Hope staff around potential roadblocks along the way

Terms
Project must be complete on or before September 30, 2023. Hourly rate cannot exceed $150 (loaded).

To submit a proposal, please include:

  • Confirmation of a current account in the System for Award Management (sam.gov)
  • Estimated schedule/number of hours needed to complete project
  • Resume/CV detailing relevant experience
  • Short description (1-2 paragraphs) of your approach to this project

Proposals must be received by Friday, August 12 th at 5:00PM CDT to be considered. Please send
required materials and any questions to Maggy Otte at motte@hope-community.org. All qualified
applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual
orientation, gender identity, or national origin.

About Hope
Hope Community creates connections that strengthen the power of community members and
communities. We cultivate community leaders, build community capacity, care for the housing and
community spaces we develop, and pursue equity and diversity in all we do. For more than 40 years,
Hope Community has been a neighborhood hub in the Phillips Community at the intersection of Franklin
and Portland Avenues in Minneapolis. We began as a hospitality house and homeless shelter for women
and children in 1977; more than 8,000 people found shelter and community at the house during its 15
years of operation. By the mid-1990s, decades of disinvestment and neglect had devastated the
neighborhood. In 1995 we closed the shelter and took on a new mission focused on community,
equitable development, and systems change. Today, Hope is a strong, nationally recognized community
development organization, known for our visionary integration of neighborhood revitalization and
extensive community engagement.

All Hope’s work relates to what we call Placekeeping – a development and engagement approach that
recognizes, amplifies, and leverages the stories, practices, and collective assets already found within the
neighborhood and the community. We actively listen and engage in ways that are not merely
transactional but also transformative. Our primary organizational goal is to facilitate and support
community-centered visioning, decision making processes, and projects that increase community
stability, vitality, resilience, and power while also reducing indirect negative consequences such as
displacement and gentrification. Now Hope staff and community leaders create spaces where racially
diverse, low- and moderate-income community members can come together to learn about, build, and
share power. A growing network of community leaders, most who are people of color, work on dozens
of community-based partnerships and projects. As our networks grow, the impact builds in our
neighborhood, across the city, and beyond.

 

Download — RFP: Housing Finance Consultant [PDF, 81KB]

Apply now for TRCSTR!

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CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS!
TRCSTR: Transformational Creative Strategies Training

Apply now to join the third cycle of Transformational Creative Strategies Training (TRCSTR)! Cohort application open through midnight on April 21st — Spread the word!

TRCSTR is focused on building capacity as Hybrid Practitioners: visionary creatives working across art mediums to shift narratives, embody healing and truth-telling; build connections, share visions, and support decolonizing and collective liberation. We will share skills, build community, and create spaces of collaborative learning.

  • Hands-on learning and skills workshops
  • One on One and Group mentorship
  • Participants receive stipends
  • Support with creative collaborative projects
  • Intergenerational learning spaces
  • All mediums and creative forms welcome to apply

Program Dates: June-October 2022.

Sessions will be held both online and in social distanced outdoor settings.

Staff Spotlight #6

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Since mid-March, Hope’s staff has been working from home. We are adjusting our work and overcoming the challenges presented, and though our work today looks much different than it has during our previous 42 years, we are still fulfilling our mission each day. We are highlighting our staff members so you can hear from us how we fulfill our mission in today’s world! You’ll hear what our work looks like, what challenges we’re overcoming, what updates we have, and our plans moving forward. Thank you for joining us!

Spotlight #6: Youth & Family Engagement

This week, we’re putting a spotlight on our Youth and Family Engagement team, with DHop, the Director of Youth and Family Engagement, and J.T., our Best Buy Teen Technology Center Coordinator. DHop and J.T. give updates on what all of the youth programs have looked like this year so far. They explain pivots made in working with youth through virtual programs, vitrual engagement with the summer internships, connecting with youth through the uprising including the youth-let sit-in, and many more details about their work.

Staff Spotlight #5

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Since mid-March, Hope’s staff has been working from home. We are adjusting our work and overcoming the challenges presented, and though our work today looks much different than it has during our previous 42 years, we are still fulfilling our mission each day. We are highlighting our staff members so you can hear from us how we fulfill our mission in today’s world! You’ll hear what our work looks like, what challenges we’re overcoming, what updates we have, and our plans moving forward. Thank you for joining us!

Spotlight #5: ARC Team

Watch this week’s staff spotlight video to hear from our Art of Radical Collaboration (ARC) team, partner from Minneapolis Institute of Art, and the incredible work they’ve been doing! Olivia Levins Holden, ARC Lead Organizer, Samie Johnson, Creative Programs Assistant, and Hope’s partner Crystal Price with Mia, provide program and partnership history, updates about Art of Radical Collaboration’s programming, TRCSTR description updates, and what their work looks like this year.

Staff Spotlight #4

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Since mid-March, Hope’s staff has been working from home. We are adjusting our work and overcoming the challenges presented, and though our work today looks much different than it has during our previous 42 years, we are still fulfilling our mission each day. We are highlighting our staff members so you can hear from us how we fulfill our mission in today’s world! You’ll hear what our work looks like, what challenges we’re overcoming, what updates we have, and our plans moving forward. Thank you for joining us!

Spotlight #4: Parks & Power Team

This week, we are featuring our Parks & Power team, Jake Virden and Shruthi Kamisetty! First you’ll hear from Jake, Parks & Power Lead Organizer. He describes their work in parks during the pandemic, working with the Parks Board, supporting the Minneapolis Sanctuary Movement and encampments with the parks, and navigating the challenges. Then you’ll hear from Shruthi, Parks & Power Organizer. She explains the Parks & Power values and purpose, the disproportionate impacts COVID-19 is having on the BIPOC community, the curcial need for parks, and a COVID-19 testing site at Phelps Park.

Staff Spotlight #1-3

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Since mid-March, Hope’s staff has been working from home. We are adjusting our work and overcoming the challenges presented, and though our work today looks much different than it has during our previous 42 years, we are still fulfilling our mission each day. We are highlighting our staff members so you can hear from us how we fulfill our mission in today’s world! You’ll hear what our work looks like, what challenges we’re overcoming, what updates we have, and our plans moving forward. Thank you for joining us!

 

Spotlight #1: Maggy Otte

Our first staff spotlight is Maggy Otte, our Community Development Associate. Maggy gives an update on what housing looks like today for Hope and our property management partners!

Spotlight #2: Malyun Yahye

Our second Staff Spotlight is Malyun Yahye, our Community Ownership Project Coordinator. Malyun introduces our new Community Ownership Project launching this month! If you are intersted in learning more about this program, take our quick survey.

Spotlight #3: Maryan Abdinur

Maryan Abdinur is our Food, Land & Community Program Lead. In this Spotlight, Maryan describres her program, engagement, and policy work during a time of distancing, talks about her response to food access shortages through the supply drop, and provides updates on harvesting in the Gardens this year!

Enjoy our 2019 Annual Report!

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Our 2019 Annual Report reflects on what can happen when dreams meet reality – when dreamers and doers align. Making dreams come to fruition requires concrete plans, follow through, patience, grit, and dedication. Hope Community has been comprised of leaders, staff, volunteers, and supporters who share those qualities; for decades, we’ve been working with community members and partners to make dreams become reality.

Together, we will keep dreaming and doing for the years to come.

We will keep fighting for justice and liberation, solidifying foundations for lasting placekeeping, establishing safe and healthy environments in our neighborhoods, and we will never stop listening to the voices of our community.

In gratitude,
Shannon Smith Jones,
Executive Director

Read the 2019 Annual Report [PDF]