Annual Report – 2019

As Americans now face an unprecedented series of changes in their daily lives due to Covid19, the importance of stable and affordable housing cannot be overstated. Our homes have become our offices, our schools, our social clubs, our places of worship, and our safe havens. But economic uncertainty combined with ongoing housing affordability concerns make it harder and harder for the most vulnerable Americans to access that safe haven. Covid19 has only served to exacerbate this inequality, especially for those rural regions that were already struggling to maintain hospitals, employers, bank branches and their aging housing stock.

As Covid19 spreads across rural places, HAC is pouring all our time and resources into the hardest hit rural communities. This year’s Annual Report is concise and conveys only primary corporate information.

Before the pandemic, public concern over housing affordability and rural poverty was rising. The pandemic has spiked those concerns as it lays bare the inequity that exists between different places in our country. HAC’s work is essential to an effective response and recovery. We continue to deliver local communities the resources and capabilities they need to address both the short term and long term solutions for rural America. We hope you’ll continue to join us in this fight.

Read the report

Privacy Policy

HAC Privacy Policy

Privacy Policy

Effective date: August, 2 2023

Housing Assistance Council (“us”, “we”, or “our”) operates the https://ruralhome.org website and the HAC Trainings mobile application (the “Service”).

This page informs you of our policies regarding the collection, use, and disclosure of personal data when you use our Service and the choices you have associated with that data.

We use your data to provide and improve the Service. By using the Service, you agree to the collection and use of information in accordance with this policy. Unless otherwise defined in this Privacy Policy, terms used in this Privacy Policy have the same meanings as in our Terms and Conditions.

Information Collection And Use

We collect several different types of information for various purposes to provide and improve our Service to you.

Types of Data Collected

Personal Data

While using our Service, we may ask you to provide us with certain personally identifiable information that can be used to contact or identify you (“Personal Data”). Personally identifiable information may include, but is not limited to:

  • Email address
  • First name and last name
  • Phone number
  • Address, State, Province, ZIP/Postal code, City
  • Cookies and Usage Data

Usage Data

We may also collect information that your browser sends whenever you visit our Service or when you access the Service by or through a mobile device (“Usage Data”).

This Usage Data may include information such as your computer’s Internet Protocol address (e.g. IP address), browser type, browser version, the pages of our Service that you visit, the time and date of your visit, the time spent on those pages, unique device identifiers and other diagnostic data.

When you access the Service by or through a mobile device, this Usage Data may include information such as the type of mobile device you use, your mobile device unique ID, the IP address of your mobile device, your mobile operating system, the type of mobile Internet browser you use, unique device identifiers and other diagnostic data.

Tracking & Cookies Data

We use cookies and similar tracking technologies to track the activity on our Service and hold certain information.

Cookies are files with small amount of data which may include an anonymous unique identifier. Cookies are sent to your browser from a website and stored on your device. Tracking technologies also used are beacons, tags, and scripts to collect and track information and to improve and analyze our Service.

You can instruct your browser to refuse all cookies or to indicate when a cookie is being sent. However, if you do not accept cookies, you may not be able to use some portions of our Service.

Examples of Cookies we use:

  • Session Cookies. We use Session Cookies to operate our Service.
  • Preference Cookies. We use Preference Cookies to remember your preferences and various settings.
  • Security Cookies. We use Security Cookies for security purposes.

Automated processing of data

  • We automatically collect certain information to track visitor activity on our websites. We use this information to improve the content of our sites as well as to provide visitors with a more relevant overall experience with our organization and our site. This information may include information that identifies you as an individual or relates to an identifiable individual, including: name, title, company name, job function, expertise, postal address, telephone number, or email address. We may also collect other information that does not reveal your specific identity or does not directly relate to an identifiable individual such as browser and device information, information collected through cookies, pixel tags, and other technologies, and demographic information. We never share this information or information you provide us with third parties except to the extent necessary to provide our Service and only to the extent described in the Terms of Service.
  • If you fill out a web form on our site, your information will be stored in our CRM system and some amount of your past browsing on our site may be available to us to determine your interests. We may use this information to more effectively engage with you and improve our site. However, if you use private browsing as described below, you may provide us your information without making your past browsing activity available to us. If you do not wish for us to have your personal information, please do not fill out any of the web forms on this site.
  • If you provide your email address and consent for email marketing, some information is collected about when/if the email was opened and what links were clicked. This information is used to assess the engagement and success of an email campaign.
  • Clicking on a link in any of these emails may cause you to be personally identified on our site and may cause some part of your past browsing history on our site to be available to our personnel so we may more effectively engage with you and improve our site. If you do not wish for this tracking to occur, you can unsubscribe from our mailings or use private browsing mode to avoid tracking.
  • Housing Assistance Council never uses visitor identification techniques that involve sharing information you provide us with other sites or vice versa. Housing Assistance Council never stores any information in your computer’s Flash local shared objects area (i.e., we never use what is known as ‘flash cookies’).

If you do not want this site to place a cookie on your browser and track your activity, you may leave the site or you may browse the site using privacy mode in your web browser. To learn how to use privacy mode, refer to the links below depending on the browser you use.

Use of Data

Housing Assistance Council uses the collected data for various purposes:

  • To provide and maintain the Service
  • To notify you about changes to our Service
  • To allow you to participate in interactive features of our Service when you choose to do so
  • To provide customer care and support
  • To provide analysis or valuable information so that we can improve the Service
  • To monitor the usage of the Service
  • To detect, prevent and address technical issues

Transfer Of Data

Your information, including Personal Data, may be transferred to — and maintained on — computers located outside of your state, province, country or other governmental jurisdiction where the data protection laws may differ than those from your jurisdiction.

If you are located outside United States and choose to provide information to us, please note that we transfer the data, including Personal Data, to United States and process it there.

Your consent to this Privacy Policy followed by your submission of such information represents your agreement to that transfer.

Housing Assistance Council will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that your data is treated securely and in accordance with this Privacy Policy and no transfer of your Personal Data will take place to an organization or a country unless there are adequate controls in place including the security of your data and other personal information.

Disclosure Of Data

Legal Requirements

Housing Assistance Council may disclose your Personal Data in the good faith belief that such action is necessary to:

  • To comply with a legal obligation
  • To protect and defend the rights or property of Housing Assistance Council
  • To prevent or investigate possible wrongdoing in connection with the Service
  • To protect the personal safety of users of the Service or the public
  • To protect against legal liability

Security Of Data

The security of your data is important to us, but remember that no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage is 100% secure. While we strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect your Personal Data, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.

Service Providers

We may employ third party companies and individuals to facilitate our Service (“Service Providers”), to provide the Service on our behalf, to perform Service-related services or to assist us in analyzing how our Service is used.

These third parties have access to your Personal Data only to perform these tasks on our behalf and are obligated not to disclose or use it for any other purpose.

Analytics

We may use third-party Service Providers to monitor and analyze the use of our Service.

  • Google Analytics

    Google Analytics is a web analytics service offered by Google that tracks and reports website traffic. Google uses the data collected to track and monitor the use of our Service. This data is shared with other Google services. Google may use the collected data to contextualize and personalize the ads of its own advertising network.

    For more information on the privacy practices of Google, please visit the Google Privacy & Terms web page: https://policies.google.com/privacy?hl=en
  •  

    Microsoft Dynamics 365

    Dynamics 365 is a set of intelligent business applications that help organizations run their entire business and deliver greater results through predictive, AI-driven insights. HAC utilized Dynamics 365 Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) and Customer Voice to gather marketing contacts, track business activities, and distribute marketing communications to the HAC audience. HAC does not share this data with external parties. 

    To learn more about Microsoft’s privacy policies, visit https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/privacy/ 

Links To Other Sites

Our Service may contain links to other sites that are not operated by us. If you click on a third-party link, you will be directed to that third party’s site. We strongly advise you to review the Privacy Policy of every site you visit.

We have no control over and assume no responsibility for the content, privacy policies or practices of any third-party sites or services.

Children’s Privacy

Our Service does not address anyone under the age of 18 (“Children”).

We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from anyone under the age of 18. If you are a parent or guardian and you are aware that your Children has provided us with Personal Data, please contact us. If we become aware that we have collected Personal Data from children without verification of parental consent, we take steps to remove that information from our servers.

Changes To This Privacy Policy

We may update our Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of any changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on this page.

We will let you know via email and/or a prominent notice on our Service, prior to the change becoming effective and update the “effective date” at the top of this Privacy Policy.

You are advised to review this Privacy Policy periodically for any changes. Changes to this Privacy Policy are effective when they are posted on this page.

Contact Us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us:

  • By email: hac@ruralhome.org
  • By visiting this page on our website: https://ruralhome.org/privacy
  • By phone number: 202.842.8600

Help Rural America Thrive on Giving Tuesday

Good things are happening in rural America. Be a part of it.

Too often, the prevailing narrative about rural America is that it is failing compared to its urban and suburban counterparts. While rural America is certainly facing its share of struggles, there are so many bright spots and amazing things taking place in small towns and communities across the country. We know because we see it every day.

In October, HAC kicked off the Citizens Institute on Rural DesignTM (CIRD) with the CIRD Learning Cohort Summit in the towns of Thomas, Davis, and Elkins in rural West Virginia. The Citizen’s Institute on Rural Design™ is a National Endowment for the Arts leadership initiative in partnership with the Housing Assistance Council, along with buildingcommunityWORKSHOP. Participants representing 23 rural communities from across the country convened to learn the fundamentals of rural design and how it can help solve some of their community’s most challenging problems.

Giving Tuesday 2019

Over the next year, these 23 communities will receive access to the resources they need to convert their own good ideas into reality. Here a few examples of the challenges these communities will be tackling:

  • One of the pressing issues still facing the residents of Iola, Kansas is the lack of quality, affordable housing. Thrive Allen County and the City of Iola will use the design challenge to develop an affordable housing master plan for a neighborhood on the north side of town.
  • The town of Entiat, Washington is exploring how it can reinvent itself as a destination for recreation, agritourism, small business development, and residential development.
  • The Mt. Zion Baptist Church Preservation Society in Athens, Ohio plans to rehabilitate the Mt. Zion Baptist Church into a multi-use space devoted to the contributions of African Americans in Southeast Ohio – honoring its founding in 1905 by a community of free-born and formerly enslaved people of color.

2020 holds many possibilities for HAC and the communities we partner with, like Iola, Entiat, and Athens. This #GivingTuesday, your donation to HAC will have more impact as every dollar raised will meet HAC’s match for the CIRD program. And every donation made to HAC on Facebook on #GivingTuesday will be matched by Facebook. You can be a part of changing the story in rural America.

Donate Button

Catalyst of Change – The 2018 HAC Annual Report

catalyst of change

HAC is pleased to present the 2018 Annual Report, which looks back at our accomplishments and those of our partner organizations over the last year.

For 49 years, the Housing Assistance Council (HAC) has worked to build communities across rural America. As we approach a half-century of improving housing conditions for people in rural areas, we wanted to take a moment to reflect on our work.

As we thought about the many ways HAC has created change, empowered local organizations, fostered collaborations between sectors, built a community of learning and advocated for those whose voices are often silenced, one word kept rising to our minds. Catalyst.

A catalyst is an agent of change. It helps to enable collaboration among existing elements that may struggle to combine. HAC has been serving as a catalyst for improving rural communities throughout our history.

2018 was no different. We continued to help local organizations in rural areas increase their capacity and assist in financing their projects. We expanded our collaborations with national organizations, foundations and private funders, and began new initiatives around rural prosperity and Duty to Serve. Our research shed light on a looming crisis for affordable rental housing and continued to inform advocates and policymakers about the realities of rural poverty and housing conditions. We ended the year on a high note with our biennial conference. The rural housing community shared ideas, discovered new approaches, and returned back to their communities rejuvenated and recommitted to the effort.

As we expand our reach, we acknowledge that the work we do would not be possible without the generous support of our public and private supporters. Their commitment to rural people and communities helps create a fertile environment for HAC’s actions.

The work is not done. The challenges for rural communities are, in some ways, becoming more severe. But we know the solution. HAC will continue to serve as a catalyst for rural organizations, offering them the tools they need to generate local solutions. While the job is never finished, we are always inspired by the energy, passion, and ingenuity of rural people and places.

Read this publication online at Issuu.com.

HAC: Building Rural Communities: Annual Report 2017

HAC's 2017 Annual ReportHAC is pleased to present the 2017 Annual Report, which looks back at our accomplishments and those of our partner organizations over the last year.

Rural America got a lot of attention in 2017. The results of the 2016 presidential election encouraged journalists, policymakers, and others to consider the differences between rural and urban parts of the U.S. The Housing Assistance Council has known these facts for decades, of course, and has worked with partners around the country towards improving life for the lowest income rural Americans.

Economic recovery from the Great Recession is lagging in rural areas, with a lower rate of job creation than in metropolitan places. Most of the new rural jobs are in the service sector, with far lower salaries than past mining and manufacturing positions. Forty percent of renters in places with populations under 10,000 pay more than 30 percent of their income for housing. While rural residents are more likely to be homeowners than city dwellers are, the homeownership rate for rural African Americans and Hispanics is 20 percentage points lower than that of white non-Hispanic rural households. Persistent poverty counties – those where poverty rates have exceeded 20 percent since 1990 – are predominately rural.

At the same time, HAC knows rural America’s advantages. The barnraising spirit is still strong: residents care deeply about their communities and they really do pitch in to help their neighbors. Rural places’ products and their natural resources benefit the entire country. Costs of doing business are often lower in small towns than in big cities.

HAC spent 2017, as it has spent more than 45 years, helping rural communities use these positive traits and resources to improve their residents’ lives. This has always been the hallmark of HAC’s work: HAC helps local organizations so that they can, in turn, help their communities – not only immediately, but for years to come. HAC builds rural resources, capacity, and knowledge by providing financing, training and technical assistance, and research and information. In 2017 HAC continued its special efforts to help provide housing for rural veterans and launched a new initiative on creative placemaking.

Whether the new attention to rural areas yields useful results or not, HAC and our partners on the ground will continue our efforts. Rural Americans will deserve decent, safe, affordable housing, as they always have.

Read this publication online at Issuu.com.

David Lipsetz, President & CEO

David Lipsetz - HAC CEO - Headshot

David Lipsetz is the President and CEO at the Housing Assistance Council (HAC) and a leading expert in affordable housing and sustainable community development. David came to HAC after holding several White House-appointed positions, most recently serving as the Associate Administrator for Rural Housing and Community Facilities at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA.) His office oversaw policy development and program administration of more than $100 billion in direct lending, mortgage guarantees, grants and technical assistance for community and economic development in rural America.

Prior to USDA, David was at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD,) where he served as a Deputy Assistant Secretary and Senior Advisor for Public and Indian Housing, and as an Acting Chief of Staff to the Deputy Secretary. Prior to HUD, David managed policy, large-scale initiatives and organizational development for housing agencies in New York City and Oakland, CA. He also worked for the San Francisco Bay Area’s regional planning authority; and Dresden, Germany’s Institute for Ecological and Regional Development. His career began as a Legislative Assistant for domestic policy issues in the Office of U.S. Congressman John Dingell.

David was born and raised in Ohio. He earned a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Michigan State University, and Master’s degrees in Sociology and City and Regional Planning from the Ohio State University. He currently resides in Washington, DC with his wife and kids.

Supporters

HAC would like to recognize and thank our generous supporters.

Supporters

The Atlantic Philanthropies
Bank of America
BBVA Compass Bank
Capital One Bank
Council of Federal Home Loan Banks
Episcopal Diocese of Iowa
The Episcopal Church
F.B. Heron Foundation
Federal Home Loan Bank of Des Moines
Ford Foundation
The Hearst Foundation
The Home Depot Foundation
Home Missioners of America
Lenin Juarez
John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
JP Morgan Chase
Morgan Stanley
Navajo Housing Authority
NeighborWorks™ America
Seton Enablement Fund
Sisters of Charity, Blessed Virgin Mary
Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia
Sisters of the Holy Cross
Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Society of Mary
U.S. Department of Agriculture— Rural Development – Business and Cooperative Programs
U.S. Department of Agriculture
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
U.S. Department of the Treasury— Community Development Financial Institutions Fund
Wells Fargo Housing Foundation

Partners

Gideon Anders
Joseph and Tamara Belden
Brattleboro Area Affordable Housing Corporation
Congregation of the Humility of Mary
Council for Affordable and Rural Housing
Habitat for Humanity
Norman Hurwitz
Moises and Teresa Loza
Maria Luisa Mercado
National Trust for Historic Preservation
Next Step
PathStone Corporation
William and Gloria Powers
Reno & Cavanaugh, PLLC
Rural Community Assistance Corporation
Rural Community Assistance Partnership
Byron and Lee Stookey
Leslie R. Strauss
Harold and Marilyn Wilson

45 Years. 45 Stories Cover

45 Years. 45 Stories

We Believe in Rural America

45YearsCoverFor most of our county’s history, the United States was largely a rural nation. That changed sometime in the 1930s when more people began living in and around cities than in the countryside. In the past few decades, the pace of urbanization has accelerated even faster. This fundamental shift is not only in our nation’s demography, but also in our identity and character. What does it mean to live, work, and prosper in 21st century rural America? Rural areas have their share of challenges, some unique, while others are similar to those in the cities and suburbs. But rural citizens also have a strong sense of pride, work ethic, and perseverance.

At the Housing Assistance Council (HAC), we know rural America. For 45 years, HAC has worked to improve the lives and homes of rural Americans all across this land – especially in often forgotten places and among often forgotten populations including Appalachia, the rural South and Mississippi Delta, the Border Colonias, Native American Lands, and migrant and seasonal farmworkers. The following 45 stories represent not only our past accomplishments and efforts over as many years, but also, and possibly more importantly, they offer a glimpse into our activities and aspirations for rural communities today and for the coming 45 years.

We know rural America. More importantly, we believe in rural America.

Read a web friendly version on Issuu.com

Annual Report 2015

HAC's 2015 Annual Report CoverThe Housing Assistance Council is pleased to present Building Rural Communities, HAC’s 2015 Annual Report.

Read a web-friendly version of this publication on issuu.com.

In 2015 the Housing Assistance Council (HAC) mixed innovation, tried and true techniques, and special attention to special needs to further its mission of improving housing conditions for low-income rural Americans.

Ongoing issues surrounding the preservation of existing decent, affordable rental housing in rural America were one important focus of HAC’s work this year, as a large proportion of U.S. Department of Agriculture rental housing mortgages near the end of their terms. Veterans’ housing needs were another. HAC also continued its strong support of self-help homeownership for families who could not afford to purchase their own homes without the value added by their “sweat equity.” HAC’s loan funds make below-market financing available for those developing or rehabilitating affordable rural housing for both owners and renters.

This year HAC continued to increase its use of technology, delivering webinars and publications online and launching a new Veterans Data Central site to complement its popular Rural Data Portal. Person-to-person interactions remained important as well, with individualized conversations and live training sessions, including peer-to-peer events, providing technical assistance to local rural organizations and governments nationwide.

The importance of HAC’s role as an intermediary remains clear. As always, in 2015 local organizations throughout rural America made good use of HAC’s loans, grants, trainings, technical assistance, and information resources. HAC is proud to continue empowering these groups to provide decent, affordable homes for the lowest income residents of their own communities.

20 Years of Rural Voices

What a Difference 20 Years Makes

This edition, “20 Years of Rural Voices,” highlights and revisits a selection of articles published over the past two decades.

View from Washington

Let’s Recommit to Rural America
by Congressman Bennie Thompson

Rep. Bennie Thompson challenges his colleagues in Congress to re-engage in the fight to keep successful federal rural housing programs alive.s

FEATURES

Self-Help Housing on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation: Alive and Well
by Leslie Newman

There is more than one way to design a self-help housing program, and collaboration between community organizations helps.

Still Ticking After All These Years: Low-Income Housing Tax Credits in Washington State
by Kim Herman

Tax credits have remained important in rural Washington, financing the production of thousands of homes.

Rural Midwest Housing Remains Complex and Diverse
by Ann Ziebarth and Jeff Crump

Whether growing, stable, or declining, rural communities in the Midwest face challenges in providing housing for lowincome residents.

The Housing Trust Fund Movement Spans the Country
by Mary Brooks

State and local housing trust funds continue to offer flexible funding for affordable housing across the country, and a national fund has been created as well.

Where You Live Matters: Fair Housing is Still the Law and Even Stronger
by Shanna Smith

The Fair Housing Act has been law since 1968, and new developments in 2015 have strengthened it.

Reflections on Cushing Dolbeare and Eleven Years of Housing Change
by Sheila Crowley

Cushing Dolbeare founded the National Low Income Housing Coalition; her legacy guides the organization years after her death.

20 Years Do Make a Difference
by Joe Belden

Many things have changed since 1995, says a veteran rural houser, but rural housing needs and solutions have never been partisan issues, and should not be now.


Rural Voices would like to hear what you have to say about one, or all, of these issues. Please feel free to comment on this story by sending a tweet to #RuralVoicesMag discuss on the Rural Affordable Housing Group on LinkedIn, or on our Facebook page.