[Excerpts:]
A growing effort to preserve mobile home parks as affordable housing was praised by local leaders at a recent public forum co-hosted by the Aspen Jewish Congregation, Snowmass Chapel and Mountain Voices Project (MVP) at the Aspen Chapel as an example of public-private, cross-sector collaboration that could help solve wider housing challenges….
A resident-led cooperative formed by the 98 households at the park — located between Carbondale and Glenwood Springs — has raised just over $11 million and is still hoping to raise another $1.8 million before closing on the purchase in October…
[MVP leader] Miguel Delgado’s family came to the Roaring Fork Valley from northern Mexico more than two decades ago, and he said they’ve built a successful life here.
We started living in tents, then trailers and cabins, and eventually opened our own mechanic business here — my parents became home and business owners,” Delgado said. “Cavern Springs is one of the few affordable places to live for workers in this valley, including my parents.”
Delgado hopes becoming a resident-owned community will mean that his family and his neighbors’ families will have more secure housing for the long term.
Owning this park together isn’t just about a deed,” Delgado said. “It’s almost 100 families who will learn how to deliberate, compromise and make their own decisions as a collective — what is more of an American dream than that?”
MVP shared strategies to preserve mobile home parks as long-term affordable housing:
- Strengthen state legislation to increase residents’ opportunity to purchase the land under their homes, extending the time required for residents to raise capital
- Allow more flexible application timelines for parks to apply for state housing funds
- Establish a cap for annual lot rent increases
- Leverage local governments’ power to use deed restrictions and land-use policies like zoning to protect parks from redevelopment and preserve them as affordable housing
- Develop a community-led and governed regional housing fund to provide low-interest loans
Building it will take investment from every sector represented in this room,”
said MVP Project Organizer Katherine Coe.
[Photo credit: Eleanor Bennett, Aspen Journalism and Aspen Public Radio]
Local Leaders say Collaborative Model to Save Mobile Home Parks Could Inform Other Initiatives, Aspen Daily News [pdf]