Built to last

From homelessness to homeownership and everything in between, a broad coalition is working to make Atlanta a better place for all who call it home.

Note: In the Fall 2024 issue of THE GIVING LIFE the story “Closing Time” chronicled how the Community Foundation’s housing team closed on eight properties within five weeks, resulting in grants and impact investments for the construction or renovation of 750 affordable homes for seniors, families and first-time homebuyers. The following story offers news and insights as the Foundation drives toward its goal of supporting the creation and preservation of 500 units of affordable housing by the end of 2025.

Asking for the impossible.

That was developer Darion Dunn’s first reaction when he heard of Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens’ rapid housing initiative to build 500 units of Permanent Supportive Housing by the end of 2025.

Dunn’s second thought: Why not?

“We really had no idea how we were going to do it,” Dunn said on a recent afternoon, as he took a brief break from overseeing a 24-unit affordable housing renovation at 729 Bonaventure St. “But it sometimes takes folks outside of the housing industry to push the envelope.”

That includes folks like the housing team at the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta and its visionary donors, both individual and institutional, who have sped more than halfway toward the envelope-pushing goal of their own.

The Foundation is on track to support the creation or preservation of 500 units of affordable housing by the end of 2025. Sparked by an initial $100 million commitment from the Robert W. Woodruff Foundation and the Joseph B. Whitehead Foundation in 2023, the Community Foundation’s Atlanta Affordable Housing Fund has raised over $152 million of the $200 million.

Both the Foundation’s and the Permanent Supportive Housing’s goals are helping to drive toward Mayor Dickens’ promise of building or preserving 20,000 units of affordable housing across the city by 2030.

The urgency of the effort speaks to the daunting scope of the persistent challenge and the opportunity to harness local resources for our community’s needs. An Urban Land Institute’s Atlanta District Council update to its 2018 Affordable Atlanta report found in 2023 that within the core five-county region, there is no ZIP code where someone earning 80% or less of the area’s median income can purchase a home at the median price.

While acknowledging the substantial progress that has been achieved through Atlanta’s public-private partnerships and unprecedented philanthropic funding, the study’s authors characterized the findings as “distressing” — and a clarion call for more action.

Meanwhile, the annual 2024 Point in Time (PIT) Count found approximately 2,867 individuals experiencing homelessness in Atlanta, including both sheltered and unsheltered populations. The count represented a 7% increase from the previous year, highlighting a growing need for effective interventions and support systems.

A ‘model for the U.S.’

The data on housing affordability and homelessness helps frame the central challenge facing most major cities nationwide: how to devise and execute solutions and actions capable of outpacing — and, over time, reducing — the rate of the affordable housing shortage.

On that count, Atlanta has emerged a pioneer. Atlanta’s rapid progress has drawn national attention of leaders, planners, advocates, foundations and philanthropists eager to hear how it is tackling a common challenge.

In March, Harvard University published an article touting Atlanta’s approach as “a social housing model for the U.S.” The piece provides an in-depth analysis of the innovative public-private-philanthropic investment that is delivering real results.

The coverage has made Sarah Kirsch, the Community Foundation’s managing director of housing funds, a first call for those from other communities who are looking to make progress on addressing their regions’ housing crises.

“We’ve heard from community foundations from almost every major city in the country that are grappling with this issue,” Kirsch said. “Some are overwhelmed on where to start. We’re able to share what we have found to be our secret sauce of a unique platform of establishing a philanthropic fund and a lowcost loan fund, working with government, having a highly engaged volunteer network, and frankly, relentless tenacity to make it happen.”

A key ingredient to that sauce has been dedicated donors such as Marc Pollack, co-founder of the Atlanta Affordable Housing Fund, who worked with the Community Foundation’s staff to execute on the novel idea to direct money from his donor-advised fund to support the effort.

“That was sort of the first move that opened up a whole plethora of possibilities for other people to use their donor-advised funds to do the same thing and really build momentum,” Pollack said. “What’s happening in Atlanta is pretty amazing. There is a terrific collaboration on this issue right now, and the Foundation is at the forefront of making it happen.”

Steady support beyond move-in day

Another strength of Atlanta’s efforts has been greater understanding that walking through a new front door is often just the first step in a homeowner’s or resident’s journey toward stability.

Case in point is the Rapid Housing Initiative launched by the city and nonprofit Partners for HOME to reduce unsheltered homelessness through the Permanent Supportive Housing model. The model aims to help ensure long-term stability for its tenants, who have been deemed chronically homeless based on a chronic debilitating condition and lengthy stretches of homelessness.

A $212 million campaign is underway to create sustained funding for supportive services, which include mental health and addiction treatment, job training, and life coaching, said Partners for HOME Chief Executive Officer Cathryn Vassell.

There’s also help at the ready to deal with everyday challenges such as figuring out newfangled microwave ovens that do triple duty as air fryers and convection ovens.

“These are regular folks that are coming to the table with lots of trauma and sometimes just medical and mental health issues that have gone untreated for a really long time,” Vassell said. “So a lot of this is playing catch up and making sure we’re comprehensive and helping that person get what they need and what they want so they can live happier more fulfilling lives — and that spans everything, including how to use the microwave.”

‘Resiliency of the human spirit’

Back at the Bonaventure project, Darion Dunn reflected on the work happening there as well as on several ther affordable housing projects that his firm, Atlantica Properties, is working on.

Dunn says that Atlantica, which he co-founded in 2010 with his brother, Trenton, has long been committed to affordable housing. Yet the risk associated with the firm committing its own capital to challenging projects limited what it could achieve.

Now, backed with considerable funding and resources from partners like the Community Foundation, Dunn is making an impact for those unhoused in Atlanta.

“If you really want to make a lot of money as a developer, you don’t do this type of work — but then who would be left to do it?” Dunn said. “We have the expertise in this space, and it’s hard to turn your back on it once you have seen the reality of what people are facing.”

Indeed, that reality is something Dunn has seen firsthand with the Bonaventure project. Prior to renovations starting there, several homeless men were using the property to shelter at night. Early on in the work, Dunn’s team would halfheartedly board up the building at day’s end, with the unspoken expectation that the men would easily find their way back in at night.

Eventually, however, Dunn had to lock down the building to ensure security and on-time completion of the work.

Still, it’s his hope that, eventually, some of those same men who sought refuge in the then dilapidated building will be able to return — but this time as tenants living in a safe, stable and supportive environment.

“These folks, they’re real to me,” Dunn said. “To struggle through homelessness and just survive is very impressive and shows the resiliency of the human spirit. I never cease to be amazed that, even in the midst of homelessness, the positivity that many of these people still have, and the faith that many still hold on to. That’s what drives us to keep making progress.”

Pictured: 729 Bonaventure St. housing renovation project

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Read the full Summer 2025 edition of The Giving Life here.