NCF hosts legislator tour at Park Plaza Cooperative

Legislators gathered for a tour of Park Plaza Cooperative on September 21, 2021. Pictured left to right: Senator Lindsey Port, Rep. Sandra Feist, Rep. Steve Elkins, Sen. Mary Kunesh, Victoria Clark (NCF), Rep. Connie Bernardy, Natividad Seefeld (Board President, Park Plaza Co-op), Sen. Mark Koran, Soren Stevenson (NCF), Trevor Nelson (APAC Board President), Rep. Tony Jurgens.

NCF co-hosted a Minnesota legislator tour of Park Plaza Co-op in Fridley, MN on Tuesday, September 21, 2021. Fifteen legislators and legislative staff attended the event. The event’s co-host, the Park Plaza board of directors, had an opportunity to share the positive impacts that cooperative ownership has had in their community and legislators had an opportunity to hear about what can be done at the Legislature to improve and preserve more manufactured home communities.

Some of the issues highlighted during the tour included the need for dedicated down payment assistance programs and improved home financing options for manufactured homeowners. Staff from All Parks Alliance for Change also provided background on a resident-led campaign to pass a bill that would expand the opportunity for cooperative ownership to more manufactured homeowners.

View photos from the legislator tour.

 Learn more about NCF’s public policy work.

Minnesota Legislature passes housing bill, includes big wins for manufactured homeowners

On June 24, the Minnesota House advanced a final housing bill just days before the June 30 special session deadline. The bill included several notable wins for Minnesota manufactured homeowners including changes to how manufactured homes can be titled and increased funding for cooperative acquisitions of manufactured home communities and infrastructure improvement projects.

Real Property Titling for Manufactured Homes. Like the majority of states across the country, manufactured homes in Minnesota are titled as personal property if they are sited in a land-lease community (ie: a community where the residents own their homes but rent the land underneath the home). The 2021 housing bill approves a new policy that allows owners of manufactured homes in cooperative- or nonprofit-owned communities to title their homes as real property instead of personal property. 

NCF has advocated for manufactured home titling reforms for many years. We hope the new real property designation for homes in our client co-ops will attract new lenders to the manufactured housing market and improve the loan terms available to homeowners.

Changes to the Rehabilitation Loan Program. Minnesota Housing’s Rehabilitation Loan Program (RLP) assists low income homeowners in financing basic home improvements that directly affect the safety, habitability, energy efficiency, or accessibility of their homes. The legislature approved an expansion of the program to allow the loans to be used toward the replacement of a manufactured home. The loan amount maximum was also raised from $27,000 to $37,500 per loan.

Opportunity to Purchase. This year, a group of homeowners from manufactured home communities across the state led a campaign to pass a law that would provide manufactured homeowners with an opportunity to purchase their community any time the property was going up for sale. Six other states across the country have opportunity to purchase laws, including in Colorado, which passed the law in 2020. 

The bill language was included in the House of Representatives omnibus bill, but did not receive a hearing in the Senate so was not included in the final housing omnibus bill. The campaign’s leadership plans to bring the bill forward again in 2022. Learn more about the opportunity to purchase bill by visiting the campaign’s website: mn4otp.org.

Funding Allocations. The housing bill includes $10 million in new, one-time funding and $100 million in Housing Infrastructure Bonds (HIBs). 

Of the $10 million in one-time funding that was allocated, the Manufactured Home Park Infrastructure Program (MHCRP) received $1,750,000 in addition to the program’s existing base appropriation of $1,000,000. The total amount available through the MHCRP in 2022 will be $2,750,000. Eligible uses of the MHCRP include manufactured home community acquisitions and community improvement projects. Funds are available once a year, typically in mid-August, through a competitive application process.

The Workforce and Affordable Homeownership Development (WAHD) Program received $3,250,000 above the program’s existing base appropriation of $250,000 per year. The total amount available through the Workforce Homeownership Program in 2022 will be $3,500,000. WAHD provides one-time grants for residential housing development and rehabilitation, land development, and infrastructure development and repair for manufactured home communities. Funds are available once a year, in mid-July, through a competitive application process. 

Perhaps the most notable outcome of the 2021 session for manufactured housing was the inclusion of a $15,000,000 set-aside of Housing Infrastructure Bonds to be used for manufactured home community acquisitions and infrastructure improvements. The total HIB authorization approved by the Legislature was $100,000,000.

Housing Infrastructure Bonds (HIBs) are limited obligation tax-exempt bonds issued by Minnesota Housing and authorized by appropriations from the General Fund of the Minnesota Legislature. The proceeds of HIBs may be used to fund loans that finance specific housing development purposes. 

In 2018, the eligible uses of HIBs was expanded to include manufactured home community infrastructure improvements and expanded again in 2019 to allow HIBs to be used for acquisition of manufactured home communities.

Sungold Heights nears completion of $2.6 million infrastructure improvement project

NCF Cooperative Housing Manager, Julie Martinez, discusses project details with Sungold’s engineer consultant, WSB.

A little after two years since becoming Minnesota’s 9th resident-owned community, Sungold Heights is nearly finished with a $2.6 million infrastructure project. The project replaces the property’s aging water and sewer systems and reconstructs the roads throughout the community. The project, which is slated to be complete by October 2021, has garnered local attention and was featured in the Worthington Globe. A press release can be found on NCF’s website.

The project is funded by grants from Minnesota Housing, a loan from the Southwest Initiative Foundation, and the corporation’s reserves. 

A recent MPR story highlighted the problem of deferred infrastructure maintenance in manufactured home communities and the effect that infrastructure failure has on the homeowners who rent the land. As NCF’s Executive Director highlights in the story, landowners often choose not to upgrade the infrastructure in their communities because it is capital intensive and there is little economic incentive to make improvements. 

The Sungold Heights project demonstrates the difference that resident-ownership makes when it comes to the upkeep of critical infrastructure systems. When the decisions about what happens to the property are in the hands of the homeowners who live there, there is a built-in incentive to improve the functional use of the property and improve curb appeal. 

Stay tuned for announcements about Sungold’s project completion celebration!

Another "Virtual" Success for NCF's 2021 Common Ground Conference

We at Northcountry Cooperative Foundation are happy to report that Common Ground 2021 was another “virtual” success. Every year, NCF hosts a conference for leaders of resident owned communities (ROCs) across Minnesota and Wisconsin about perineal issues facing ROCs. This year, Common Ground featured seven remote sessions over the course of two weeks that covered a myriad of topics including Board Recruitment, Conflict Resolution, Marketing on a Budget, and Emergency Preparedness.

Building off the success of last year’s conference, we had record breaking attendance with twenty attendees across seven communities within the ROC Network attending an average of four sessions each. All sessions were recorded and are featured on the NCF YouTube page.

We were also excited to once again offer community grants to attendees based on the generous donations of the thirteen sponsors of this year’s conference (see sponsor list below). Based on attendance and participation, five of the seven communities will be receiving $3,000 in grants that will focus on marketing and recruitment of new members. Grant recipients will determine how their community will spend the grant, whether it be magnets to all members to better connect with the onsite manager or yard signs for an upcoming annual meeting to boost attendance.

Next year NCF hopes to take a hybrid approach to the conference where a portion of the classes will be remote in addition to an in-person event that will focus on networking and community development. Looking forward to 2022 and beyond!

2021 Common Ground Conference Sponsors: TSP Architects Engineering Planning, Southwest Initiative Foundation, ROC USA, Ralph K. Morris Foundation, First Alliance Credit Union, Cooperative Development Foundation, Haylor, Freyer & Coon Inc., Midwest Minnesota Community Development Corporation, Minnesota Housing Partnership, Adams, Rizzi & Sween PA, Common Properties Management Cooperative, Cooperative Development Bank, Homes of Harmony

NCF welcomes new directors to the board

NCF is excited to announce the addition of four new directors to the NCF board. The new directors, three from Wisconsin and one from Greater MN, reflect NCF’s commitment to better reflecting the geographies served by the organization. The new board recruits come from diverse personal and professional backgrounds. Among the new directors include Brian Dahlk, a Madison, WI-based accountant specializing in cooperative accounting, Bobbie Grubb, a long-time resident leader from one of NCF’s client co-ops in La Crosse, WI, Diane Schobert, a retired community development finance professional from Birchwood, WI, and Mar Valdecantos, a writer, interpreter, and community activist from Northfield, MN.

Brian Dahlk is a CPA and senior manager at Wegner CPAs in Madison, Wisconsin. He has been a member of three different housing cooperatives and served as board president for one of those organizations. For the past fourteen years he has provided audits, financial reviews, tax returns, and consulting services for hundreds of cooperative organizations all across the country, including several dozen housing cooperatives. Brian received his master’s degree in business in 1992 and his Certified Public Accountant designation in 2006. Prior to joining Wegner CPAs, he served as the financial manager of a housing cooperative for nine years, owned a small business, and provided accounting and managerial services for several nonprofits and cooperatives in Wisconsin and California.

Bobbie Grubb has been a resident of Pammel Creek Estates, a resident-owned community in La Crosse, Wisconsin, since 2013 and has served as secretary of the board of directors since 2016. She also serves as co-chair of the ROC USA Outreach and Education Committee. She’s employed by Festival Foods in La Crosse. She’s a regular volunteer at The Center: LGBTQ Connection and at a variety of community events. Bobbie takes every opportunity to broaden her skills and capacity as a board member and co-op leader. She attends ROC USA’s annual ROC Leadership Institute every year and frequents NCF training and networking events. “I love learning and experiencing new things, and with the help of NCF and ROC USA, I appreciate all the opportunities that being a resident-owned community has offered me.”

Diane Schobert is a resident of Birchwood, Wisconsin and has a unique and diverse work history in affordable housing and economic development in Wisconsin. As a recent retiree, she serves on the Educational Foundation for Birchwood Schools, which raises funds for students and teachers. Previously, she served as Chair for the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago’s (FHLBC) Affordable Housing Advisory Council, representing non-profits across Wisconsin and Illinois; she served on the Board for Impact 7, a statewide Community Development Financial Institution in Rice Lake, Wisconsin; she worked at the Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority (WHEDA) as Business Development Officer; she served as executive director of Movin’ Out, a statewide Wisconsin nonprofit housing agency; she worked as a residential lending manager, helping to create the expanded underwriting guidelines for WHEDA.

Mar Valdecantos is a native of Madrid and has lived in Minnesota since 1998. She is a writer, community organizer, artist and English-to-Spanish document translator for the Northfield (Minnesota) School District. She’s always been concerned with social injustices and has endeavored to understand the political process and the partnership between entities that usually don’t communicate with each other. As a member of the Northfield Human Rights Commission, she works to advance the rights of the underrepresented and voiceless in Northfield. She’s also co-founder of Rice County Neighbors United/Vecinxs Unidxs, an advocacy group that fights for the rights and dignity of all persons, especially immigrants, refugees and low-income groups. “Being an immigrant has given me an increased knowledge and empathy for all refugees and immigrants around the world,” she said.