Fifth Vienna Social Housing Field Study Inspires and Unites 50+ Multisectoral Delegates

In July, 55 delegates from the Bay Area, San Diego, Fresno, the Inland Empire, and Los Angeles attended the Global Policy Leadership Academy’s (GPLA) Summer 2024 Immersive Social Housing Field Study in Vienna, Austria, representing local and state agencies, elected officials, community-based organizations, developers, faith-based leaders, philanthropy, and transportation sectors. Vienna’s housing model is world-renowned for its focus on high-quality housing, which provides choices at an affordable price to more than 60% of its population, differentiating Vienna from the US in its focus on housing the middle class as well as low-income residents. This year, Vienna was ranked the world’s most livable city for the third year in a row, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit.

Delegates participated in a six-day program featuring a mix of lectures, panels, and walking tours. In addition to topics and activities featured in April, delegates discussed and shared ways Vienna and California tackle climate issues. Delegates reflected on a few key takeaways:

• This is a long-term process of movement-building that involves developing a broad coalition and messaging that supports the goal of housing everyone, including those at all income levels and life stages.
• The importance of building off current existing infrastructure and pilot cases and the need to create ways for different systems to work together, for example, health and housing systems as well as transportation and housing.
• The critical role of land banking and the potential to translate this to the US context through the Surplus Lands Act and the use of faith-based and educational institutions’ land.
• The need to include current and future residents as stakeholders in social housing and prioritize the most vulnerable populations.
• Importance of sufficient revenue to develop pilots and test ideas.
• The need for positive narratives and compelling stories that collectively offer hope and inspire bold solutions.

According to Kate Hartley, Director, Bay Area Housing Finance Agency (BAHFA), “When the opportunity arose to attend the Vienna Housing Field Study, I initially declined, thinking that the differences between housing systems in Vienna and the United States are so profound that there could be no lessons to apply here at home. I was so wrong! Seeing the Vienna model in action was not only deeply inspiring, but it illuminated transferable elements that we’re working on now.  I highly recommend it!”

Joseph Tomás McKellar, Executive Director, PICO California, added, “I found the Vienna Social Housing model to be an inspiring story that could inform how we organize for a more humane, compassionate, and racially equitable California. Our efforts to expand the availability of dignified, family-sustaining, affordable housing needs to be interconnected with other efforts to improve the strength and responsiveness of the social safety net, to fight climate change, to increase wages, and to improve public transit.”

Social housing continues to be featured in programs and legislation throughout the US, and GPLA’s Social Housing Field Study unites these movements. In 2023, the City of Los Angeles initiated a study on social housing and, through the United to House LA measure and Housing Movement Lab coalition, is funding alternative models for housing and building upon lessons learned in Vienna. In February 2023, Seattle voters approved Initiative 135 (I-135), which created the Seattle Social Housing Developer, a public development authority that will create social housing in Seattle, and the 13-member Seattle Social Housing Developer Board. Roberto Jimenez, who was a GPLA delegate in July, will be the first Seattle Social Housing Developer CEO. On the East Coast, New York State’s 2024 budget included $500M in funding to develop 15,000 units of housing on state-owned land, and Montgomery County, MD, utilizes a $100M revolving loan fund to finance large-scale mixed-income developments, with the County’s Housing Opportunities Commission (HOC) retaining majority ownership and control.

Given the depth of the housing and homelessness crisis in the US, understanding successful models such as Vienna’s will be key to determining elements that can be adapted to local circumstances. GPLA builds multisectoral delegations across perspectives and geographies to ensure an enriching experiential learning opportunity and will be organizing the following future trips:

• Spring 2025: April 6 – 12, 2025
• Fall 2025: September 21 – 27, 2025

Visit GPLA’s website to learn more about its Social Housing Field Study or contact [email protected].