I would like to see two things grow out of this project:
It might be possible to make SROs with some concierge services that would provide sufficient support for some folks with limitations but then others might need a charitable program that costs them nothing because they just have no means to pay for it themselves. And, yet, there might be a lot of overlap between what the two things look like in practical details like helping folks get meals delivered to their room, helping folks access transportation, etc.
Since the end of World War II, we have torn down about a million SROs. This used to be normal market rate housing for young single people, seniors, childless couples, etc. and now most people -- if they know the term at all -- think of SROs as some kind of program for homeless people.
I spent nearly six years homeless and since getting myself off the street, I've lived in three different small rental units in two different hundred-year-old buildings. These old units in these old buildings don't really work for modern life.
For starters, they never have enough electrical outlets for modern life. Even poor people today have more things to plug in than people did a hundred years ago, a time when most rural homesteads didn't have electricity at all.
It was during the 1930s that Federal programs in the US set out to bring electricity to farms across the country. The Rural Electrification Act was passed in 1936.
We need a LOT of such housing to redress current needs. I don't personally imagine I will become the head of some construction company that single-handedly builds a million new SROs over the next five or ten years.
I have tried to imagine how best to make sure this is likely to spread like wildfire across the country.
I have wondered if I could design the building and license it, like selling floor plans.
I have wondered if I could create a pilot project and work out some of the bugs and then franchise it to leverage it and help it spread while still getting my cut.
I have tried to imagine this as a business plan of some sort that makes money for me. I'm not sure I know how to make that make sense.
I do know how to write. So, for now, that's what I am doing.
- A return of (updated, modernized) market-rate SROs as a common form of "normal" -- AKA market-rate -- housing for small households.
- A supply of supportive housing for the sorts of folks at risk of ending up homeless.
It might be possible to make SROs with some concierge services that would provide sufficient support for some folks with limitations but then others might need a charitable program that costs them nothing because they just have no means to pay for it themselves. And, yet, there might be a lot of overlap between what the two things look like in practical details like helping folks get meals delivered to their room, helping folks access transportation, etc.
Since the end of World War II, we have torn down about a million SROs. This used to be normal market rate housing for young single people, seniors, childless couples, etc. and now most people -- if they know the term at all -- think of SROs as some kind of program for homeless people.
I spent nearly six years homeless and since getting myself off the street, I've lived in three different small rental units in two different hundred-year-old buildings. These old units in these old buildings don't really work for modern life.
For starters, they never have enough electrical outlets for modern life. Even poor people today have more things to plug in than people did a hundred years ago, a time when most rural homesteads didn't have electricity at all.
It was during the 1930s that Federal programs in the US set out to bring electricity to farms across the country. The Rural Electrification Act was passed in 1936.
We need a LOT of such housing to redress current needs. I don't personally imagine I will become the head of some construction company that single-handedly builds a million new SROs over the next five or ten years.
I have tried to imagine how best to make sure this is likely to spread like wildfire across the country.
I have wondered if I could design the building and license it, like selling floor plans.
I have wondered if I could create a pilot project and work out some of the bugs and then franchise it to leverage it and help it spread while still getting my cut.
I have tried to imagine this as a business plan of some sort that makes money for me. I'm not sure I know how to make that make sense.
I do know how to write. So, for now, that's what I am doing.