Members of the Beacon Development Group team were active and present at this year’s Housing California Conference in Sacramento. The annual conference held on March 9th – 10th brought together professionals from across the state and nation. Participants engaged in a wide range of topics, including how property management should respond to ICE (immigration) agents and the rights of their residents, displacement policies in Oakland, and tracking progress and the impact of proposed federal tax changes on affordable housing. The conference theme for this year was “Block by Block: Improving Neighborhood Health.”
The conference key note speaker, Dr. Doug Jutte, Executive Director of Building Healthy Places, presented on the intersection of housing and health. Dr. Jutte argued that health happens outside of the doctor’s office and noted that “zip-code is a greater determinate in health than any other factor.” According to Jutte, the United States spends $3.3 trillion a year on health – 80% of the expenses attributed to chronic disease, most of which are prevalent in low-income communities and are preventable. Dr. Jutte’s work focuses on improving the health outcomes through collaborations with community developers. Learn more about the work of Building Health Places here.
Speakers also included National Low Income Housing Coalition’s Diane Yentel and Housing advocate Janny Castillo. The conference had a record setting attendance and featured numerous inspiring speakers and informative sessions on best practices in affordable housing development and operations. The keynote speeches and content from the conference can be found on the Housing California website.
BDG’s Kion Sawney and Chad Wakefield of Overland Pacific Cutler, who is part of the Life’s Garden project team in Sunnyvale, CA
Keynote speaker Dr. Doug Jutte of Building Healthy Places