After more than seven years as a member representative, board member and staff leader, Joo Hee Pomplun stepped into her new role as Executive Director at the Alliance, replacing Russ Adams, on October 25. In this short post she reflects on the future of the Alliance in the near- and long-term.

Our September 2019 Actualizing Equity event included a panel discussion and collaborative visioning session to continue the leadership of Community Stabilization Project and set a new trajectory for equitable, not just affordable, housing.

Since September 2018, when Associate Director Maura Brown and I began planning for my departure from the Alliance, my mind has been filled with warm remembrances and my heart with deep gratitude. Over the past year, the transition process has left me with equal feelings of satisfaction for the pathways we’ve traveled together and anticipation and excitement for where we’re headed.

If you followed the campaign to pass the recent tenant protection ordinance in Minneapolis, Ivory Taylor may already be a familiar face. Drawing on her lived experience of growing up in a mixed-race family that faced economic insecurity and housing instability, and her work organizing with tenants through HOME Line, Taylor has spoken publicly and powerfully in recent months about the urgent need for renters’ rights in front of the press and elected officials. Given her recent leadership shift from AmeriCorps VISTA Organizer to Lead Tenant Organizer and VISTA Program Director, we sat down with her to learn more about how she got into this work, her approach to organizing — and the best concert she’s seen this year. 

Like so many overlooked infrastructure investments, the Elk Creek Interceptor could have easily slipped under the radar. But in 1994, a small group of advocates turned a spotlight on the massive sewer infrastructure project, mobilizing hundreds of suburban residents to hold the Metropolitan Council accountable — and ignite a coalition movement for regional equity.

On August 28, 2019, the Alliance submitted the following letter to the Minneapolis Mayor and City Council, supporting proposed tenant protection ordinances. Read more about the issue here. Equity in Place (EIP) is a diverse group of strategic partners from organizations led by people of color and housing advocacy organizations who believe that everyone in…

Everyone deserves a safe, dignified, and affordable home. But some landlords would rather protect their own profits over tenants’ rights in Minneapolis, launching the deceptive “Safe and Affordable Minneapolis” campaign to attack two proposed city ordinances for renter protections in Minneapolis. An effort convened by Inquilinxs Unidxs Por Justicia, The Alliance, HOME Line, Take Action…

Fighting sprawl and promoting smart growth. For years, those were the framing concepts around many urban sustainability campaigns nationwide. In the Twin Cities, the Alliance helped to bend the arc of regional efforts to center community organizing and equitable development. Dan Cramer was engaged in that shift nearly 20 years ago.

The City of Arden Hills is building a new neighborhood on 427 acres of publicly owned land but it refuses to include affordable housing opportunities for everyone to live there. In this Race & Regionalism report we examine this massive tract of undeveloped land as a case study for how and why cities like Arden…

The Safe & Affordable Neighborhoods Minneapolis campaign is nothing more than self-interested scare tactics from the landlord lobby that perpetuate racial inequities. Join us in supporting the Minneapolis city council’s tenant protection ordinances that are important first steps toward housing justice. Sign on to show your support here: http://bit.ly/MplsTenantProtection Watch the video and share with your networks!