About
Michigan’s first Statewide Housing Plan was released in 2022.
The Statewide Housing Plan aimed to address the numerous challenges that limit access to safe, healthy, affordable, accessible, and attainable housing for all in a community of their choice.
After the plan was released, regional groups (known as Regional Housing Partnerships or RHPs) were created to engage with local stakeholders and create regional plans that support the larger statewide plan.
Statewide Regional Housing Partnerships were formed.
Those engaged in this regional planning process were representatives of municipalities, community resource agencies, affordable housing developers, health and human service agencies, and others dedicated to improving the well-being of their communities.
Ultimately, the Regional Housing Partnerships are tasked with building a connected, collaborative housing ecosystem to address the affordability housing crisis in their communities.
The Region J Housing Partnership was formed in 2023.
The Southwest Michigan RHP worked hard through the summer of 2023 to develop our Regional Housing Action Plan. The region, also known as Region J, includes Berrien, Branch, Calhoun, Cass, Kalamazoo, St. Joseph, and Van Buren counties.
Since forming our RHP in May of 2023, we have met in person multiple times to create our workgroups, choose our regional priorities, and begin forming the strategies and key performance indicators that will show us how our success is measured.
Working Groups were created to focus on the priorities identified by the RHP. They met regularly to determine goals and strategies for their priority area. Those goals and strategies comprise the Regional Housing Action Plan.
This plan has come from many hours of discussions between professionals from every part of the housing industry and the region. We are grateful to everyone who took part in creating this plan!
More information about the Statewide Housing Plan and the Regional Housing Partnerships is available on the MI State Housing Development Authority’s (MSHDA) website. For more information on the Southwest Michigan RHP, subscribe to our enewsletter.
How the Regional Action Plan was Developed.
June 2023: First in-person stakeholder meeting facilitated by MSU Extension (MSUE) using the collective impact model to identify working groups and determine group membership.
Our working groups are:
- Unhoused and Equity
- Housing Ecosystem
- Housing Stock
- Older Adult Housing
July 2023: Working groups met remotely to review the statewide housing plan, and determined which goals and strategies were the highest priority for their group.
August 2023: Second MSUE facilitated meeting to select which goals were the highest priority for the region, which strategies would work to accomplish those goals, and identify key performance indicators to track the progress towards accomplishing those goals and strategies. The work populated the draft action plan that was submitted to MSHDA at the end of August.
September 2023: Draft plan was open for general/public feedback. The regional steering committee, composed of the working groups chairs, met to discuss the feedback. The Regional Housing Action Plan was submitted to MSHDA with the updates at the end of September.
October – November 2023: Working groups met to break down the steps needed to achieve the goals in the action plan. Work plans were created to detail the process to meet these goals. The Steering Committee met to review the workplans and find synergies across the working groups.
January – February 2024: Working groups met to review the workplans, shared challenges and clarify next steps to achieving the goals.
The Region J Housing Partnership is Future-Focused.
The Regional Housing Action Plan is flexible, can change, and will be updated at least annually. Working Groups meet to discuss the goals quarterly. New goals are added as needed at the Working Group meetings.
