Comprehensive Action Plan to Safeguard Cook County's Affordable Rental Housing Announced

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The Preservation Compact, a project of the Urban Land Institute supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, has announced a comprehensive series of concrete steps that will save at least 75,000 affordable rental apartments in Cook County, IL by 2020. The initiatives represent a joining of forces of area real estate, finance, philanthropic, non-profit and governmental leaders to stem the loss of a critical housing resource. 

"Rental housing plays a central role in the region's economy and is as critical to its infrastructure as highways, transit systems, schools and industrial parks, but we have been losing this critical asset at alarming rates for many years now. The Preservation Compact has forged a private, public and nonprofit partnership that has committed to working together to reverse these trends," said Julia Stasch, co-chair of the Preservation Compact and Vice President for Human and Community Development at The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

A key component of the plan is a Preservation Fund, through which community development leaders LISC and Community Investment Corp. will offer a suite of new financing tools to assist both preservation-minded buyers and existing rental property owners seeking to maintain affordability.  The MacArthur Foundation has pledged $10 million in seed money to the Preservation Fund, which will eventually swell to $100 million with banking industry support.

Other initiatives include: an interagency council to coordinate housing policy responses among local, state, and federal agencies; a data clearinghouse to provide early warnings of properties at risk; technical assistance and loans for energy-efficient improvements; technical support and legal assistance to tenants in at-risk properties; and reduced operating costs for owners through property tax reductions.

Also released today is a report on the state of rental housing in Cook County prepared by the Real Estate Center at DePaul University which makes clear the need for these preservation policies. According to the report, there is currently a 114,000 unit gap between the supply and demand of affordable units in and around Chicago. If current trends continue, the Real Estate Center predicts that by 2020 Cook County's supply of low-cost rental will drop by 78,000 units.

Click here for more information on the Preservation Compact.