The city of Jefferson Housing Committee is continuing to work on specific areas to address certain needs.

Building Official and Code Enforcer Chad Stevens says last fall the city received a $20,000 grant from the state, with a $10,000 local match, to kick-start a Rural Housing Readiness Assessment. Partnering with Iowa State University, Stevens tells Raccoon Valley Radio, there was an online survey that saw close to 400 responses about the current housing situation in the city and what people would like to see moving forward. 

Stevens points out that the Housing Committee then met after all of the data was collected from the survey and other information that ISU gathered, and an action plan was created.

“And these were specific tasks that our Housing Committee was to work on over the course of the next year to try to get more housing in Jefferson. So we defined a need and there was actually five different points that came out of this action plan.” 

Stevens notes that the five points included data collection, land development and incentives, rehabilitation and preservation of existing homes, reviewing rental properties and looking at inspections, and creating a non-profit entity that people could make monetary donations for housing initiatives. He talks about his favorite part of that process.

“The part that I enjoyed about this was actually the kind of brainstorming with the committee and getting actual action items out of this, something that we can actually work towards.” 

Stevens states that the 15 individuals on the Housing Committee were divided into sub-committees for each of the five points. He adds that the Housing Committee is meeting this month for a progress update and that there is $25,000 remaining from the $30,000 grant and local match that could be used for housing projects.