I feel there is a disconnect between the abilities of the poverty stricken the assumptions we lay-out for them, so thank you very much for this conversation! There are programs out there that help different levels of homeless and grief stricken individuals. Yes, many are physically and mentally impaired and unable to do a day's work, BUT there are also many individuals inbetween that are striving to better their situation intrinsically, not just with hand-outs. Some of these individuals have more drive to provide a hard day's work than most of us that take daily empolyment forgranted. In Downtown Atlanta, the Georgia Works! Program is doing just that. I implore you to look at their website and see if you have local outreach organizations that are similar. Their candidates are DRUG-FREE, have TRANSPORTATION provided and are managed by case workers that require them to save and fix themselves entirely without hand-outs. Georgia Works! is working for Georgia.

I appreciate your input Mindy; let me clarify a couple of things here:

I would not market to shelters alone (faith based or otherwise) for an affordable propety. My marketing plans have included:
- Craigslist
- For Rent/ApartmentGuide/Pennysaver/local newspaper/rent.com/zillow/hotpads/etc. Both in print and online.
-Resident referrals
--Outreach marketing
- Homeless shelters
- Volunteers of America
- VFW/American Legion posts
- Masonic / Scottish Rite temples (I have several in my area that date back as far as 150 years!)
- Senior centers (if property is 55+ or 62+)
- DAV offices
- VA Medical Centers (I have one nearby)
- Veterans resource offices
- Many interfaith organizations that we have locally. I am lucky that I have a Rabbi that formerly served as State Chaplain (I am in Sacramento, CA) and she continues to serve on boards of many community organizations that are interfaith.


From a Fair Housing point of view, am I out of hot water with marketing? If I choose to provide support for these organizations (either as a property/group of properties or with resident help), how would I go about making sure it is fair?

I think you know the answer to your question. If your property receives federal funding, you must declare all your advertising sources. You must make it known how and what avenues you use to inform the public of your housing services. As a single property, you cannot devote paid labor services to only one entity and not at least give the impression that you are partial to that particular organization. For example, if you only market to homeless veteran at a Catholic-run shelter, it could be questioned as to being a FH violation. And you definitely should not be volunteering there on company time. If there is an injury, it would then become a workman's comp issue and this may be hard for the property management company.

This is why companies often have a non-profit off-shoot that handles donations, etc. with a Board of Directors overseeing projects and money distributions, etc. What you could do, if you feel strongly, is 1. volunteer on your own time at your own expense and/or 2. contact the social service agencies in the area and see how you might coordinate efforts for your Apartment Association and them.

Obviously, you can market to the agency, to homeless people on the street, to veterans groups (VFWs) other homeless shelters in the area, etc. But for the sake of not seemingly favoring this one group or organization, I would just market to all avenues. Informing the local housing authority, as Nate suggested, is also a great idea.

So - spread the information, target this special group,too, as well as all other avenues, and don't look back! It is such a slippery slope to pin all your marketing to only one place, group, or area.

I appreciate your input Nate; but I was hoping to find out how to avoid the blowback from a possible fair housing issue if it appears that I am only working with this one source or the source appears to target a specific protected class.

Johnny, I would check with the city/county and get the non-profits that are operating in the area. Get the local church groups and get the local news in there. I believe that forces can be brought that would address the situation.

I would however ensure that the worker that would go there to work, would do it voluntarily and what happens if they get hurt while providing maintenance at the place? For that reason, I would go to the city and county and see what they have to offer. The Housing authority in the area may be able to bring something to the table. The city council/ the district manager all would be locked at the hip.

Then go to the local VFW and see what can be done from that end as well. Hope, I was able to throw a couple of brain storm ideas out there!

Okay, time to clarify as nobody actually answered the primary concern; and only offered opinions on whether or not doing something like this was a good idea.


Let's say I manage an affordable property (any of it's forms: LIHTC Section 42, BOND, RD, HUD Project based section 8, or I am able to accept HCV recipients). I find a homeless shelter that is in need of assistance in many forms and do so by doing the following:

1) Provide a maintenance tech (at my expense) for 1 day per month leaving it up to the tech to do more work either on a volunteer basis or paid by the shelter to perform:
*Repairs
*Health and Safety improvements
*Corrections to code violations
*Improvement projects
This would be for LABOR only, parts and materials would be the responsibility of the shelter, as would any labor time beyond the time I am paying for. If the shelter has someone as an employee or an individual actually using the shelter to learn tasks and assist; that would be welcomed and considered ideal.
2) Collect from residents or otherwise provide occasional donations of food, clothing, basic toiletries, or other necessities to assist in keeping their shelves full.
3) Seeing as though my property is being run as affordable and the shelter serves individuals that may qualify; if I have vacant units to fill, I should be able to market to those that use the shelter's services.

Let's take it a step further: let's say the shelter is run by a faith based organization. How do I avoid the appearance of a fair housing violation and marketing strictly to them? Is it as easy as showing all my marketing venues and asking the people operating the shelter to share my information with others in their network that may not be of the same faith?