Many of you know that our home of 33 years, our dear little Kauai, is facing the major challenge of having no affordable housing for our local families. And some of you know that Harvest and I have committed to help solve this conundrum, and have been working on it for years now.
I am so honored and proud to officially announce the formation of our nonprofit agency, Neighborhood Housing Community Development Corporation.
Our mission is to provide truly and permanently affordable, sustainable neighborhood housing and living for our local people, farmers and workforce on Kauai, in partnership with the remarkable Kauai community, government agencies and other organizations. Our team is getting to be very effective, and we’re so thrilled to be joined by the venerable Greg Crowe, our vice president, and the remarkable Larry Graff, executive director.
Our vision is to change the old, ineffective paradigm of “affordable housing” to “permanently affordable living” (PAL). As Greg says, it’s housing — and so much more! We are working diligently to provide (and encourage others to provide) housing which the average person living on Kauai can actually afford. We believe that housing should stay truly affordable, permanently — not just for 10 or 15 years.
We believe that PAL is building housing and also staying focused on creating sustainable communities for our residents, using innovative technologies and concepts which are tested and proven elsewhere to reduce the cost of living, protect the environment and increase our quality of life (such as solar power and hot water and advanced waste treatment units). We are building a talented and dedicated team to complete this work.
Kauai is one of the most beautiful places on earth. We are a tiny island in the middle of the largest body of water on our little planet and our “Garden Island” is facing a clear and present “creeping disaster” (our planning director’s phrase). Anywhere else that you live, if you can’t find a home, you simply move down the road. On Kauai … you are gone! And your family, which may have been in its ancestral home for generations, is torn asunder!
You can help
As a fledgling organization, we are seeking volunteers in social media, office assistance, construction, architecture, engineering, landscaping and/or any other services that will help us achieve this urgent work. If you own land and want to help us make a difference, we invite you to contact us. We can show you how to serve the community while preserving your land, protecting the environment and even generating a profit or creating a passive and on-going income stream.
Donation match fundraising
On Nov. 14 we officially incorporated in the state of Hawaii as a nonprofit organization. We submitted our application for federal
nonprofit status in December (and — even if the government is shut down, they cashed our check). Our first fundraising effort is to match our first major gift of $30,000, from an anonymous donor.
The funding is to ensure that we can continue our noble work. We need funds for developing the many projects we are working on and for supporting the work with staff, supplies and consultants.
Of course, we will meet with you to help you earmark your funds to specific efforts or projects, if you like. At this point your donation is only eligible for state tax exemption. You will be notified when our application for federal nonprofit status is approved, so that your donation would then be eligible for federal exemption.
It is absolutely vital that we raise funds to continue our mission to serve Kauai with PAL opportunities for the residents of Kauai. I urge you to visit our website at www.nhcdc-hi.org to learn more about us and call or email me if you have any questions. You can donate through the website, write a check or meet with me and our team at any time, to discuss how you can support the righteous and selfless work of Neighborhood Housing CDC.
I believe in Neighborhood Housing CDC. Through your donation and support we can make a difference on Kauai. Thank you for taking part in our great work.
•••
Jim Edmonds is president of the Neighborhood Housing Community Development Corporation.
Kudos for putting time, energy and money into something to benefit others. However, the effort should be privately funded. Why should our tax dollars be used to supply affordable housing to “local families”? Who are these “local families” and how do you determine who qualifies for your affordable housing? How long do you have to live here to qualify and what are the criteria for selecting applicants? As long as this is a purely private, charitable effort then congrats and keep up the good work. There should be no tax dollars used to supplement affordable housing on Kauai. As anywhere in the USA, you need to live within your means and live somewhere where you can afford to live.
Have fun and good luck Jim…just wait until you run head-on into the government wall of obstruction aka: suffocating rules, regulations, zoning issues & red tape all of which are the cause of the problem. All your good intentions will count for nothing with the bureaucrats, politicians and busybodies. Sorry.
RG DeSoto
Good luck with your new fund raising business! Hopefully Government will stay out of the way and let you achieve something? And hopefully, our broke Government will not get involved with any funds since it doesn’t succeed in anything it touches these days, and we’re dead broke! I look forward to the day you can include free schooling, free healthcare for all, free clothing, free food and all the rest for our poor and needy citizens. After all, we deserve it, and those people currently working hard and paying the vast majority of our taxes, that we can barely get by on now, need to pay more! I’m calling for a $100 per hour minimum wage for all, whether we decide to work or not. It’s so easy to print all that money and prosperity would explode all around us! We also need to make them increase the price of homes on the Mainland. Housing is too cheap there and it isn’t fair to Kauai! We must all be equal and live anywhere we damn well please. Even if we can’t afford it! Vote Democrat! Let’s bring this racist American experiment to an end, once and for all!
Aloha Jim,
But $30K is about what it takes to get to a building permit all things considered.
Best to your efforts…!
Charlie
How does this program differ from what Habitat for Humanity on Kauai could provide?
thanks and what percentage of the donations go for housing and related projects and what percentage goes for overhead and salaries;
we only donate when 98% + goes to the intended project and not overhead and salaries;
thanks;
RK
Hello Robinson Family – how about sharing some of your 51,000 ACRES. Or Steve Case of GROVE FARM….hmmm….whatcha doin’ with 36,000 ACRES….spare a bit bra’h..
Good luck in navigating through Hawaii’s corrupt building permit system of paying off the crooks that line their pockets in numerous “official” inspections, you pay the building planning department, the plumbing, electrical, building inspectors, sewage, water, filing fees and more. All of this takes valuable time which you pay and wait on their terms including termite inspection, insurance, hurricane strenghtening, flood zone inspection.
Be sure to read the previous letter telling of important discussions in the legislature to raise the minimum wage to $17 an hour. People need higher incomes to pay for the high price of housing here.
The U.S. government provides low income housing in most areas of the country. Without that program homelessness would be massive. And you might find this shocking but our tax dollars help pay for it just like it pays for all U.S. government expenditures.
Best of luck to Mr. Edmunds for his advocacy on behalf of our citizens who work hard, play by the rules but struggle to keep a roof over their heads.
Oh, this is rich!!
Jim and Harvest wringing their hands over the lack of affordable housing when they greatly contributed to it by gentrifying the North Shore through their sale of luxury housing and TVRs. They’d be the last people I’d trust to solve the problem.
Ok real estate broker. How about you giving back to the community that you’ve been taking from all these years. These ideas have already played out in several states just another way to take from the community again and again. The selling of kuleana lands and numerous desecration’s that has commenced you still want more. Nah no more hewa loa and then a cultural specialist to boot Ian wow didn’t he recently loose his house you should’ve help save it you could’ve started the program with him. And finally asking for donations. Seriously…hehehe funny people. Be real please…
Great work guys!
I know you are too ha’aha’a to say it, but maybe Amused and Mana Wahine would be interested to know that it takes A LOT of money to start a 501(c)3. One that has multiple kanaka maoli as employees and board members.
Harvest and Jim are the largest donors to their non profit. They have acknowledged in person and in previous articles they were “part of the problem” which is why they started this.
So yes, they acknowledged their part of it and now they are giving back to the community. Why not help them help us?