Making Housing and Community Happen (MHCH) grew out of a grassroots organization called the Greater Pasadena Affordable Housing Group (GPAHG) that was birthed in the office of a Quaker organization called the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) in Pasadena. In 2018, we became a nonprofit under the fiscal sponsorship of Social Good. Jill Shook, co-founder of MHCH, and Rev.. Bert Newton, Executive Director of MHCH, started working together on housing issues in 2000. Over the past 25 years, we have been a tireless advocate for affordable and homeless housing in the greater Pasadena area. Today we have a staff of six and over a thousand supporters. MHCH takes a faith-rooted approach to organizing churches, partners and individuals concerned with housing justice: ending homelessness and ensuring decent and affordable housing for low and very low-income residents through just and enlightened policies. For the past 25 years, we have consistently met with City Council members, Planning Commissioners and developers, raising key questions about housing policies in the city.
Here are some of our many successes over the years:
To read about our history click here.
SUCCESSES
1990s - The Affordable Housing Action (AHA), GPAHG’s precursor, began to advocate for rent control in Pasadena, without success. (In 2017 this cause was taken up by the Pasadena Tenants Union and continues to be supported by GPAHG, with promising results).
2001 - GPAHG played a role in crafting and passing the Inclusionary Housing Ordinance which requires developers who build more than 10 units to set aside 15 % as affordable, pay a fee or build off site. As of March 2019, this policy has produced over 577 affordable units, with no cost to the city, and helped provide Pasadena’s affordable Housing Trust Fund with over $21 million. These funds have been leveraged to produce and preserve 690 more units. GPAHG also advocated for an increase in the in-lieu fee for developers who prefer to pay a fee rather than build inclusionary units on site.
2005-2006 - GPAHG advocated for this surplus land of the Desiderio Army Reserve Center under the famous Colorado Street bridge to be used for nine Habitat homes.
2007 - GPAHG exposed how Pasadena Manor had wrongfully evicted elderly residents, obtained front page headlines to highlight this issue, mobilized community support, and helped them secure legal representation so that the 157 of these residents were able to obtain relocation costs.
2008 - GPAHG successfully advocated for a Housing Department separate from the Planning Department. This has significantly increased the production of affordable housing in our city.
2010 -2019 - As a result of GPAHG’s input, a large apartment complex called Westgate set aside 20% of their proposed 800 units to be affordable for very low income residents, resulting in 97 units indistinguishable from the luxury units near Old Pasadena jobs and the metro line—keeping cars off the road. GPAHG has met with other residential developers, challenging them to include the 15% of affordable housing units at the lower income levels. In 2018 when a 550-unit apartment complex was proposed in east Pasadena, GPAHG won the unanimous approval of the City Council for that developer to include the 15% affordable. GPAHG’s Inclusionary subcommittee diligently worked on a proposal to update the city’s policy to increase it’s production. See his link for the proposal: https://makinghousinghappen.net/2019/03/22/inclusionary-housing-proposal-from-the-greater-pasadena-affordable-housing-group/
2012 - GPAHG wrote a 21-page detailed analysis of Pasadena’s 2014-2012 Housing Element Draft which ultimately lead GPAHG to contact HCD (the state housing dept) resulting in the draft not being accepted without the city including more deadlines and accountably. Those deadlines now give GPAHG the leverage needed to hold the city accountable to meet them. GPAHG’s efforts helped the City to win several awards, declaring this Housing Element as the best in the state as a model for all other California cities.
2014 - GPAHG was alerted to Fuller Seminary’s sale of 197 student housing units to Carmel Partners, a luxury builder, and by so doing breaking their 2006 agreement with the city to keep these units affordable. For the past few years, GPAHG has tried to convince Fuller to leave a legacy of affordable housing when it leaves the city, particularly at Chang Common.
2016 - GPAHG stopped a proposed anti-camping ordinance which would have criminalized homelessness in Old Pasadena and other business districts. GPAHG succeeded in advocating for the Planning Commission to focus on affordable housing twice a year with an eye toward the implementation of the Housing Element. Additionally, two workshops a year will now be held by the Housing Department. Topics have included: ADUs and the Pros and Cons of a Housing Commission.
2017 - GPAHG won a stronger Tenant Protection Ordinance, cleaning up a loop hole that allowed landlords not to pay relocation fees if they put their tenants on month-to-month rental.
2018 - GPAHG succeeded in lowering the property size requirement for Accessory Dwelling Units (Granny Flats) from 15,000 s.f. to 7,200 s.f and succeeded in lowering the impact fees for an ADU from $20,000 to $957 if the homeowner agrees to: 1) an affordable housing covenant 2) to rent to Section 8 tenant 3) or to a family member. As a result, 40 granny flats were built in the first year, and 13 of them for lower income tenants. (Only one granny flat was built in the previous 15 years because of the City’s restrictive ordinance.)
2018 - GPAHG worked with the City Council to approve using city-owned property at Heritage Square for 69 units of housing for homeless seniors. Because of GPAHGs support along with other concerned citizen, the Council also approved an ordinance that will facilitate the conversion of motels to homeless housing. In addition, the Mayor recommended that a vacant city-owned YWCA be used for homeless housing. GPAHG’s Homeless Housing Subcommittee is advocating building enough permanent supportive housing (PSH) to reduce our homeless count by at least 50% in the next five years. PHS is what ends homelessness by providing stable homes and supportive services for those who have been homeless.
2019 - Our first One-Year Housing Justice Institute began on Jan 2, 2019.
2019 - Homeless housing: We successfully advocated for 134 units of permanent supportive housing (which ends chronic homelessness) at the Heritage Square South and the Salvation Army sites. We conduced vigils in front of the city-owned YWCA advocating for the approval of 94 more affordable housing units, half for homeless neighbors, half for low-income families, and the City Council is now calling for affordable housing at the Civic Center.
2019 - Housing Preservation: On Martin Luther King day, 2019, we planned a prayer vigil to preserve 169 affordable units in Chang Commons on the Fuller Seminary campus with over 100 in attendance. This event and the team that emerged from it helped to preserve these units and keep Fuller Seminary in Pasadena.
2019 - Church Land: We started a new subcommittee to help churches interested in building affordable housing on their land to go down that path with expert consultation. This team is now working with ten churches in Pasadena and southern CA cities.
2019 - ADUs: We formed a team that is researching how to make Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs or “granny flats”) more affordable with pre-approved designs and other ways to streamline. This team has supported the many new state ADU policies that makes it easier to build ADUs.
2019 - Education: We collaborated with Everyone In to plan three Homeless to Housed Bus tours, filling busloads of key leaders from San Gabriel Valley cities to tour permanent supportive housing. The goal was to educate and inspire people to become advocates for permanent supportive housing, which ends homelessness.
2019 - Education: We had monthly educational forums on gentrification, theology of land and housing, community land trusts, rent control and other tenant protections, trauma in homelessness and supportive housing. We also held a candidate forum on affordable/homeless housing that drew 13 candidates and 150 attendees.
2019 - CLTs—We are forming a team with the goal of starting a Community Land Trust (CLT) for the San Gabriel Valley. CLTs are a model that insures permanent affordability because homes are purchased, but not the land, making it affordable. Then homeowners agree to keep their home affordable when they sell it.
2019 - Inclusionary: In 2001 we participated in crafting Pasadena's Inclusionary Housing Ordinance which produced over 1000 affordable units by putting over $26 million into the city's affordable housing trust fund. In 2019 we got the city to increase the percentage of units allocated for affordable housing in new construction from 15% to 20% and ended all trade-downs. Advocates from San Gabriel, Alhambra and Monrovia joined out team and are now working on these policies in their community.
2022 - Homeless Count: Worked closely with our partners to see a homelessness by (roughly) half since 2011 when the count was over 1,000.
2023 - Successfully advocated for safe parking to be a permitted use at 69 church sites in Pasadena. As of April 2023, 8 parkers at Trinity Lutheran Church have been permanently housed. The Housing Department has also secured a $1.3 grant to create an additional safe parking program at All Saints Episcopal Church for 25 safe parkers.
2023 - Successfully advocated for SB 4, the bill that rezones religious land statewide and makes it easier for congregations to have affordable housing on their underutilized land. MHCH initiated this bill and was part of a coalition of 300 organizations that supported this bill, which was signed into law by Governor Newson in 2023.
2024 - North Fair Oaks Plan: In February 2024 we presented to Pasadena's Northwest Commission N. Fair Oaks Vision Plan, which they fully embraced and sent a letter of support to the City Council. This Plan will revitalize a once a thriving Black business district divested due to unjust policies. This Plan will slow traffic, make the street safer, create more affordable housing and "beautify but not gentrify" N. Fair Oaks from Washington Blvd to the border of our city. This Plan has the support of may in the area and began as a survey of 150 of its residents, church members, and businesses to address the dreams and concerns for this disenfranchised corner of Pasadena. Seven of the 15 items are in the process of being accomplished, including a $268 traffic signal!
2024 - Workforce Housing: In April 2024, workforce housing was approved for a closed PUSD campus.
2025 - One-Day Housing Institutes: As of January 29, 2025 we have held nine One-Day Institutes with anywhere from 20-120 passionate folks participating: two in Broomfield, CO; two in Denver, CO; for the Colorado Habitat staff, one in Pasadena, CA; one in Temple City, CA; one in Monrovia, CA; one in Placer County, CA.
