Santa Fe Living Wage Network

Post Office Box 23764, Santa Fe, New Mexico 87502, 505-983-9563

email: info@santafelivingwage.org

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Affordable Housing

 

Support the Santa Fe Affordable Housing Initiative

 

Vote tomorrow (Tuesday)! Vote YES for Affordable Housing!

 

Click here to find out where you go to vote YES.

 

For a map of city precincts, click here.

 

Get out and VOTE! Don't leave it to other people - turnouts in special elections like this one are very low.

 

Our opponents in the Real Estate Industry have tried everything to defeat the Initiative, including a hugely expensive campaign of misinformation, falsehoods and outright lies. Don't let them win. GET OUT AND VOTE! Every vote counts!

 

We know you won't be taken in by the Realtors' phony campaign - make sure your friends and neighbors aren't either! Here are the real facts:

  • funds from the tax go into the Affordable Housing Trust Fund;
  • no money from the tax will go to administer the program;
  • the city cannot change the use of the money;
  • funds will be spent according to a detailed 5-year plan, passed by the city after extensive public input;
  • the funds can only be spent on affordable housing programs, like first-time homebuyer and rental housing assistance;
  • and by state law (3-18-2) the tax can't be changed without another election.

 

The latest campaign finance reports for the Workforce Housing Funding Initiative special election were last week.  As you know, the Network has been working as part of United for Affordable Housing to pass this initiative.  We reported a total of $16,775.  Opponents of affordable housing have been given $139,520 from the State and National Associations of Realtors.  They have used this money to fund an advertising campaign of slick productions and glossy mailings filled with misinformation.  A bulk of their money has gone to pay for consultation coming from Virginia.  Their mailings are post marked from Arizona.

 

But if opponents of affordable housing think they can buy this election from out of state, they are facing an uphill battle.  What we lack in money we make up for with community support.  The list of sponsors and allies of United for Affordable Housing grows every day.  Our supporters join our efforts because they see that their coworkers can't afford to live here.  It is their children who are forced to leave because they can't contend with the high cost of living in Santa Fe.  Our supporters are labor unions, community organizations, faith-based groups, businesses and community leaders who are rooted in Santa Fe.  When we combine the memberships of our organizations, the number of supporters of the initiative swells to a number that can well contend with their money.

 

We still need your help!

  • Volunteer to help on Election Day. Call the Living Wage Network at 983-9563 if you have any block of time - even just an hour or two - between 7am and 7pm tomorrow.
  • Donate.  Our opponents on the local and national levels are spending massively to defeat our efforts. We still have bills to pay from this campaign. Click here to donate online to the New Mexico Coalition to End Homelessness, fiscal agent for this campaign. Or send your donation for this campaign to: NM Coalition to End Homelessness, PO Box 865, Santa Fe 87504.
  • For much more information on the Initiative click here or call us at 983-9563

 

Everyone who works in Santa Fe deserves to live in Santa Fe!

 

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have little. President Franklin Roosevelt, January, 1937.

The Santa Fe Living Wage film by Thunder Road Productions (Miguel Grunstein and Dale Kruzic) is available from the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee at cost ($10 for packaging and mailing)! You can order it on their website by clicking here.