Firstly, a huge thank you goes out across the sector for lifting the delivery of community housing, whether though Housing First, social housing, emergency housing, assisted rental or assisted ownership. While it’s positive that the policy and funding environment in the emergency and social end of the spectrum has begun to stabilise, the real work ahead is in making the affordable space work to offer longer-term housing stability.

Thanks to the hard work of the CHA Council, there is clarity of strategic vision for where we are headed. The refinement of Our Place over the past year is a prime example. It is a privilege to work with such a dedicated team of leaders who challenge me and our fantastic, dedicated staff to deliver.

We are proud to support the widely held view to activate the whole housing affordability continuum for all New Zealanders. Signs of our sectors growing clarity of direction are demonstrated by the 40 organisations endorsing Our Place, and membership growing to 92 full members and 21 partner members, an increase of 16 since last year. We are responding to a growing number of requests for service in ways that connect you to each other, and to solutions that help you deliver for your communities. We organise our delivery services across three key areas:

Engage strategy

Organising conversations with officials as well as Ministers, we provide avenues to share your views, building consensus for evidence-based solutions wherever possible. Through a variety of submissions and sector engagement opportunities we’ve provided feedback on many areas from methamphetamine standards to negotiating the RFP process on emergency housing and IRRS settings. At the strategic level we are pleased to be working with the Human Rights Commission on how a Homes Accord can foster a more stable environment for delivery of ‘adequate’ housing.

Support providers to grow supply

We are proud to support two new networks, one for Pacific Island community housing providers and another for Operations. We continue work with the Auckland Emergency Housing Network, Auckland Community Housing Provider Network, and Te Waipounamu Network. We support growth of common reporting and backbone service delivery approaches, such as being deployed through the Housing First Community of Practice. Working closely with many members, we highlight current research and sector developments. With the Australasian Housing Institute, we promote joint training seminars and programmes.

Measure outcomes

As a sector we have added 315 new homes, bringing the total homes delivered by registered community housing providers to 9,582 homes. The IMPACT Conference 2017 grew by a third from our 2015 conference, with over 300 people committed to the goal of Our Place to see all New Zealanders well-housed. Both the Ageing Well and Building Better Homes, Towns and Cities National Science Challenges are providing a solid evidence base of research, with CHA assisting to foster sector engagement.

This collection of activities provides practical support for the growth and development of providers as well as ensuring the homes delivered are affordable, habitable, accessible, culturally adequate, and with secure tenure. Taking a human rights-based approach means we are doing this for the benefit of our fellow New Zealanders, not just for the benefit of providers. I am proud to work with our dedicated team of professionals: Chris Glaudel as our Deputy Director, David Zussman, Marc Slade and Hope Simonsen as Senior Programme Managers, Angie Cairncross as Communications Coordinator, and Gunda Tente and Jordan Kendrick as Programme Assistants. As a team we’re always up for new learning and we welcome feedback on how we can improve our delivery for you and your community.