Before Melanie Turner joined Oakland’s Rooted program, she was house hopping and couch surfing, moving between the homes of families and friends with her preschool-age son in tow. Pursuing a career in education while trying to afford a place to live in Oakland took a toll.
“It was a hard reality for me to grasp as a parent that I was not able to provide for my child in the way that I expected to,” she said.
Then she found the Rooted marketplace, which offers teachers and school staff housing at discounted rates in buildings across the city. On Thursday, Turner spoke from the rooftop deck of her apartment building, which was recently purchased by the nonprofit Oakland Fund to become affordable housing exclusively for educators.
“I don’t have to worry about whether I have enough to pay my rent and my groceries and my medical bills and commute costs,” she said. “I am at peace. You can’t put a price on peace.”
Turner’s building is the first project of this kind in the country, where a nonprofit has acquired an existing building to become subsidized housing for teachers.
Oakland Fund CEO Kyra Mungia said the organization, which the Rooted program is part of, wanted to take advantage of the moment in the city’s depressed real estate market, and purchased The Idora, a 33-unit building in Temescal.
“The question is, who will own Oakland?” Mungia said during a Thursday press conference. “Will it be outside investors looking to extract value from our neighborhoods, or will Oakland be stepping up and choosing to invest in itself?”
“It’s so important that we continue to invest in housing and in people who make this city work, but also who makes sure that our children have that future that they so deserve,” Mayor Barbara Lee said at the event.
It’s a model they hope to replicate so that more teachers can live in the communities where they work. As teachers and school staff repeatedly cite the Bay Area’s cost of living as a deterrent, school districts have turned to building housing on their own properties as a way to retain educators, maintain a competitive edge in hiring, and make use of vacant properties.
But it takes school districts years, and much more money, to build housing. Converting existing housing is faster. The Oakland Fund will begin renting out units at the Idora immediately, as tenants turn over. To purchase the building, the group raised $1.5 million from the Crankstart Foundation, along with contributions from the Give Forward Foundation, Tipping Point Community, and PG&E. The Oakland Fund was also awarded $7.6 million from the city’s Acquisition & Conversion to Affordable Housing fund, and financed the rest with a loan, to buy the building for $12.6 million, Mungia said.
Eligible tenants are Oakland teachers, paraeducators, school staff, teacher residents, and anyone working with Oakland Unified School District long-term. One-bedroom apartments will range from $1,120 to $2,240, and two-bedroom units will rent for $1,1740-$2,560, capped at 30% of the tenant’s income. Oakland Fund leadership expects the tenants to be 90% educators within five years.
Acquiring The Idora is part of a three-year plan to eventually own 150 units in Oakland to lease to educators, Mungia said. Other districts that have built workforce housing have seen teacher turnover rates plummet. In Oakland, teacher retention is around 82%, while participants in the Rooted program remain in their jobs 93% from year to year.
OUSD has attempted to pursue building housing on its properties, but the projects have stalled. Construction has been delayed on two properties the district leased out five years ago to become affordable housing.
Turner, a special education teacher at Emerson, can walk to school with her son now. Another student at the school joyfully exclaimed, “Hi neighbor!” when she realized she lives in the same building as a teacher from her school. “Somebody that she sees at school is somebody that’s a part of her local community,” Turner said, “and that starts her day off with a smile.”
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This story was originally published by The Oaklandside and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.
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