Five Things You Can Do
You can help us make homes safer and healthier. Below are five things you can do to get started.
1. Meet Your Member of Congress Locally
Invite your member of Congress to visit your site or speak at your event. Your member of Congress needs to see the full effect that substandard housing has on their communities. Invite them to tour your site, speak at your event, or attend a meeting with them at their district office to help them prioritize healthy housing issues among their constituents. Find additional information and resources.
2. Join the Find It, Fix It, Fund It Action Drive
The National Center for Healthy Housing and the steering committee of the National Safe and Healthy Housing Coalition are thrilled to announce the release of Find it, Fix It, Fund It, a bold new action drive to eliminate lead poisoning. Read about the action drive.
- Click here to sign up to participate in the drive and/or add your organization’s logo to it.
- We’d love your feedback on the drive. Email Sarah Goodwin to provide feedback!
Stories of real families and communities impacted by home health hazards including lead poisoning, asthma triggers, pests, mold, carbon monoxide, radon, and other causes of injury and illness are critical in the effort to promote healthy housing and eliminate lead poisoning. The media won’t cover these issues without great stories, and members of Congress simply will not act to promote healthy housing if they don’t know the impact on their constituents. Help us help them to act!
The National Center for Healthy Housing, the National Safe and Healthy Housing Coalition, and Find It, Fix It, Fund It: A Lead Elimination Action Drive have an ambitious goal to collect stories from all 50 states, including 20 states and districts of policy makers in critical leadership positions. Help us win the battle to promote healthy housing, eliminate lead poisoning, and reduce illness and injury due to home health hazards to historic lows!
We urge local organizations to collect other stories from their communities. Here’s a video training on how to collect stories.
Once you’ve collected stories, there are multiple ways to use them in your own work:
- Send them to your local or state government—they want to hear from constituents just as much as Congress.
- Send them to your local media as a possible story, letter to the editor, or press release.
- Share them with community members at your events.
4. Encourage Others to Join the National Safe and Healthy Housing Coalition
The National Safe and Healthy Housing Coalition is a unique group of healthy housing practitioners, advocacy groups, state and local government agencies, academics, and individuals. Membership in the National Safe and Healthy Housing Coalition offers opportunities to engage members of Congress, host local events, and join social media campaigns.
The coalition currently has over 600 individual and organizational members from all 50 states, but some states are not as well represented as others. By sharing the link to join, you can help us get more members from the following states:
- Alabama
- North Dakota
- South Carolina
- South Dakota
- Utah
- Wyoming
Our social media accounts are great ways to get involved in the movement. Not only will you receive current information about the latest initiatives and projects, but you’ll also have the opportunity to connect with fellow healthy housing advocates from all different backgrounds. We’d love to hear from you! Join the movement!