History and Accomplishments
Below is a list of recent NCHH events. Links to a comprehensive history appear at the bottom of this page. You may also view an interactive timeline of NCHH’s history.
In 2022…
NCHH celebrated its 30th anniversary on September 4.
For Extracting Indoor Pollutants with Proper Ventilation (the EXTRACT study), NCHH partners with the Indoor Climate Research and Training program at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, the Fort Collins (Colorado) Healthy Homes program, and the Illinois Home Weatherization Program to study whether outdoor-exhausted kitchen fans are more effective than outdoor-exhausted bathroom fans at reducing indoor air pollutants in homes.
NCHH and the Lead and Environmental Hazards Association begin a study, Creating a Lead Evaluation and Assessment Reporting System (CLEARS), to help determine whether a housing lead hazard surveillance database can feasibly be developed and used to investigate pressing questions about the relationships among the presence of lead-based paint, its concentration and condition, and dust lead levels.
NCHH and its partners from New Ecology, Inc., Preservation of Affordable Housing, Inc., Homeowners Rehab, Inc., and Beacon Communities, begin a study, Passive House Asthma Mitigation by Optimizing Unique Building Systems (PHAMOUS), to determine if breathable particulate levels are lower in new multifamily affordable housing built to the Passive House versus conventional energy efficiency standards.
Enterprise Community Partners and NCHH release a report on a multiyear study affirming the importance of ASHRAE-compliant mechanical ventilation in homes, supporting the inclusion of ASHRAE ventilation standards in green building standards, and recommending the replacement of gas stoves with electric. The report calls for including the cost of installing mechanical ventilation in housing rehabilitation financing programs.
In Analysis of the Benefits of Abatement Techniques and Effectiveness in the HOME Study (ABATE HOME), NCHH and partners at the Cincinnati Children’s Medical Center, Simon Fraser University, and Brown University conducted a study that found that achievement of dust lead levels less than 5 μg/ft2 for floors and less than 50 μg/ft2 for windowsills is achievable with just one clearance attempt (range one to five attempts). Lower windowsill dust lead levels were sustained for at least two years.
In 2021…
NCHH and its wholly owned subsidiary, Healthy Housing Solutions, partner to evaluate HUD’s new Older Adults Homes Modification Grant Program. This evaluation will (1) determine how modifications in over 5,000 homes affect older adult residents’ health and physical function; (2) assess challenges, barriers, and successes grantees experience as they implement this important new grant program; and (3) collect older adult residents’ perspectives on the grant program.
In 2020…
In partnership with the Day One Project, NCHH authored a draft executive order for the incoming Biden-Harris Administration, entitled Ensuring Healthy Homes: Eliminating Lead and Other Housing Hazards.
In partnership with the New York State Department of Health and Health Research, Inc., NCHH published influential study findings that, in most multifamily buildings, all ground-contact dwelling units should be tested for radon. Based in part on these findings, in 2021, HUD updated its radon policy to increase such testing from 25% to 100%. Government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are considering a similar increase, from 10% to 100%.
NCHH completed its three-year Aging Gracefully in Place study, collaborating with the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) and organizations in four U.S. communities to study the effectiveness of JHU’s “Community Aging in Place, Advancing Better Living for Elders©” (CAPABLE) program. CAPABLE is a client-centered, home-based program utilizing teams of occupational therapists, registered nurses, and home repair professionals to improve both older adults’ physical function and their homes so they can more safely and independently age in place. Seven months after CAPABLE, participants experienced improvements in activities of daily living, falls efficacy, depression, and pain. These results add to existing research on short-term effectiveness, showing CAPABLE yields long-term health improvement for older adults in small and large communities and can be successfully implemented by diverse organizations with different housing types.
In 2019…
NCHH and partners Children’s Environmental Health Network (CEHN) and National Association for Family Child Care (NAFCC) released the Lead-Safe Toolkit for Home-Based Child Care, created to educate home-based child care providers about lead exposure, help them to establish lead prevention policies for their businesses, and learn vital lead prevention strategies for use in their child care homes.
NCHH released the Code Comparison Tool, designed to compare local housing codes against the International Property Maintenance Code and the National Healthy Housing Standard.
In 2018…
NCHH published a pair of technical briefs relating to funding community health worker services.
NCHH took over stewardship of the Extinguish Tool from Georgia Tech.
NCHH awarded 10 mini-grants to support efforts to integrate healthy homes activities into healthcare systems and policies, and develop a trained, reliable workforce to provide healthy homes services.
NCHH unveiled a new, comprehensive, and completely redesigned website.
In 2017…
NCHH contributed to 10 Policies to Prevent and Respond to Childhood Lead Exposure, a comprehensive report published by the Health Impact Project.
NCHH celebrated its 25th anniversary on September 7 with a private function honoring both past and current board and staff.
Amanda Reddy was selected as NCHH’s fourth executive director, succeeding Nancy Rockett Eldridge.
NCHH created a new nonprofit organization called the National Well Home Network, with Nancy Rockett Eldridge assuming the role of director.
NCHH released Building Systems to Sustain Home-Based Asthma Services, a free comprehensive online learning and technical assistance platform designed to equip staff public health agencies, state asthma-control programs, state Medicaid agencies, and other housing and health organizations with information on how to build the systems, infrastructure, and financing to put home-based asthma services in place in their respective states, communities, or regions.
NCHH launched the Aging Gracefully in Place initiative in collaboration with Johns Hopkins University (JHU) and organizations in four communities around the country to evaluate the replicability of JHU’s CAPABLE intervention model.
NCHH and partners at the New York State Department of Health published three articles in The Journal of Public Health Management and Practice summarizing the health and cost benefit of the New York State Healthy Neighborhoods Program. Four federal agencies collaborated to write two companion commentaries.
Sections
View NCHH’s history and accomplishments from 2010 to 2019.
View NCHH’s history and accomplishments from 2000 to 2009.