Sustainability

Net Zero Heroes

How do you transform from building your first green project, to becoming a green organization? In the second episode of the Green in Action podcast, host Kimberly Vermeer shares RUPCO’s journey toward becoming a leading sustainable affordable housing developer in New York’s Hudson Valley. Guests Guy Kempe, Vice President of Community Development, and Chuck Snyder, Assistant Vice President for Real Estate and Construction, recount RUPCO’s organizational growth through stories of their increasingly ambitious green developments. This episode explores how RUPCO is building sustainably in a rural context, meeting the challenges of creating green communities, providing housing and cultural spaces for artists, building net zero energy homes, and more. Learn more about RUPCO at https://rupco.org/. For episode show notes, visit www.urbanhabitatinitiatives.com/podcast-home/. Follow us on Twitter www.twitter.com/UHIPodcast

Net Zero: Making it Real for Residents

How do you make green features work for affordable housing residents? What do you do if they’re not working? Developer Mutual Housing California learned from experience about the importance of resident engagement at their ambitious net zero energy development, Mutual Housing at Spring Lake, in Woodland, California. In the first episode of the Green in Action podcast, host Kimberly Vermeer spoke with Bryan Dove, Director of Asset Management at Mutual Housing California, and Spring Lake residents and youth leaders Gerardo Brambila and Manuel Maravilla about how owner and residents learned together to make net zero real for residents. Learn more about MHC at http://www.mutualhousing.com/. For episode show notes, visit www.urbanhabitatinitiatives.com/podcast-home/. Follow us on Twitter www.twitter.com/UHIPodcast

Trailer: Welcome to the Green in Action Podcast

Welcome to the Green in Action podcast! In each episode, host Kimberly Vermeer, President of Urban Habitat Initiatives, shares stories of green leadership in affordable housing. The trailer gives listeners sneak peaks into some of the topics we’re touching on in season one: sustainability, climate resilience, healthy and equitable homes, and community development. Listen for a preview of some of the voices telling the stories of green achievements on the pod: Guy Kempe, Jane Carbone, Tara Barauskas, Ray Demers, Gerardo Brambilla, Bryan Dove, Michelle Apigian, Anne Torney, and Walker Wells.

Learn more about the pod at www.urbanhabitatinitiatives.com/podcast-home/ and follow us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/UHIPodcast/.

Resilience Matters: Reimagining the Future in a Tumultuous Year

The Resilience Matters e-book is the latest initiative from Island Press’ Urban Resilience Project, launched in 2013. The goal of the Urban Resilience Project is to advance a transformative approach to climate change and urban resilience, an approach grounded in a commitment to sustainability and equity.

Developing Health-Centered Communities

Kimberly Vermeer will be leading the team-based “Make your Pitch” assignment for an all-new professional education course this spring with Dennis Frenchman and Stanley Shaw: “Developing Health-Centered Communities: The Next Revolution in Real Estate.” Offered virtually over three weeks starting in mid-April through MIT Center for Real Estate and Harvard Medical School, the course explores building projects that create value, promote healthy living, support aging-in-place, and produce communities that thrive.

Green in Action: a New Podcast

How do green building practitioners approach the problems that arise when navigating the complex work of building sustainable affordable housing? Exploring that complexity is where the forthcoming Urban Habitat Initiatives podcast Green in Action comes in.

2020 in Review

Urban Habitat Initiatives President Kimberly Vermeer reflects on her work in 2020.

Revisiting Plaza Roosevelt

Kim revists an affordable housing development featured in Blueprint for Greening Affordable Housing: Plaza Roosevelt, in Michigan