The League of Women Voters of Virginia supports the Faith and Housing bill, HB 2153 because it will help create additional affordable housing by giving localities the authority to adopt a variety of strategies intended to encourage and facilitate the development of affordable housing on property owned by religious organizations or tax-exempt nonprofit organizations. It also gives localities the right to request administrative support from the Department of Housing and Community Development in the preparation of a faith and housing ordinance.

In the last 2 years Trinity United Methodist Church in Roanoke Virginia has bravely moved forward to merging with Greene Memorial United Methodist Church, but had a historic building to find a new purpose. As their pastor I got to witness to this hard and holy work. Through incredible community partners of Restoration Housing we were able to sell our building to them for the use of affordable housing for seniors, and they will break ground next month. But the weight of figuring out how to rezone that space for a new and mission driven use was heavy. Making the law easier for churches to consider this will allow other brave folks in the midst of a new season to take on this good work. There will be 15 homes in what had been a church home for many because we were able to rezone that space and a local non profit will be able to utilize it. There will always be room in God's house, but making the law of our state easier to navigate this will be a gift to so many folks, both faith communities who need to utilize physical assets differently and our communities as a whole. We urge you to support this work.