Today, UU Class Conversations spoke in favor of the Congregational Study Action Issue Housing: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Here are our statements:
Denise Moorehead, Cofounder
I am a member of 1st Parish Framingham UU. For more than a decade, I have worked with UU Class Conversations, a UU organization raising class awareness, confronting classism and promoting class inclusion in all UU communities. It is from this vantage point that I encourage you to vote for the Congregational Study Action Issue Housing: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
I recently heard someone talk about a group of roommates on the West Coast, young doctors, lawyers and recent MBAs, who are living together because rent in their city tops out at more than $10k/a month. So you can imagine what finding safe, clean, affordable housing is like for everyone else.
According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, there is a shortage of more than seven million affordable homes for our nation’s 10.8 million-plus extremely low-income families. Many of these people work multiple low-wage, no-benefit jobs. This is leading to homelessness for far too many. And this true for every region in the U.S.
Americans with more class privilege, working class and middle class people, are finding it increasingly difficult to manage rising housing costs as well – unless their class privilege has provided a home passed down. Even then, utilities and taxes can lead to home loss. I knew someone who lost their inherited home due to maintenance costs, taxes and insurance.
As I’m sure you are aware, since January, government support for housing and utility assistance has markedly declined. In response, working class people are organizing tenant unions and community programs to demand housing that is safe, affordable and acceptable. Unitarian Universalist congregations and UUs with our connections, social class backgrounds, and commitment to justice, have the potential to move the needle on this issue.
UU Class Conversations asks 2025 General Assembly delegates to vote “yes” in support of the housing justice proposal Housing: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
Elias Poore, Steering Committee Member:
“Housing is not just a policy issue—it’s a moral and spiritual imperative. As someone who was unhoused as a young person—sleeping in cars, on couches, in public parks, even once between a shed and a fence to shelter from the snow—I know how dehumanizing and dangerous it can be to live without a safe place to land. Even during seminary, I faced housing insecurity and had to rely on staying with family to get by. I’ve experienced the barriers that come with being formerly incarcerated and trans, and I’ve spent the last decade organizing alongside others navigating the same struggles. A Unitarian Universalist CSAI on housing justice would name what we already know to be true in our bones: that every person is worthy of safety, stability, and home. Our faith calls us not to charity alone, but to justice—rooted in relationship, repair, and the radical belief that no one is disposable.”
Eli is currently serving as an intern minister for the Southern Oregon UU Partnership, which includes congregations in Ashland, Grants Pass and Klamath Falls, Oregon.
For the past eight years, Eli has been involved in an ongoing street ministry/community development project with communities experiencing poverty and houselessness through a nonprofit organization Eli co-founded.
