Early Voting Has Begun on Santa Fe Affordable Housing Initiative

From Santa Fe Living Wage Network: Support the Santa Fe Affordable Housing Initiative. A recent Santa Fe election was won by only seven votes. Every vote will count in this election! Election Day for the Affordable Housing Funding Initiative is March 10th. But don't wait!

Early voting will be open from February 18th through March 6th at Santa Fe City Hall, Monday through Friday, between the hours of 8 AM and 5 PM. Pledge to vote YES for affordable housing on March 10th (or during early voting). Click here to sign our pledge form.

United for Affordable Housing is a coalition of community organizations and businesses including the Living Wage Network, Somos Un Pueblo Unido, NM Coalition to End Homelessness, the Northern NM Central Labor Council, HomeWise, Noble Reality and many more. Together we are working hard to make sure that Santa Fe's workers will be able to live in the city where they work.

Working families in Santa Fe are already feeling the weight of these tough economic times. Even with the highest minimum wage in the country of $9.85, about 44% of our workers still have to live outside of the city just to make ends meet. This not only offsets many of the hard-won benefits of the living wage for the workers themselves, it also hurts our local economy as a whole when workers spend their paychecks elsewhere.

Passing the Affordable Housing Funding Initiative can help lift some of the burden on our working families and stimulate our economy by funding affordable housing through a transfer tax on the sale of high-end houses. The buyer of a house that sells for $750,000 or more will pay a one-time fee of 1% of the amount over $750,000. If the home sells for less than $750,000, no fee is required. If passed, it is projected to raise about $1,000,000 a year for affordable housing, nearly doubling the amount of help available for home purchase and rental assistance for Santa Fe's workers.

We also need your help with this campaign. If you can help with data entry, phone banking, canvassing or writing letters to the editor in support of affordable housing, please click here">here to volunteer or contact the Network at 505-983-9563.

• Get your family, friends and co-workers to pledge to vote IN FAVOR. Download a copy of the pledge sheet here.

• Download a fact sheet about the initiative here.

• Download a copy of the ordinance here.

• Volunteer to help with the campaign. Click here to get involved!

• Donate. Our opponents on the local and national levels are preparing to spend massively to defeat our efforts. We need to counterbalance their money. Send your donation to: Santa Fe Living Wage Network, PO Box 23764, Santa Fe, NM 87502.

For more information click here or call us at 983-9563. Everyone who works in Santa Fe deserves to live in Santa Fe!