{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"New Housing Alternatives","title":"Bridging The Housing Gap","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":1576,"description":"In this episode of New Housing Alternatives, hosts Cherise Burda and Dr. Ren Thomas speak with Alex Laidlaw, Director of Impact Investments at the Calgary Foundation, one of Canada’s largest community foundations. They explore how community foundations sit at the intersection of philanthropy, government funding, and non‑market housing—and how tools like grants and flexible loans can help close the financing gaps that keep desperately needed projects from getting built.\nAlex traces the Calgary Foundation’s roots back to the 1950s, when large estates were locked into obsolete causes like carriage maintenance charities, and explains how community foundations were created so local partners could continually redirect those funds toward evolving needs. Today, that endowment of over $1.6 billion supports a wide range of priorities—but food insecurity and affordable housing are increasingly emerging as fundamental pressures across Calgary and the Treaty 7 region.\nThe conversation then turns to the Resolve campaign, a collaborative, time‑bound effort by nine housing agencies that set out to raise $120 million for permanent supportive housing. Alex explains what made Resolve unusual in the philanthropic world: instead of competing campaigns chasing the same donors, organizations pooled their asks, coordinated messaging, and treated housing as a shared civic project. Even though the campaign ultimately raised just under $80 million, it was enough—paired with public funding and financing—to bring all of the planned projects to fruition.\nFrom there, Cherise and Ren dig into the broader role of philanthropic capital in the housing system: not as a replacement for government, but as one critical slice of the capital stack. Alex highlights the importance of using donations to build organizational capacity, fund feasibility work, and take early‑stage risks that public programs are often too rigid or slow to support. He also describes Calgary Foundation’s impact investing program,...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/BKM7lGJ2EZ_i6AuOOKCMh_Qqaj32gJ7zqd3Rfy62guQ/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS84Y2Jm/MjQxMjcyZmU0MzNh/ODQ3MWFjMWVlMWQ0/YWViNC5wbmc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}