Marty Bell Author Archives

During the past couple of years, we have reported frequently in these pages on the evolution of the relationship between housing and healthcare.

In this issue, you will find detailed reporting on everything mentioned above from that informative day in Boston. NH&RA’s Fall Forum was the concert. This issue is the album.

You read it right. That’s $7,000,000,000. Seven Billion. It’s the value of the New Markets Tax Credits allocated by the Treasury Department’s Community Development Financial Institutions Fund to 120 Community Development Entities in 36 states to develop businesses and improve lives in underserved communities.

By the time you read this, we will have elected a new President.

History is au courant. Not old history; new history. “Game of Thrones” wins the Emmy, “Spotlight” wins the Oscar and “Hamilton” wins the Tony. And what they all share is a fresh look at history through a contemporary prism. Kind of like an old building rehabbed for contemporary usage. Right?

The flames glowing along the Providence River you see on this month’s cover are part of an event called WaterFire, that began as an artistic installation and has grown into an annual Rhode Island arts festival and celebration. When the photos of this event were presented at the NH&RA Summer Institute, I immediately decided this would be our next cover

The memories of our childhoods are quaint and fond. Vinyl records, vanilla Carvel and Vin Scully. The Little Rascals and the Young Rascals. Milk delivered to our home in the morning, the newspaper on the lawn in the afternoon, and the doctor examining us in our own bedroom. Dr. Brown was her name. (Yes, she was a she…and yes, this was in the early ‘50s.)

Aging in Place may now be a familiar term, but it remains a vague idea. Those familiar with the term would most likely define aging in place as remaining in your home for as long as you would like to as opposed to relocating to a care facility. This is a comforting notion. Rather than envisioning spending later life cooped up in a nearly bare room amidst ailing people with that medicinal smell in the air, you can anticipate maintaining your active lifestyle amongst friends and the smell of your garden. But is it a false promise?

I know that on your summer vacation you usually like to get away from thinking about work and bury yourself in a romance or mystery. But I’m afraid what we are offering you this July is going to be too tantalizing for you to escape. You might associate summer reading with fluff, but this issue is packed with a lot of red meat.

Success has its costs. As portfolios grow, so do expenses, staff and responsibilities. Assets bring great value but come with great demands.

Hope this month’s cover got your attention. And if you’ve arrived at this page, I guess it did. When I find myself waiting in the checkout line at Safeway with nothing to do but stare at all the celebrities on the magazine covers, I’m envious that the editors of those publications can depend on famous faces to lure you inside.

Attendance at this year’s annual meeting of the National Housing & Rehabilitation Association at the Breakers in Palm Beach was a record high for the 34 year-old organization. Along with Henry Flagler’s beach palace, an aggressive level of development activity and the chance to network with industry luminaries, I have to think one of the lures was an entire day’s symposium devoted to the progress of the Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD) program.