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NW Michigan Housing Summit: Working together to address the region's housing crisis

Ten new mobile homes will house international workers at Interlochen Center for the Arts this summer.
Taylor Wizner
/
Interlochen Public Radio
Ten new mobile homes went in this summer, to house international workers at Interlochen Center for the Arts this summer. Some northern Michigan employers are adding housing, in hopes of attracting employees. (IPR File Photo: Taylor Wizner)

Housing advocates, nonprofit leaders, government officials and others gathered this week in Traverse City for the 8th annual Northwest Michigan Housing Summit.

Housing in northern Michigan isn't just a crisis.

"Lately, we've been saying it's almost reaching the point of an emergency," said Yarrow Brown, executive director of Housing North. "We are concerned that more and more people are going to be displaced, and we're just not seeing enough progress toward those housing units that we need."

Housing North works in 10 different northern Michigan counties to help remove barriers to housing.

The hundreds of people at the summit heard from keynote speaker Yusuf Dahl. His story is compelling — from poverty in Milwaukee, to prison, to his current role as a college educator and advocate for housing issues.

Now you can hear from him, too. IPR News aired his speech in a one-hour special. You can listen to it through the audio player above.