This fall, the Regional Opportunities Initiative completed a housing study, evaluating the future needs of 11 counties, including Monroe.
The ROI is a nonprofit focusing on education, workforce, and quality of place needs in the 11 counties that make up the region they call the Indiana Uplands.
Tina Peterson is the CEO & president of the ROI. She says affordable housing is needed at every income level for people at different stages in their life.
“Well if you talk about the region, over the next ten years we need 14,000 new housing units, and a third of that is in Monroe County,” she says.
She says because of the lack of housing and variety, people who are retired are unable to downsize and leave their single-family home without taking a financial hit. This makes these types of homes more unavailable to middle income and young families.
Now, The City of Bloomington is conducting its own housing study for a more in-depth look into the city’s needs.
Doris Sims, Bloomington's housing and neighborhood development director, says the Bloomington Housing Study is in its beginning stages. Listening sessions occured at the end of October.
"[The ROI]'s study pretty much concentrated on the eleven counties that she served with Monroe County being one of those," Sims says. "But we want to take a deeper dive into Bloomington and look at Bloomington's current housing situation, different types of housing we currently have and what the future needs of housing would be in Bloomington."
