2014
The Welcome Home Coalition was formed by JOIN, Housing Oregon, Rose CDC, Coalition of Communities of Color, Community Alliance of Tenants, Street Roots, and 211info, to establish champion public investment in affordable housing options.
2015
Welcome Home led advocacy to increase the Tax Increment Financing (TIF) for Affordable Housing in the City of Portland. In July 2015, the City of Portland increased the TIF from 30% to 45% - successfully increasing funds for affordable housing development.
Welcome Home began a campaign to pass the Yes for Affordable Homes to allow the City of Portland to invest in affordable housing.
2016
Portland voters passed the Yes for Affordable Homes , measure 26-179 (City of Portland Affordable Housing Bond). The $258 million bond set out to add 1,300 housing units. As of 2025, all the original housing goals have been exceeded by over 500 homes.
2017
Welcome Home led advocacy to pass the Yes for Affordable Housing, measure 26-199 (Portland Metro Regional Affordable Housing Bond) & measure 102 (Statewide constitutional amendment), to create permanently affordable homes across Washington, Clackamas, and Multnomah counties.
2018
Voters passed Yes for Affordable Housing. The $652.8 million bond has the goal to build or preserve more than 5,200 housing units for residents living on low incomes.
2019
Welcome Home Coalition members participated in the creation of the Here Together measure (measure 26-210), an income tax to fund Supportive Housing Services. The measure is expected to generate $2.5 billion over 10 years to provide housing assistance and services for people experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity.
Welcome Home hired a Regional Organizer to promote advocacy centered around listening to those who have lived experiences of housing insecurity.
2020
Welcome Home’s Regional Organizer began community advocacy training with a cohort of people with lived experience with homelessness.
Voters passed the Here Together measure.
Welcome Home focused its advocacy priorities on increasing funding for rent assistance and supporting state and local eviction prevention laws in response to the COVID pandemic. These efforts carried into 2021.
2021
Welcome Home engaged with TriMet to advance a more equitable Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) strategy. As part of the Getting There Together Coalition, we advocated that TriMet commit to ensuring affordable housing development along with new transit developments.
The Supportive Housing Services Measure dispersed its first round of funding to social service organizations. Along with other successes, these new public funds have allowed for over 1,000 supportive housing units to be created from July through December 2021.
2022
Welcome Home Coalition spent the year building out our network of advocates with lived experiences of homelessness and kicked off our Community Conversations for Housing Justice Community Education Program in order to increase public support for long term solution to our affordable housing shortage.
2023
Welcome Home built on previous efforts to support new advocates with lived experiences by forming our Community Advisory Committee to inform a future housing policies.
Welcome Home also launched weekly workgroups to encourage the counties to increase contract wages at Community-Based Organizations.
Members and Staff engaged with local elected officials to encourage the continuation of the affordable housing pipeline as regional funding begins to wind down.
2024
Welcome Home sat at Metro Regional Government’s policy tables to ensure regional funding for housing and services. In the spring members gather for a first annual housing summit to hear from experts about Social Housing and Housing First principles. Today, both organizational members and members with lived experience are invited to our monthly advocacy workgroup to identify innovative solutions to our region’s housing shortage.
2025
In order to increase the institutional power of our network of advocates with lived experiences with housing instability, Welcome Home began welcoming all participants of our Voices for Housing Justice Program to be 'Individual Members' and expanded our Steering Committee to include 15 new seats for people with lived expertise.