Housing America: Mission Accomplished

Magali Perez, 25, remembers coming home from her job at a plant nursery, hoping she was next in line to use the kitchen shared by four families living under one roof. They shared one stove, so they had to cook and eat in shifts. She and her husband, Ramiro, and their five children now have…

Rural Neighborhoods has built the best apartments available, period, in places like Immokalee, Labelle and Okeechobee, he said. “We’ve changed the perception of farm worker housing. I would be happy to live in any of our developments.” Read the article Gastronomica

The challenges of site acquisition, land use, and competitive financing are no different in communities targeting agricultural workers than in other affordable rental communities, said Kirk. “The added complexity in serving farmworkers is to understand agricultural markets and wages, and to layer sufficient subsidies to reach affordability.” Read the article Seeds of Change

The residents of Naranja Lakes and environs — living in a square mile of South Dade in not much better shape than the day after Hurricane Andrew — often feel like the storm’s forgotten victims. Their self-interests — some legitimate — now threaten careful plans to house temporarily other oft-ignored residents: migrant farmworker families. Read…

Usually Robert Torres would be in the fields now, preparing the flat, marly ground for young tomato plants set in rows that run straight into the horizon. But not this year. Not after Hurricane Andrew. “Sometimes it’s hard to believe all this,” Torres, 35, said Monday. A big man, Torres was sitting in a folding…