Rep. Emily Randall (D), who represents Washington’s 6th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives, spent the better part of an hour at NeighborWorks of Grays Harbor’s offices in Aberdeen last Wednesday.

Randall sat down with NeighborWorks Executive Director Eric Bjella, Board President Bill Sidor and Board 2nd Vice President Ty Palmer and discussed initiatives and challenges facing NeighborWorks.

Bjella provided a packet of information that included Fiscal Year 25 accomplishments, anticipated successes, critical partnerships and resources, upcoming activities and changes and what more NeighborWorks America could do to support local efforts in Grays Harbor. The packet outlined the demographics of NeighborWorks’ clients and affordable housing challenges, and included an overview of its loan portfolio which includes mortgages and home repair.

The discussion began with an overview of rental properties owned and/or managed by NeighborWorks followed by explanation of the organization’s lines of business.

“We have basically three lines. We have the housing counseling piece, we have the rental side and then our lending side,” Bjella said. “We have a loan portfolio of just under $6 million, which is basically loaned out. We are out of money to loan out, now we would have to go out and borrow money to loan out which drives the cost up. We’re all in this trying to do the work and you can’t rely on the government to bail you out every time. Our goal has been to find revenue streams that are consistent and ongoing.”

The conversation turned to NeighborWorks’ down payment assistance program, for which the organization recently received a $500,000 Washington State Department of Commerce grant.

“I used the (Washington State Housing Finance Commission) first-time home buyer program when I bought my house,” Randall said. “We need so many more programs like this to allow folks to get into homes when your mortgage is going to be lower than rent and you’re in-between different programs you qualify for.”

Bjella added that home ownership adds stability to the family dynamic and helps build wealth.

“The equity piece is a bonus. People are healthier, they’re more stable, the family situation is better with home ownership, then you get the bonus of the wealth building side,” Bjella said. “That’s not a promise, but over time that’s been the way it works, you’ve made an investment and there’s a return on that investment.”

According to Palmer, the exponential increase in home prices in the region in recent years is a significant barrier to home ownership and limits the assistance NeighborWorks can provide.

“Part of the challenge has been home prices. In Aberdeen, I’ve been here for 35 years. Home values didn’t go up much,” Palmer said. “I can take my $45,000 house that I bought way back in ‘77, in ‘95 it was probably still worth maybe $75,000 to $80,000 but they’ve jumped way up. When we’ve done loans here in the last four or five years, the dollar amounts have gone way up over what we were doing in the past.”

Palmer said that education is a key part of what NeighborWorks does.

“A challenge for a lot of the first-time homebuyers is the education part. It’s complicated. I’m a commercial banker and it’s still confusing to me sometimes,” Palmer said. “Where do I begin? We help a lot of folks with that education and getting started.”

Bjella added ongoing home ownership education when it comes to taxes and insurance is important as well. Randall suggested that NeighborWorks have a conversation with the insurance commissioner to try to find solutions for rising insurance costs across the board and offered to make inroads.

The conversation then shifted to NeighborWorks’ home repair loan program and then on to pending appropriations bills in Washington, D.C.

“It’s my first rodeo, but it feels unlikely we’ll get them all passed and signed into law before Sept. 30, so we’re in another continuing resolution position,” Randall said. “It’s wild what is influencing our ability to pass a budget that funds programs making such a difference for communities. We have $18 million in community project funding requests that have made their way into the draft appropriations bills, which is really exciting. All 15 of our requests are in process. If you look at the last Congress, for the 2025 fiscal year, the House passed the appropriations bill that had those earmarks, and then it didn’t get signed into law. None of that money materialized for folks. So, we’re watching, we’ll see what happens.”

Randall said visits to organizations like NeighborWorks is an important part of her job and she takes great pleasure in meeting constituents in person.

“Both my favorite part of my job and the most important part of my job is to understand the issues that are facing my community. So visiting with organizations like NeighborWorks that are providing service on the front lines to folks who need housing, like so many people in this community, helps me understand what’s working, what’s not working and how we can be better partners to either draw federal money or create connections between organizations,” Randall said. “I have come home almost every weekend since being elected, I think all but two, that’s like 96,000 airline miles since January. Now that we’re home in August, we’re all over the peninsula every day to make sure that we can see more of our neighbors and deepen those roots and make sure folks know how to find us.”

Washington’s 6th Congressional District encompasses the Olympic Peninsula, the Kitsap Peninsula, and most of the city of Tacoma. Its counties include the entirety of Clallam, Kitsap, Mason, Jefferson, and Grays Harbor, and part of Pierce County.

According to the official website, “NeighborWorks of Grays Harbor works to help provide safe, affordable and sustainable housing through homebuyer education and first mortgage financing for income qualified residents of Grays Harbor County.”

NeighborWorks offers a homebuyer education course as well as free housing counseling, and can also help with rental options.