GoWest Foundation Grants Help With Innovative Solutions for Workforce Housing Challenges – Apply Today!

Posted by Alyse Knudsen on March 19, 2025

Affordable workforce housing – also known as housing for middle-income workers, typically those earning between 60-140% of the area median income (AMI) – is a major issue in communities nationwide. Across the GoWest region, credit unions have seen the impact of the lack of affordable housing for their members who can no longer afford to live close to where they work.

Credit unions are working with community partners to design innovative solutions to this challenge, and the GoWest Foundation is committed to supporting credit unions that are working to alleviate the housing burdens facing the workforce in their communities.

Through its Workforce Housing Grants, the GoWest Foundation provides credit unions with opportunities to launch initiatives that meet the unique needs within local communities. Through planning and project implementation grant funds, credit unions can design and implement new products, services, or pilot programs to address those local housing needs.

Planning Grants
Planning grants provide a unique funding opportunity for researching and developing a project. Grants can be used to fund feasibility studies, financial analysis and modeling, policy research and development, project management expenses, and any other expenses necessary to fully develop a workforce housing project plan. Planning grant awards are up to $20,000 depending on the scope and scale of the project.

Project Implementation Grants
If a credit union is already engaged in its community around workforce housing and has a product or solution it would like to launch, a project grant may be a good option. The purpose of the project grant is to pilot or implement a product or program which decreases barriers to workforce housing that the community and credit union’s members are experiencing. Each project plan should be comprehensive, well-researched, and designed to address the workforce housing challenges faced by a specific community. Project implementation grant awards for individual credit unions range up to $100,000, depending on the scope and scale of the project.

Learn more about some of the Foundation’s Workforce Housing Grants:

• Tucson Welcome Home Program
• Mid Oregon Credit Union’s Workforce Housing Land Acquisition Fund
• NuVista Federal Credit Union’s Community Land Trust and Leasehold Mortgages
• Central Willamette Credit Union’s Innovative 80/20 Mortgage and Down Payment Assistance

While credit unions are already very engaged in the housing market, from providing charitable contributions for low-income housing efforts to homeownership education and traditional mortgages for market-rate homes, there is more work to be done.

Credit unions are encouraged to reach out to the Foundation if they have a project or idea in mind. Individual credit unions as well as collaborations among multiple credit unions are welcome to apply for grant funding.

Learn more about Workforce Housing Grants here or reach out to the GoWest Foundation Team at [email protected].

Posted in Community Impact, GoWest Foundation, Top Headlines.