Conclusion

The Northern New England Housing Investment Fund (NNEHIF) is firmly committed to its nonprofit mission of ensuring a sufficient supply of quality affordable housing in Maine and New Hampshire. Historically this mission was carried out solely through the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program, and the program continues to be our core business. At the same time, we will build on existing capacity to strengthen our mission with new ventures and strategies. This includes offering comprehensive consulting services in the arena of affordable housing, as well as services related to third party asset management. Also, we will remain open to other opportunities for new ventures.

These new strategies and ventures require us to consider how best to structure NNEHIF from a corporate standpoint. As such, we will examine our corporate structure and practices to better align our governance and management with actual operations. Overall, our goal is to strengthen our position as a nonprofit leader in affordable housing, while remaining competitive in a fast changing market.

To be successful, we must maintain excellence in Board and staff. As such, we are examining new ways to enhance our development of human resources to ensure that they have the information, tools, and opportunities they need to succeed.

Of importance to us are the continuing relationships with key stakeholders, such as the New Hampshire Housing Investment Authority, MaineHousing, investors, developers, community nonprofit organizations, and public officials. The solution to the affordable housing shortage lies in the collaboration of all these groups and others. To that end, during the next three years we will increase our efforts to remain in close contact with these groups, and to understand the issues they are facing.

Fundamental to all the above strategies is a renewed focus on communication. This involves better internal communication to enable all staff to fully understand NNEHIF activities. It involves a higher degree of strategic communication between senior staff and the Board. It requires a heightened sense of the need to listen carefully to key constituencies and to be responsive to new input, concerns, or suggestions. And it requires NNEHIF to be active in communicating the importance of its mission.

The strategic planning process has reinforced our sense of purpose, sharpened the tools we employ to pursue our mission, and set a dynamic and prudent course of action. In particular, participation of the Board and staff throughout this process has strengthened NNEHIF as an organization and created a solid foundation on which to move forward.