National leaders to gather in Alexandria for faith-based housing summit
Tuesday's summit at United Way headquarters comes as Alexandria churches lead a growing national push to convert underutilized land into affordable housing
Leaders from Enterprise Community Partners, Catholic Charities USA, the Bipartisan Policy Center, Navy Federal Credit Union, United Way Worldwide, and Capital One will be among those converging on Alexandria on Tuesday for a summit aimed at turning thousands of acres of underutilized church-owned land into affordable housing.
The daylong event, titled “Restoring Hope and Building Opportunities National Summit 2026,” will be held from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at the United Way Worldwide headquarters at 701 N. Fairfax St., Alexandria. Mayor Alyia Gaskins is scheduled to deliver opening remarks.
The gathering comes as Alexandria grapples with its own affordable housing crisis — a 41.6% decrease in available units over the past 25 years, with roughly 10,500 market or committed affordable units remaining and 900 of those slated to expire within the next 15 years.
But the city is also emerging as a proving ground for the very model the summit seeks to scale nationally: faith institutions partnering with developers to build affordable housing on church-owned land.
A local blueprint
In December, the City Council unanimously approved a plan by the historic Alfred Street Baptist Church to redevelop a portion of the Olde Towne West apartment complex into a 145-unit affordable housing building. The church, which traces its origins to 1803 and is home to the oldest African American congregation in Alexandria, is working with The Community Builders Inc. to replace 34 aging affordable units at 598 S. Alfred St. with a four-story building for households earning between 30% and 60% of the area median income. Construction could begin as early as mid-2027.
When approving the project, Gaskins said it “has a lot of amazing things to highlight” in terms of preserving affordability and partnering with community stakeholders.
Nearby, the 81-unit Waypoint at Fairlington stands as a completed example of the model. Opened in 2022, the $37.2 million affordable apartment building was constructed on a former parking lot owned by Fairlington Presbyterian Church through a partnership with nonprofit developer Wesley Housing and the city. Wesley Housing’s vice president of real estate development, Judith Cabelli, is a panelist at Tuesday’s summit.
And just blocks from the summit venue, construction is underway on the Samuel Madden Redevelopment, a $120 million project replacing 66 public housing units with more than 530 new apartments in a community named for an early pastor of Alfred Street Baptist Church.
A national movement
The keynote speaker, David Bowers of Enterprise Community Partners, has been at the center of a growing push to mobilize faith-owned land for housing. Enterprise’s Faith-Based Development Initiative has produced more than 1,500 affordable housing units and channeled more than $155 million in grants, loans, and tax credit equity to houses of worship since 2006.
In D.C. alone, faith-based institutions own approximately 450 vacant parcels that officials estimate could accommodate between 6,000 and 29,000 new housing units. Enterprise has worked with 17 D.C. congregations through a program expected to generate more than 1,100 new affordable homes. Across the broader D.C. metropolitan area, houses of worship collectively own more than 679 acres of land across five jurisdictions.
The challenge, organizers say, is bridging the gap between mission-driven congregations and the complexities of real estate development — zoning, financing, permitting, and community engagement.
Inside the program
The summit is powered by the International Institute for Business Information and Growth, or iiBIG, and hosted in collaboration with the Faith Opportunity Zone Initiative. Presidential Cottage Homes is the sponsor, with Walls of Troy as co-sponsor.
Following Bowers’ keynote — titled “Radical Common Sense” — panels and fireside chats will examine how housing initiatives move from concept to completion. Among the speakers: Colleen Green, director of D.C.’s Department of Housing and Community Development; Edmund Delany of Capital One’s Community Financial Group; Curtis H. Johnson Jr. of Catholic Charities USA; Emma Waters of the Bipartisan Policy Center; and Marcus Coleman of United Way Worldwide.
A fireside chat will spotlight the Charlotte, N.C., model, featuring Bishop Claude Alexander of The Park Church, Charlotte Councilwoman Lawana Mayfield and Pam Perry, senior vice president at Navy Federal Credit Union. A separate session on the Abundant Housing Framework will draw on two projects underway in Chicago.
The summit closes with the “Faith in Action Exchange,” a facilitated collaboration lab designed to move participants from observation to partnership.
Why Alexandria
The city lost 90% of its market-rate affordable units between 2000 and 2017, according to its Office of Housing, but has invested heavily in reversing the trend, exceeding its original Housing Master Plan goal of 2,000 new affordable units by 2025, with more than 3,500 in development or completed as of last year.
The summit also arrives as Alexandria is rewriting its housing playbook. The 2013 Housing Master Plan expires this year, and the city is developing its Housing 2040 replacement, with draft recommendations expected to go before public hearings in June. A community open house on the draft plan is scheduled for Feb. 28 at Nannie J. Lee Memorial Recreation Center.
Tuesday’s summit begins with a networking breakfast at 8:30 a.m. Registration and agenda details are available at www.iibigevents.com. The in-person event has sold out.A Zoom webinar option is also available.