Scoping the capacity of Indigenous Community Housing Organisations

Summary

This project will provide a detailed, contemporary, empirical understanding of Indigenous Community Housing Organisations (ICHO) to inform an understanding of, and to identify short and longer-term development options, for the ICHO sector. ICHOs are a significant housing service for Indigenous people, especially in remote areas. The research seeks to profile the different types of organisational structures of ICHOs and to describe and examine the factors that affect the viability of the sector. It includes an understanding of the nature and extent of links between the ICHO sector and other providers of support and community services, and the nature and extent of community participation.

Project Number: 80316
Research Theme: Indigenous Housing
Project Leader: Anda, Martin
Funding Year: 2005
Research Centre: Western Australia

Description

The first stage of this project will profile the different types of organisational structures of ICHOs and highlight the range of housing and other activities undertaken through these organisations. ICHOs include a diverse range of organisational structures, which differ in a number of ways. For instance:

Some ICHOs are stand alone developers and providers of housing, undertaking the full range of property and tenancy management
Other ICHOs are multifunctional community services organisations, which have a housing related function
Both types of organisations usually have a network of links with other providers of support and community services
The nature and extent of these links vary according to the nature of the ICHO as well as their location, ie. Urban, Rural or Remote.

The project will identify the nature and extent of these links, focusing particularly on differences between ICHOs located in urban, rural and remote areas. Other factors that will be taken into account are governance arrangements and the nature and extent of community involvement and participation in the control and management of ICHOs.

The second stage of the project will describe and examine the factors that affect the viability of the ICHOs. It is expected that the locational, governance and organisational factors described above will prove to be important determinants of the viability of the sector. In addition, it is expected that a number of other factors will prove to be important determinants of viability. These include:

Financial issues, such as the presence or absence of adequate recurrent funding, strategic planning to guide funding allocation and methods to increase rent collection, capital costs, construction costs and maintenance costs. Many of these factors vary greatly with remoteness. It is expected that much of this data will be available form the Berry/Hall RMIT 30282 outputs.
Non-financial issues, such as the condition of existing housing stock, the number of dwellings managed, and effectiveness in reducing the amount of housing need in their town or their communities.
Opportunities to harness economies of scale are expected to vary for different locations (eg. urban, remote), activities (eg. maintenance, tenancy management) and organisational type (eg. housing specific organisation, multifunctional organisation).

It is assumed that financial data will flow from Project 30282, The cost of housing in diverse Indigenous communities in Australia. With regard to non-financial aspects of viability, the report will collect data from a number of ICHOs on a range of indicators. It is envisaged that a dual approach will be taken. Firstly, eight in depth case studies of ICHOs will be conducted, representing various degrees of remoteness, sizes, activities and organisational types.

Finally, the project will identify a number of policy and programming measures aimed at enhancing the viability of ICHOs. The final report will clearly indicate what measures are most appropriate in what circumstances. In particular, the project will make an informed assessment of the types of measures that will be most effective according to the location, size and organisational nature of the various ICHOs.

More Information

Final Report: No. 125: Scoping the capacity of Indigenous Community Housing Organisations
2091 KB PDF Document

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