Shift the Seacoast
What is Shift the Seacoast?
Shift the Seacoast is our grassroots initiative reshaping how communities understand and respond to housing and homelessness. Through education, advocacy, and storytelling, we mobilize residents, empower local leaders, and partner with developers to move real housing solutions forward. Together, we’re building momentum for a stronger, more inclusive future.
Some of the ways we do this include:
Neighbor to Neighbor Housing Chats – Informal, community-hosted conversations that equip residents with knowledge, dispel myths, and offer concrete ways to take action on housing issues in their own neighborhoods.
Can I Be Your Neighbor? – A storytelling campaign that uplifts real voices from Seacoast residents, landlords, and developers to humanize housing challenges and dismantle stigma.
On the Edge of Home – A seasonal collaboration with local libraries that fosters education and engagement around housing insecurity while enhancing support for unsheltered individuals.
The Local Lift – A civic engagement effort that builds grassroots momentum for affordable and supportive housing projects that address specific community needs. Powered by SiteLines, a forthcoming regional dashboard designed to track housing and homelessness data, inform advocacy, and coordinate collective action.
Neighbor to Neighbor Housing Chats
Housing affordability and homelessness are growing challenges across the Greater Seacoast Region. Neighbor to Neighbor Housing Chats bring people together to discuss these challenges, share perspectives, and explore actionable solutions.
Whether you host or attend, you’ll connect with neighbors who care about housing and discover ways to create meaningful change in your community.
These gatherings aim to:
✔️ Educate the community on actionable solutions to homelessness and housing insecurity.
✔️ Dispel myths that hinder affordable housing development.
✔️ Inspire action and engage community advocates through storytelling and compelling case-making.
By participating, you’re helping build a movement where everyone in the Seacoast region has a place to call home.
Housing chats are designed to inform, inspire, and empower residents to advocate for housing solutions.
Change often begins as a whisper—small voices that grow into powerful movements. Real transformation isn’t about grand gestures; it’s rooted in consistent, committed local advocacy. By coming together, shifting perspectives, and amplifying voices, we’re building a future where every Seacoast resident has access to affordable housing.
Why Housing Chats?
Hosting a Housing Chat is a powerful way to spark change in your community, bringing neighbors together to discuss housing challenges and solutions. By fostering open conversations, you’ll help build awareness, strengthen connections, and inspire action toward a Seacoast where everyone has a place to call home.
As a host, you’ll:
Provide a comfortable space for discussion.
Invite friends, neighbors, and colleagues to join the conversation.
Facilitate an engaging and guided discussion with our support.
Home for All provides resources, materials, and a stipend to help you host a successful gathering.
Why Should You Host a Housing Chat?
Together, we can Shift the Seacoast toward a future where everyone has a place to call home.
To learn more or get started below or email us at info@homeforall-seacoast.org.
Interested in hosting or attending a Housing Chat?
Can I Be Your Neighbor?
Your voice matters. Whether you're struggling to find housing or shaping the housing market, we want to hear from you. Let’s put real faces to the housing crisis—because every story counts.
We want to hear your housing stories.
Seacoast Residents
Shift the Seacoast starts with our neighbors. Home for All is highlighting the faces behind the communities we love, the people who keep our towns running but are being priced out of the very places they serve.
Through our Can I Be Your Neighbor? campaign, we’re amplifying real stories to show the impact of the housing crisis on everyday people, workers, families, retirees, and young professionals trying to build a life in the Seacoast.
Why Your Story Matters
Your experience helps illustrate why a thriving Seacoast means housing choices for everyone - homes of all shapes and sizes, so people of all backgrounds and incomes can live, work, and stay in the communities they love.
Landlords and Developers
Housing is essential and so are the people who create it.
Whether you’re a small-scale landlord, a first-time investor, or a seasoned developer, your role in shaping the Seacoast’s housing landscape matters.
From renting out a room to building multi-unit housing, property owners of all sizes help provide the homes that keep our communities thriving. We want to highlight the diverse ways people engage with housing—and the opportunities and challenges they face along the way.
Why Your Story Matters
Landlords and developers are key to solving the housing crisis. By sharing your experiences, you can help illustrate the realities of housing supply, the barriers to building and renting, and the ways we can create a more balanced, affordable market for all.
The Local Lift keeps Seacoast residents informed and engaged in local housing decisions. Through timely advocacy alerts, we share upcoming public meetings where affordable or below-market-rate housing projects, or broader housing and homelessness issues, are on the agenda. Each alert provides a clear overview of the project, the local need it addresses, and what’s at stake if it doesn’t move forward. We include background resources, examples of similar developments that are already strengthening other communities, and talking points to help residents share their own perspectives. Even if you won’t live in these homes, your voice matters because affordable housing benefits the entire community.
Want to stay informed and help shape housing solutions in your community?
Sign up below to receive Local Lift Advocacy Alerts. We’ll notify you about upcoming public meetings where affordable or below-market-rate housing developments are being considered, or when housing and homelessness are on the agenda.
The Local Lift
Do you have a project that could use support or think we should know about?
Complete the form to share details of your project.
On the Edge of Home
Exploring Housing, Homelessness,
and Community Solutions, Together
On the Edge of Home is a powerful, interactive library-based initiative led by the Home for All Coalition in partnership with Seacoast public libraries. Through storytelling, education, and community engagement, the program invites residents to explore the realities of housing insecurity and homelessness—and imagine what a truly inclusive housing future could look like.
Driven by three core objectives:
Raise Awareness: Shed light on the local housing and homelessness crisis and the structural challenges behind it.
Foster Empathy: Cultivate understanding through powerful personal stories and lived experiences that humanize the issue.
Encourage Action: Inspire meaningful dialogue, build public will, and spark community involvement in local housing solutions.
Recognizing that libraries are often the only safe, welcoming spaces for unsheltered individuals during the day, On the Edge of Home serves a dual purpose it:
Educates and mobilizes the broader community through curated book displays, interactive exhibits, and housing-themed activities.
Supports library staff with tools, training, and up-to-date information to better respond to the needs of patrons experiencing housing instability.
By centering lived experience and fostering meaningful conversations, On the Edge of Home builds empathy, sparks action, and brings neighbors together to advocate for housing justice, right where they are.
“Home to me, is more than just a physical space- it’s a sense of safety, and belonging. After leaving Ukraine, where war has disrupted everything familiar, I realize how important it’s to have a place that feels stable, even if it’s temporary. It is where I can breathe, gather my thoughts, and rebuilt my sense of self.”
Let us help you bring On the Edge of Home, a dynamic, interactive exhibit designed to spark conversations and inspire action around housing and homelessness to your local library. Click below to email us today!
Interested in bringing On the Edge of Home to your Library?
Curated Book Display
We work with your library to curate a book display that features literature that explore housing, homelessness, and housing justice with titles for children, youth, and adults.
Check out our recommended reading list below!
Interactive Activities
We work with your library to select 2-3 hands-on experiences to foster community engagement and discussion around the topics of affordable housing, homelessness, and housing insecurity. Some of the activities include:
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Encourage visitors to reflect and share their thoughts on prompts like “What does home mean to you?” or “Why is affordable housing needed now more than ever?” Contributions will form a visual tapestry that highlights your community’s housing needs.
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Invite participants to place a pebble in a jar to symbolize the scale of housing insecurity in your community, providing a striking visual representation of the issue.
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Help spread awareness by collecting books from our essential reading list to stock free little libraries in your community, ensuring everyone has access to impactful stories about housing and homelessness. We will put a QR code sticker inside the cover of each book, linking readers to valuable resources and inviting them to share their own housing stories, fostering a deeper connection and community engagement.
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Inspire young minds with a housing-themed bookmark contest fostering early awareness about the importance of housing. The winner will be recognized at our concluding event.
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We will help library goers explore key locations tied to affordable housing and homelessness prevention in your area. Those who complete bonus challenges like attending local meetings or volunteering, or share their journey online will have an opportunity to be recognized at the concluding event.
Wrap up the exhibit with a special event that brings the community together to celebrate progress and inspire future action. This concluding event will feature a panel of local experts, honor “unsung heroes” who are making a difference in promoting housing stability, and provide an opportunity to reflect on the stories and insights shared throughout the exhibit.
Whether through a dynamic panel discussion, a storytelling session, or a community celebration, this event will serve as a powerful moment to recognize collective efforts and explore the path forward toward equitable housing solutions.