A Healthy Alexandria Starts at Home

Ensuring all Alexandrians have healthy and safe, hazard-free housing.
Page updated on March 10, 2023 at 8:42 AM

About the Healthy Homes Initiative

Everyone deserves access to healthy and safely hazard-free housing. Unfortunately, not everyone in our community can count on that, particularly our lower-income residents, those with disabilities, seniors, and communities of color. Equity and the conditions for healthy housing cannot be created overnight, but together, we can make meaningful changes that improve residents’ quality of life in just a few years.  

The Healthy Homes Initiative works to ensure all Alexandrians have healthy and safe, hazard-free housing. Based on a 2022 report put together by the Alexandria Health Department and the National Center on Healthy Housing, the Healthy Homes Initiative includes several programs led by different departments, community-based organizations, landlords, and homeowners in Alexandria. Each year, different programs will advance the Healthy Homes Initiative in different ways.  

Action Plan for 2023

Community partners and residents have shared their experience and knowledge to help create a roadmap for the next year of healthy housing initiatives . Highlights include:

  • ALX Breathes
  • Tenant Rights Trainings
  • Housing Modification Programs

While the plan lays out the strategies for 2023, we need your help to get it done. Email healthmatters@vdh.virginia.gov to get involved in this work.

ALX Breathes

As part of the Healthy Homes Initiative, AHD partnered with the community to create ALX Breathes. ALX Breathes is a free program from the Alexandria Health Department (AHD) that helps residents with asthma or COPD breathe easier at home. Learn more.  

Background on Home Conditions in Alexandria

The Alexandria Health Department worked with the National Center on Healthy Housing to review local healthy homes policy, program, and data assets and gaps in Alexandria. Read the report here and find the detailed code analysis here. This report showed that while the city has some resources to deal with the challenges around home-related health conditions, we needed to do more to coordinate those efforts and truly address the root causes of poor health. The Action Plan for 2023 is the next step in this work to coordinate existing resources and partners for systemic change.