MTSU Mondays: Tackling housing challenges, ‘Deep Roots’ photo exhibit

Courtesy MTSU
·3 min read

Here's the latest news from Middle Tennessee State University.

THDA director notes housing challenges, opportunities

Tennessee Housing Development Agency Executive Director Ralph Perrey told a group of scholars recently how important public perception impacts discussions about housing in general, and affordable housing specifically.

The chair of Excellence in Urban and Regional Planning hosted the THDA director for a forum on affordable housing across the region and state with students in the COE-URP Scholars Program, an interdisciplinary program that kicked off at the beginning of the fall semester and pairs 11 selected scholars with faculty mentors.

Perrey cited a recent report from the National Association of Realtors that said 34% of potential homebuyers were stopped because of lack of available homes for sale in their budgets.

“You have to change the picture in people’s mind about houses,” he said, adding that the term “affordable housing” is a loaded one, and work must be done to change how people view that — until that is done, there will be continued pushback against affordable housing initiatives.

Moderated by Jones College Dean Emeritus David Urban, Perrey’s talk was followed by a Q&A with the scholars, their faculty mentors and others attending the event inside the Business and Aerospace Building.

Perrey focused on two main points regarding affordability: the roadblocks to housing affordability and the future of it in Tennessee.

When discussing the challenges that people face with affordability, Perrey pointed to multiple variables, including Middle Tennessee’s unprecedented population boom in recent decades, reducing supply and increasing demand. It is not, Perrey argued, that there are no affordable options in the region; rather, population changes are requiring more options be built than ever before.

“We have to build more houses,” he said. “… And at the affordable level, there’s almost nothing that gets built in America anymore without some sort of subsidy involved.”

The current landscape of affordable housing does not cater to middle-income people who struggle to make ends meet, Perrey said, but specifically expanding this would address the supply issues. He also pointed to alternative housing and mixed-use communities as circumstantial solutions that can be applied to certain areas to alleviate the housing affordability crisis on a case-by-case basis.

Perrey recommended that more tax credits be given to incentivize developers to build, including more affordable houses such as starter homes, duplexes and townhomes.

‘Deep Roots’ of Mississippi blues in Baldwin Gallery photo exhibit

Photojournalist and MTSU alumnus Bill Steber sits on the porch of a facade of a salvaged Mississippi Delta sharecropper's shack that is part of his exhibit, "Deep Roots: Evocations of the Mississippi Delta Blues," on display through Dec. 9, 2023, in Middle Tennessee State University's Baldwin Photographic Gallery. (MTSU photo by Nancy DeGennaro)
Photojournalist and MTSU alumnus Bill Steber sits on the porch of a facade of a salvaged Mississippi Delta sharecropper's shack that is part of his exhibit, "Deep Roots: Evocations of the Mississippi Delta Blues," on display through Dec. 9, 2023, in Middle Tennessee State University's Baldwin Photographic Gallery. (MTSU photo by Nancy DeGennaro)

Photojournalist and Middle Tennessee State University alumnus Bill Steber takes a visual and interactive journey into the world of Delta blues with his newly installed exhibit on display through Dec. 9 at Baldwin Photographic Gallery on campus.

“Deep Roots: Evocations of the Mississippi Blues” features a collection of images, artifacts and mixed-media artwork from his 30-plus-year exploration and documentation of the Mississippi blues culture. In addition to the gallery images, you’ll find the façade of a bona-fide sharecropper shack that Steber preserved before it was demolished.

Photojournalist and MTSU alumnus Bill Steber sits on the porch of a facade of a salvaged Mississippi Delta sharecropper's shack that is part of his exhibit, "Deep Roots: Evocations of the Mississippi Delta Blues," on display through Dec. 9, 2023, in Middle Tennessee State University's Baldwin Photographic Gallery. (MTSU photo by Nancy DeGennaro)
Photojournalist and MTSU alumnus Bill Steber sits on the porch of a facade of a salvaged Mississippi Delta sharecropper's shack that is part of his exhibit, "Deep Roots: Evocations of the Mississippi Delta Blues," on display through Dec. 9, 2023, in Middle Tennessee State University's Baldwin Photographic Gallery. (MTSU photo by Nancy DeGennaro)

Steber will give a public artist talk at 6 p.m. on Nov. 15 in the State Farm Room (BAS S102) of the Business and Aerospace Building. Gallery hours are 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on weekdays when classes are in session.

“What Bill does touches so many things — culture, history and music,” said Shannon Randol, MTSU assistant professor of photography and curator for Baldwin Gallery, located on the second floor of Bragg Media and Entertainment Building. “He’s devoted almost his entire life to photographing one geographic location.”

Steber’s love of blues music dates to his childhood, when he discovered his parents’ record collection of crossover musicians John Lee Hooker and Jimmy Reed.

“It was kind of transformative and I became a lifelong fan of traditional blues music,” said Steber, who picked up a camera about the same time he started tinkering with music. After graduating from MTSU, Steber was hired at The Tennessean in Nashville as a staff photographer.

MTSU Mondays content is provided by submissions from MTSU News and Media Relations.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: MTSU Mondays: Tackling housing challenges, ‘Deep Roots’ photo exhibit