For more than 20 years, my wife, Mary Kay, and I have raised our family in Richmond’s East End. It’s the place where we cheered on our kids as they played soccer for the Powhatan Community Center, made lifelong friends sitting on our neighbors’ porches, and connected with families at regular events at Chimborazo Elementary School. But for too many people – residents who have lived here for generations and newcomers alike – the neighborhood we love calling home is becoming unaffordable and out of reach.

Church Hill isn’t alone. Recent Harvard University data reveals about one in three Richmond households pays more than 30% of their incomes on their mortgage or rent. It’s a term researchers call “cost burdened” and affects a family’s ability to pay for other important living costs like food and transportation.

The impacts on communities of color are even more troubling. Black and Latino families are more likely to face cost burdens by rentals while Black homeowners face distressing home value disparities, fueled by decades of racial discrimination and redlining.

But you don’t really need reports or statistics to know we’re in a housing crisis – just look down the block. High housing costs are displacing too many residents.

It’s a trend I’m fighting to reverse in Richmond.

I launched my mayoral campaign earlier this year with a deep passion to serve our incredible city. Since then, we’ve heard from thousands of residents about their top concerns, which mirror the reasons I’m running, like improving schools and city operations, boosting job opportunities, and most resoundingly, addressing our accelerating housing crisis.

I recently released a detailed plan with policies to create more affordable housing in Richmond focused on transparency, community feedback and sustainable growth that benefits us all.

We must get this right. As a pediatrician and public health leader, I know one of the top predictors of families’ well-being and quality of life comes down to something we all deserve to have: safe, stable and affordable housing.

The truth is, too few new housing units built in recent years are actually affordable.

I’m ready to implement policies that facilitate large-scale investments that expand supply in Richmond with an emphasis on deeply affordable housing for people with annual incomes under $50,000. For starters, I’m prepared to put additional money into the Maggie Walker Community Land Trust to acquire more vacant properties and create housing units that are permanently affordable.

The Richmond Redevelopment and Housing Authority provides public housing units or housing vouchers to nearly 7,500 households.

Conditions in the 3,200 RRHA-managed properties are simply unacceptable: We must expand funding for operations and maintenance to give residents higher quality housing. RRHA communities deserve it. I am committed to one-for-one replacement, and to working closely with RRHA to ensure that residents are at the table for these decisions, just as I did when I was the city’s public health director as we established resource centers clinics in RRHA communities.

It’s essential we keep long-term Richmonders in their homes. The families in neighborhoods like Church Hill, Jackson Ward, Fulton, Carver and so many others across our city, helped to create the culture and community that makes Richmond special and a wonderful place to live. We can’t let these families be priced or taxed out of their homes.

I’m prepared to help more seniors access the existing property tax assistance program and work with the General Assembly to design more effective tax structures that can protect long-term and low-income residents.

Richmond’s eviction rate continues to be one of the highest in the nation. We know evictions keep families locked in poverty and make it extremely difficult to find future housing. We’ll work to strengthen protections and resources available by expanding the Eviction Diversion and Family Crisis Fund to prevent far-reaching and life-altering evictions.

When it comes down to it, we need to retain more residents and attract new families to Richmond to expand and strengthen our tax base, which gives us the opportunity to grow revenues to invest in more affordable housing programs, our schools and other citywide priorities. We need to sustain and bolster the City’s program providing down payment support for employees to include our hard-working Richmond Public Schools teachers as well. We have the capacity to build more affordable housing across our 62 square miles by leveraging zoning opportunities to construct additional multi-family housing projects, accessory dwelling units and other lower-cost housing. Every step of the way, we’ll prioritize and center community feedback and needs while expanding access to green spaces, grocery stores, health care and transportation.

I’m prepared to work alongside Richmond’s residents, our nonprofit community, regional partners, state officials and City Council to bring this plan to life. I’ve spent my career solving complicated problems that have made our city a safer and healthier place, and we’re going to need everyone at the table to get this done. The reality is many of my colleagues are running on similar housing platforms, but the difference is I’m the person with the experience and skills to get it done.

The writer is a pediatrician and Richmond mayoral candidate.