My name is Natalia Stewart, my pronouns are she/her/hers, I’m 15 years old, and I currently go to Golden Valley High School. I live near Golden Valley and I personally see how lack of affordable housing affects people because I see people struggling. I have friends who have talked about their housing situations and how that affects how they live. I also have family who have chosen to live in Merced even if they can’t really afford it because they want to be close to me. Seeing this is why I think Merced should invest in more affordable housing and it’s important to the community, too. It’s a problem that brings more problems with it. It affects people in my community mentally and emotionally because they don’t have the support they need in order to have a human right like housing. People should be able to not worry about paying for rent and all the other bills they have and still have money left over just in case something could happen. If more affordable housing is built, that’s possible. Everyone deserves a home and should have the basic right to live in a state where everything is stable.