Tyler Perry is addressing the housing crisis affecting the elderly in Atlanta head-on by donating $2.5 million to ensure they’re able to keep their homes.
The Associated Press has reported that the filmmaker, who was awarded with the Humanitarian Award at the 2021 Oscars, reached out to Mayor Andrew Dickens to discuss providing assistance to residents on fixed incomes at risk of losing their housing due to rising real estate taxes.
Perry is set to pay the property taxes for 300 low-income senior citizens to thwart the displacement.
The outlet added that the funds, totaling $2.5 million, will cover city, county and school taxes. He has already donated $750,000 for the first year to cover back taxes and pledged to pay $500,000 over the next four years. Perry will additionally cover any increase in taxes over the next 20 years for 100 low-income seniors.
The donation will be administered by Invest Atlanta Partnership, the nonprofit sector of Atlanta’s economic development authority.
Mayo Dickens’ office did release this statement, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, thanking the A Jazzman’s Blues‘ writer for his philanthropy. “Atlanta’s growth and prosperity should not come at the expense of our legacy residents—many of whom have been priced out of their homes in previous years. Tyler Perry has been engaged in our ongoing conversations around legacy resident retention, and he told me he wanted to do something to support these efforts. Thanks to his generosity, more Atlantans will be able to remain in the communities they built,” the statement read.
View Perry’s Humanitarian Award acceptance speech below.