The roll of honours is impressive. Among them is winning City of Culture 2021 status, a Motofest weekend featuring racing on our infamous ring-road – and a glorious trip to Wembley for the mighty Sky Blues (Coventry City FC) on bank holiday Monday.

These landmark occasions are important because they promote pride in our communities and bring people together – but a great place is more than a space for hosting headline-grabbing events.

I’m a member of the Federation’s Great Places Commission, whose objective is looking at housing challenges in the North and the Midlands and identifying factors that contribute to thriving and resilient communities. As part of this project, I attended the first of our member debates, held in Coventry in May, to discuss this complex issue.

People, places and partners, including housing associations, were the themes of the debate. I led a session focusing on the role of housing associations in creating or supporting ‘great places’ – and I was told to be provocative, so I was ….

I talked about why housing associations have to make some straightforward choices and I raised difficult questions about our role. For instance, are housing associations anchor institutions or absent landlords? Are we proactive, visible and engaged as partners to invest, support and promote our areas? Can we be brave enough sometimes to be less bureaucratic and paternalistic, to give up our power and allow local people to make decisions?

And are we honestly prepared to listen to the voices of residents and communities, to hear what they want for their place?

Grassroots involvement is a must-have ingredient for great places

As social businesses, which housing associations are, we must address the challenges that exist in the North and the Midlands – which go way beyond the need to just build homes. In 2013, we set out our sector’s mission in our Ambition to Deliver – and the Great Places Commission is a logical development from that ambition. The Commission’s work has included visits to Liverpool and Yorkshire, to talk with local residents and stakeholders, and what struck me from these trips was a common theme: passionate community activists. We met residents who are fiercely proud of their place and their community, who want to make a difference to it and are determined to be involved in decisions-making.

It is this kind of grassroots involvement – asking residents what they want and need, rather than imposing ideas on them – that formed the basis of WM Housing Group’s regeneration programme in north-east Coventry. This ongoing programme started with a masterplan led by members of the local community.

The redevelopment, which features in a film launching at the Chartered Institute of Housing conference in Manchester in late June, serves as a reminder that housing associations’ role in addressing the housing crisis is not just about building homes. We are also committed to tackling the challenges communities face.

This goes to the heart of our overriding social purpose, despite the funding challenges in recent years that have prompted a more business-like approach in our operations. What singles housing associations out from other housing providers is that we are rooted in our communities – and we invest in places and people for the long haul.

We must work with those who share our ambitions, like the people we met in Liverpool and Yorkshire, because like us, they’ll be living with the results of our efforts long after the building contractors have left.

As I told the audience at the Great Places debate, I strongly believe the involvement of community activists is crucial to creating or rebuilding ‘great places’. I know it won’t be easy, nor will it grab as many headlines as a major event coming to town, but creating places where communities thrive means we will have created a long-lasting legacy.