Several Eastern CT towns do not meet the state’s affordable housing bar. What happens now?
In the midst of an increasingly expensive real estate climate, a 2017 state law is enabling cities and towns to create more affordable housing while providing officials with better insight into localities’ housing needs.
By June 1, every municipality in Connecticut must have a plan on how to incorporate affordable housing, per Connecticut State Statute 8-30j. Eastern Connecticut municipalities are making progress on that mandate. But they only have a month before the deadline.
Towns bordering Norwich, Preston, Lisbon, Franklin and Montville have yet to adopt a plan while Sprague and Bozrah have adopted theirs, said Amanda Kennedy, the deputy director and director of special projects for the Southeastern Connecticut Council of Governments.
In Montville, town officials said it’s important for as many people as possible to comment on the plan ahead of a May 24 hearing with Planning and Zoning Commission. The town is scheduled to consider adopting its plan that night, said Liz Burdick, director of the Planning and Zoning Department.
“Hopefully, that will give us an idea of what people think of the plan,” she said.
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The process enables towns to familiarize themselves with housing needs in greater detail than normal, Kennedy said.
“There’s a bit of a learning curve with exploring the issues around affordable housing, and how affordable housing gets produced and administered,” she said. “And this is a great opportunity for the commissioners to ask the questions they have, and collectively understand the issues better.”
Options for senior housing preferred
During the process, affordable housing officials have frequently heard from rural towns that seniors should have housing options to downsize in the towns in which they live, said Carly Holzschuh, a planner for the Southeastern Connecticut Council of Governments.
The senior housing issue is important since options for that specific population are limited. Some may have to move to nearby towns such as Colchester. And facilities such as Elmbrook Village might be too expensive, said Glenn Pianka, first selectman of Bozrah.
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“One or two bedroom houses or apartments, they haven’t been plentiful in the region for a long time,” he said. “Everyone was building the McMansions.”
Holzschuh said there’s an agreement that starter homes for young families are important, and there’s an emphasis on attracting more CHFA/USDA loans to support first-time homeownership, which are subsidized loans for single-family homes that count toward the 8-30g requirement, as they are stable loans.
Holzschuh also said there’s “a lot of resistance to multifamily housing in rural areas if it’s not restricted to senior housing” and not supporting tax breaks for the building of these units.
Pianka said the smaller towns are already under a strain to keep up education budgets, especially with extra spending related to COVID-19.
“When you open the door to facilities that can accommodate younger folks as opposed to older ones, there’s an additional cost that becomes involved,” Pianka said.
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As the area ages, however, towns, including Montville, would like to attract more young families, and affordable housing may be a way to do that, Burdick said.
On a draft of Montville’s Affordable Housing Plan, 81 residents responded to a survey, supporting both senior housing and stating that having children and families is a sign of a thriving town.
Developers can bypass zoning rules in towns without 10% affordable housing
While towns aren’t necessarily required to have 10% affordable housing, if a municipality doesn’t meet that threshold, a developer can submit an application under state statute 8-30g, which enables developers to submit proposals that don’t meet existing zoning in the town.
Then the town would have to prove to a judge that an “important health, safety or welfare reason” would outweigh the benefit of affordable housing.
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“It doesn’t happen often in Southeastern Connecticut, but we’ve had 8-30g applications in Griswold and Stonington, and it’s a way for developers to have more success with multi-family housing,” Kennedy said.
All the towns bordering Norwich are under 10% affordable housing, according to the 2021 Affordable Housing Appeals List.
Kennedy said 8-30g can just be used as a way to make the zoning process simpler, rather than be something hanging over a town’s head.
However, Burdick wants to encourage of deeded affordable units without resorting to 8-30g, saying that 57 of the 72 proposed Oxoboxo Lofts will be affordable units.
“That way, we get a good development that complies with zoning regulations and the site plan requirements that come with it,” she said, “but are also providing some affordable housing that will be affordable for the next four years.”
Affordable housing is a household that brings in 80% of the area median income, being able to pay 30% of their earnings, according to HUD’s definition. In southeastern Connecticut, that could mean a household making $60,000 paying $1,300 monthly.
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“It can be people earning a pretty good living who still find it hard to find good, quality housing in the region,” Kennedy said.
Burdick added that people often perceive affordable housing to be the same as public housing, as people’s first idea of it may be like the now-demolished high-rises on Crystal Avenue in New London. As a number of affordable housing units can be contained in otherwise ordinary looking apartments as deed-restricted units, Burdick said it’s also important to bring in reasonably priced units that are affordable to begin with.
Looking forward, Kennedy said municipalities will have to go over their plans every five years, and she wants to see the towns having “ongoing engagement” on housing. This includes the Southeastern Connecticut Council of Governments and the Southeastern Connecticut Housing Alliance continuing to consult with towns.
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Kennedy said the Southeastern Connecticut Council of Governments is currently doing plan follow-ups with North Stonington’s Affordable Housing Commission.
“They’re looking to us for some advice on what they can do next,” Kennedy said. “That’s ideal to keep it up in the conversation, and work with the towns on implementation.”
While Pianka said plans are being developed “under a cloud” of being a requirement, he wants the plans to be used by the towns, for all the effort put in.
“Some of these things, you jump through all these hoops and the document sits on a shelf,” Pianka said. “Hopefully, that’s not going to happen.”
This article originally appeared on The Bulletin: Eastern CT towns react to state-mandated affordable housing minimums
