Gov. Maura Healey pitches lawmakers on the Housing Committee on her five-year, $4.1 billion housing bond bill at a hearing on Thursday, Jan. 18, 2024. Photo by Chris Lisinski | State House News Service
As the MBTA Communities law expands its reach over 100 more Massachusetts cities and towns in 2024, Gov. Maura Healey appealed to business leaders to step into the fray and lobby their hometowns to expand multifamily zoning.
“I hope everyone in this room is wiling to engage, if you’re not engaged already, by talking to your neighbors, talking to your colleagues,” Healey said during her annual address to the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce at the Westin Copley Place Hotel Tuesday morning. “I hope everyone understands that the future of our state depends on new homes: not somewhere else, but in our own communities, OK?”
The administration has contrasted the town of Milton’s rejection of new multifamily zoning with approvals in 11 other rapid-transit communities last year, vowing to withhold discretionary state funding from localities including Milton that resist.
The broader effects of the MBTA Communities act are starting to be felt this year. Another 130 communities that have MBTA commuter rail stations or are located next to those with stations have a Dec. 31 deadline to submit their own housing compliance plans.
“With respect to the ‘M’ town, we continue to be engaged and have provided technical assistance and be a thought partner,” Healey said. “There’s a carrot and stick with all of this.”
The law requires communities to approve multifamily development for at least 15 housing units per acre within a half-mile of MBTA stops. Suburban communities have begun reviewing their options to rezone districts that would meet the housing production goals submitted by the state Executive Office of Housing and Liveable Communities.
In Tuesday’s remarks, Healey urged the hundreds of business leaders to become active in their local communities’ debates over rezoning.
Healey cited Massachusetts’ lowest-in-the-nation 2.8 percent apartment vacancy rate and recent declines in home sales as obstacles to economic development.
A report by real estate researchers Yardi Matrix this week said Greater Boston’s 96.5 percent apartment occupancy rate remained one of the nation’s highest, while the Worcester-Springfield market ranked fifth nationally in year-over-year rent increases. Average asking Worcester-Springfield rents rose 6.4 percent to $1,768, with 1,656 units under construction.
Boston area rents rose 3 percent year-over-year to $2,758, Yardi Matrix reported, compared to the 0.3-percent average national rent increase.
While the MBTA Communities law continues to play out, Healey pushed Beacon Hill legislators to approve the administration’s $4 billion housing bond bill which promises an assortment of incentives for communities and developers. Healey filed the bill last October, but lawmakers only gave it a first hearing in January amid concerns about the slowing pace of state tax revenue increases.
As Massachusetts’ life science industry expansion slows, Healey is seeking to renew the state’s $1 billion life science initiative for another 10 years beyond its current 2025 expiration date.
But the administration is seeking to catalyze the growth of emerging industries including AI and clean energy in an economic development bond bill to be submitted this year.
The 10-year climate tech initiative will include public-private partnerships, workforce development and incentives for startups.
“Just within miles of here, we have people working on fusion energy, on carbon-free cement for the building industry, on batteries and solar and offshore winds,” Healey said. “In Massachusetts we’re going to solve climate change through innovation because that’s what we do here.”
A task force is scheduled to deliver recommendations for an AI strategy this summer.
