Chrystal Kornegay

Acknowledging the housing affordability crisis in Massachusetts is easy. For decades now, housing growth has slowed, while the commonwealth’s economy has accelerated. New housing construction is now roughly half what it was in the 1980s, and as a result, working families and younger residents struggle to afford to live and work in Massachusetts. 

We cannot solve the housing crisis in Massachusetts if you do not diagnose what’s driving it. It is far too easy to blame all the state’s housing woes on the forces of NIMBYism. Plenty of cities and towns across Massachusetts are actively working to meet the need for new housing. The problem is, as a state, we have handcuffed the ability of these municipalities to accommodate housing growth.  

The way forward is not so much about bulling over voices of dissent, as it is about reforming the way cities and towns make land use decisions, and unlocking the ability of local partners to say yes to new housing.  

MassHousing was proud to join the Baker administration several months ago, to launch a Housing Choice Initiative that will deliver 135,000 new housing units by 2025. The Governor’s Housing Choice Initiative has three planks. It is a new system of incentives and rewards, through a Housing Choice Community designation, that dedicates resources to communities that have been adding new housing. It also involves new, coordinated technical assistance, to help cities and towns attain Housing Choice Community status and includes legislation that would remove unnecessary barriers to rezoning for housing growth.  

In partnership with Gov. Charlie Baker, MassHousing is focused on building capacity at the local level. We are focused on creating incentives and rewards that support growth. This approach seeks a coalition of the willing, and the December Housing Choice launch attracted a broad coalition of municipal officials and planners, real estate developers and advocates for smart growth, affordable housing and environmental preservation – stakeholders that have sparred over past zoning reform efforts.  

Milestone Progress 

Housing Choice reached a milestone last month, when the administration celebrated its first class of 67 cities and towns that have achieved Housing Choice Community status; collectively, these municipalities have permitted nearly 60,000 housing units in the past five years. At that same event, MassHousing awarded technical assistance grants to 14 projects, under our new Planning for Housing Production program.  

The local projects MassHousing funded last month will help deliver 4,200 new housing units, by building data transparency tools that support new growth, transforming municipally-owned land into affordable housing, modernizing local zoning and designing public infrastructure that supports growth.  

Housing Choice has shown that a substantial number of Massachusetts communities are actively planning for growth, to serve the housing needs of their residents. Several have identified restrictive local zoning as an impediment to achieving the housing visions they have crafted for themselves. Through Planning for Housing Production, MassHousing is partnering with Amherst, Gloucester, Littleton, Norfolk, Salem, Scituate and Swampscott to update local zoning, and create new opportunities for housing growth. 

These efforts will only translate into new housing if our local partners are able to create land use regulations that deliver the housing growth that cities and towns want to achieve. But right now, state law actively works to prevent cities and towns from achieving their own planning goals.  

Massachusetts is one of a handful of states nationally to require a two-thirds supermajority vote for rezoning. Having to clear this high hurdle means that smart growth projects with solid majorities still fail at Town Meeting, while many others never even get to a vote. The supermajority rezoning barrier frustrates local planning, by preventing municipalities from aligning their planning ambitions and land use regulations.  

The Governor’s Housing Choice legislation will fix this, by allowing municipalities to enact smart growth zoning with simple majority votes. It will unleash the capacity, and creativity, of our local partners. And it will shift the housing debate where belongs – away from the NIMBYs, and towards the communities seeking solutions.  

Chrystal Kornegay is the executive director of MassHousing.