| 
Gov. Charlie Baker discusses his final annual budget proposal at a January news conference inside the State House library. Photo by Sam Doran | State House News Service
Amid fierce suburban pushback, Gov. Charlie Baker stands at a crossroads in his drive to boost housing production in Massachusetts.
Baker can stay the course and allow towns across the Boston area to essentially evade new requirements under his centerpiece Housing Choice law to open the door to as many as 200,000 new condominiums, apartments and townhomes near MBTA stops over the next decade.
Home prices and rents will continue to rise to ever more insane levels, and Baker’s big housing plan will fade into the background, joining all the other policy misfires over the decades – 40R, Compact Communities and Starter Home districts, to name a few – that have failed to move the needle on our state’s anemic level of new residential construction.
Or, as he slips into his final months in office, one of our country’s most popular governors can draw upon his carefully accumulated stash of political capital and push back against the pushback to what could be his most significant achievement.
How? Well, Baker could raise the stakes for suburbs that opt to thumb their noses at the new Housing Choice law, which requires 175 Boston-area communities to roll out zoning that allows for new apartment and condo buildings near commuter rail, subway and important bus stops.
Stronger Sticks?
Housing Choice’s key weakness right now is its reliance on MassWorks infrastructure grants as the main stick to wield against communities that refuse to play ball and make room for badly needed new multifamily housing.
While MassWorks grants are certainly popular, the amount of money that goes to the suburbs and small towns at the heart of the resistance to Baker’s new housing drive is fairly modest, with some communities not receiving anything.
That has led a number of local officials, like Concord Select Board member Henry Dane to do the math and decide there is no real significant cost to failing to comply with Housing Choice and much to gain by stopping what they see as outsized rental projects.
For Baker to make this signature legislation and policy a success, he will need to start to make more aggressive use of the bully pulpit.
“Requiring us to build 750 units of multifamily housing, we would have to lose an awful lot of state funding to make it worthwhile to do this,” Dane said at a recent meeting.
But the very fact that local officials are doing the calculations does not suggest that withholding grants is ineffective.
Rather, it demonstrates there could be a pain point at which local leaders would reconsider.
Officials Eye Their Options
To that end, the governor could expand the number of grants that suburban leaders would lose by not complying with Housing Choice and doing their part to boost badly need new apartment and condo construction.
In fact, it is a possibility that state housing officials, in their communications with local officials, have hinted at, noting other “discretionary grant programs” that might also be curtailed or cancelled for recalcitrant communities.
There’s also an executive order, issued way back in 1982 by then Gov. Ed King, that gives the governor sweeping powers “to hold development-related grants to municipalities across all executive agencies to places that are determined to be unreasonably restrictive of new housing growth,” said Jesse Kanson-Benanav, executive director of Abundant Housing Massachusetts.
Sounds like that old order would certainly be worth dusting off for a closer look, as well.
We Need a Road Show
But strong penalties will only go so far. For Baker to make his signature legislation a success, he will need to start to make more aggressive use of the bully pulpit to explain exactly why all this new housing is absolutely essential.
Scott Van Voorhis
Baker took a step in that direction when he recently unveiled his $3.5 billion economic development bill in Lynn near a new waterfront residential project, recalling that Massachusetts actually had a good shot at landing Amazon’s coveted HQ2 expansion, only to be thwarted by our crazy-high rents and home prices.
At the end of three days of top-secret meetings with state and city officials, business leaders and others back in 2018, Amazon leaders delivered a blunt message.
“We love your people, we love your institutions, but the housing thing is a big deal for us,” Baker recalled being told by Amazon execs. “We just think you are too expensive.”
Amazon apparently was also concerned about the cumbersome and restrictive process under which new housing projects are vetted in Massachusetts, with executives noting “you don’t have a process … to create more.”
Now Baker needs to take that message on the road to Greater Boston’s less housing-friendly suburbs, packed as they are with highly-paid professionals who should certainly understand the danger that decisions like Amazon’s pose for the future of the region’s economy.
Barring some unforeseen shift on the state or national political scene, Baker could very well be nearing the end of his political career as wraps up his final year in office.
And given that, the governor might want to consider that old adage about wealth and other worldly possessions and death: You can’t take it with you.
Scott Van Voorhis is Banker & Tradesman’s columnist; opinions expressed are his own. He may be reached at sbvanvoorhis@hotmail.com.
