City of Austin Council Message Board

Colleagues:
Council Member Renteria and I would like to invite you to a discussion of Fair Housing Initiatives at May’s Planning and Neighborhoods Committee (5/24) and June’s Housing and Community Development Committee (6/6).

With the 50th anniversary of the Fair Housing Act approaching, I think it’s important for us to come together as a body to deliberate on what policy choices we could make today to further the spirit of Fair Housing, and also plan on how we can progress further (and defend against getting worse) for the future.

I recognize that our Council and staff have already done hard work to promote fair housing in our first 16 months in office. But there’s much more to be done. I hope that through these two committee meetings—and with more meetings as necessary—we can focus on large-scale, proactive policy solutions that are evidence-based ways of fostering housing integration and combating community displacement. I also think we’ll be well-served by having more time for constructive public conversation about not only the challenges we face, but about how we can rise to those challenges.

I’ll be bringing forward several policy options that I believe in—from increased budgets for housing integration work, to creative code amendments, to more market-based solutions—and I encourage the Council and community members to do the same. In particular, I believe that we can look at formerly County and State owned lands that are now on the tax rolls for affordable housing money to help fund the economic integration of desirable areas of town. I also want to look into affordable housing fees, sustainable monitoring and implementation of our housing programs, and land development code revisions (be they shorter or longer term).

I think the Mobility Committee has done some great work taking public input and fostering discussion among Council Members to address our significant transportation challenges. I hope you’ll accept CM Renteria and my invitation to come do the same regarding Fair Housing at our committees.

Greg

P.S. For those of you haven’t had a chance to read the City’s Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice, I recommend it. It’s available here: https://austintexas.gov/sites/default/f ... or_web.pdf

Colleagues, please find below a proposed starting point for our conversations on Fair Housing at the Planning and Neighborhoods Committee this coming Tuesday.

As you will see, the proposed policies offer an 'all of the above' approach to addressing existing impediments to Fair Housing and our housing affordability crisis in Austin. They have been primarily sourced from the City's Impediments to Fair Housing Report, community input, and staff reports Council has received over the last year and a half.

I hope you will consider joining CM Renteria, the rest of the PNC, and me Tuesday at 10 AM in Council Chambers to discuss these proposals.

Thank you for your consideration,
Greg



Austin’s Fair Housing Initiative: Anti-Displacement & Economic Inclusion

More Mixed Income Developments
As working-poor communities face gentrification, we have a responsibility to work to ensure that new developments will include working class communities rather than exclude them. We should initiate inclusionary zoning where state law allows and consider appropriate affordable housing linkage fees, especially for commercial developments.
• Direct the City Manager to meet with stakeholders and provide a plan to initiate inclusionary zoning in Homestead Preservation Districts;
• Direct the City Manager to conduct a comprehensive local real estate market analysis in order to reevaluate and provide recommendations to enhance affordable housing production by the City’s existing SMART Housing policy and any changes to the City’s density bonus programs in CodeNEXT;
• Direct the City Manager to initiate a code amendment to require non-discrimination based on source of income as part of our voluntary SMART Housing and Density Bonus programs.

Smaller Housing in High-Opportunity Areas
Our most desirable and highest-opportunity neighborhoods are becoming increasingly more exclusive and expensive. We should change or eliminate rules in our land development code that force homeowners and renters to pay for large pieces of land and large homes to live in certain neighborhoods. We should preserve affordable units and create new opportunities for people at all income levels in different parts of town by adding new housing supply and housing types.
• Direct the City Manager to prioritize opportunities for smaller housing and smaller lot sizes in “high opportunity” areas in Code NEXT, and if necessary present potential amendments to the growth concept map if Fair Housing principles indicate that the Council should consider any such amendments;
• Direct the City Manager to present options to the City Council to create more diverse housing opportunities in areas where deed-restrictions or other private covenants may have a disparate impact on low-to-moderate income communities or communities of color, such as deed restrictions that exclude renters or those who cannot pay for large pieces of property.

Larger Public Investment
We should commit more funding towards subsidizing affordable housing. In December, the Council committed more than $50 million of anticipated property taxes to the City’s Housing Trust Fund which currently has under $2 million in it. We should dedicate new property tax revenue from developments on former state-owned or county-owned lands to below-market housing, and repurpose our vacant and under-utilized city land for affordable housing. We also should consider amending our fees to have more developments support the creation of affordable housing.
• Direct the City Manager to include new property taxes generated from former county-owned and state-owned land as funding for the City’s Housing Trust Fund in order to ensure the City’s Strategic Housing Plan and affordable housing goals are funded and viable;
• Direct the City Manager to provide a recommendation on how to redevelop any city-owned land, including properties with existing facilities, for affordable housing;
• Direct the City Manager to research and provide recommendations regarding the possible introduction of affordable housing fees for new developments, commercial developments in particular, and conduct any necessary nexus study to do so.

‘Stay in Place’
Many homeowners are faced with the choice of either having to sell their home or spend an untenable portion of their income on property taxes. We can help neighbors stay in place as property values rise by giving them the tools to downsize in place by renting parts of their property.
• Direct the City Manager to initiate a process to consider tools including, but not limited to, code amendments and funding programs that would provide lower-income homeowners the option to rent or sell more portions of their property in order to maintain ownership of parts or all of their property as values rise.