The housing struggle intersects with open spaces

Communities everywhere are struggling to respond to the crisis-level need for housing that most people can afford.

And at the same time, many communities are working to protect their open spaces and farmland and combat climate change.

Hardly a day goes by without a major media report, opinion piece, or policy proposal about these issues.

 It doesn’t seem controversial to say that vibrant, sustainable communities need housing that people can afford and a healthy environment, including accessible public spaces — but figuring out how to get there in ways that will be supported by local residents can be a challenge.

In places like Northwest Connecticut, there’s a proud tradition of support for conservation efforts. In some towns, much of the farmland has been protected from sprawling subdivisions, ecologically-sensitive tracts have been saved, and nature preserves created. That’s all good. It’s what I’ve spent most of my career doing in the Hudson Valley. And, in the face of the climate crisis and an increasingly fragmented rural landscape, there’s still more to be done.

There also are examples of affordable housing projects that not-for-profit housing groups have been able to complete. But as years and then decades have passed, and as our rural economies have changed, communities have become more exclusive, land and house prices have risen, the size of houses has grown even as the size of households has shrunk, and the supply of housing that most people can afford hasn’t come close to meeting the demand.

The people who work in the jobs we all rely on for the normal functioning and quality of life in our communities — schools, trades, farms, hospitals, nonprofits, local government services — and the restaurants and stores we frequent, have few if any options.

I believe, and maybe you agree, that there also are hidden, but very real costs to the increasing homogeneity that comes with the loss of economic diversity in our communities. Having fewer opportunities for shared experiences across socio-economic lines results in the loss of a sense of community and with it, the loss of meaningful civic engagement.

Issues like affordable housing become even more intractable as the need becomes so widespread that no one community can address it at scale — and then, small, incremental efforts to create more affordable housing may not receive the support they deserve because they aren’t seen as being significant enough to move the needle.

Time and again, even though affordable housing projects are often the greenest development projects around, more energy efficient than most market rate projects, and located in or adjacent to existing town and village centers — which takes pressure off of land in the surrounding countryside — neighbors often don’t grasp the scale and severity of the problem, or they become alarmed about the perceived impacts of new affordable housing projects on their quality of life or property values.

A similar dynamic arises when it comes to conservation, and in particular, addressing the climate crisis. Many people believe that the solutions need to happen at a higher, structural level, because one person’s or one family’s actions won’t make much of a dent.

Yet, when state or national policy incentivizes solutions, like solar, on a larger scale, we often see opposition to specific projects — always for principled reasons — when they’re located nearby.

And knowing that millions of people need to relocate away from vulnerable locations due to sea level rise and storm events, how do we make good on our shared responsibility to identify new places where they can live?

As it turns out, the phrase “Think globally, act locally” is far easier to put on a bumper sticker, than for whole communities to put into action — that “act locally” part can be particularly confounding.

One of the most frequently prescribed solutions to the affordable housing crisis focuses on local zoning that permits only single-family homes and makes it virtually illegal to build just the kind of mixed-income neighborhoods we need. We must fix this. But, oh can it be difficult to change decades of established zoning policy to encourage a more robust and efficient mix of housing types. Many of our communities once had just such a mix, but now are dominated by higher-priced, single family homes.

Making these challenges even greater, too often the perception and the reality is that the conservation and affordable housing sectors are mutually exclusive or worse, opposed to one another. Unfortunately, public programs and private philanthropy have tended to reinforce the siloed nature of each.

Both sectors depend on land, both rely on local support from our families, friends, and neighbors. Both want to be part of and to support the communities where they work. They don’t have to be separate or at odds. The solutions to one don’t need to exclude the other. We want to focus on the way forward, on constructive solutions and encouraging trends, while highlighting some of the hurdles that stand in the way.

How can affordable housing and conservation groups support one another,or even collaborate, to build stronger communities? How can local government be the critical third partner or lead? How can private philanthropy support these efforts? How can we debunk the myths that help to perpetuate the current state of affairs? And what are some success stories we can learn from?

Steve Rosenberg is co-convener of Hudson Valley Affordable Housing & Conservation Strategy, and was formerly Sr.VP of Scenic Hudson and Exec. Dir. of the Scenic Hudson Land Trust. He delivered these opening remarks at The Salisbury Forum’s Sept. 22 discussion: Housing + Jobs + Conservation: A Roadmap for Action in partnership with Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation.