Alders Richard Furlow and Charles Decker at Legislation Committee hearing.
A proposed rent-capping amendment to the city’s new “inclusionary zoning” (IZ) law is now one vote away from adoption, after committee alders voted unanimously in support of the update.
That was the outcome of a meeting of the Board of Alders Legislation Committee. The in-person meeting took place in the Aldermanic Chamber on the second floor of City Hall.
The committee alders unanimously backed a proposed zoning ordinance amendment to a law that the Board of Alders first passed in January, and that went into effect on Feb. 18. That amendment now advances to the full Board of Alders for further discussion and a potential final vote.
The IZ law that the alders passed in January requires — or, at, least, intended to require — developers to set aside a certain percentage of units in new market-rate apartment buildings at rents affordable to lower-income tenants.
Assistant Corp. Counsel Mike Pinto: Implicit has been made explicit.
City Assistant Corporation Counsel Michael Pinto explained at the Tuesday night session that the amendment now before the alders “makes express and explicit what we believed to be implicit” in the law already on the books.
That is: that the city has the authority to cap rents for certain set-aside apartments, and not just incomes for tenants eligible to rent those set-aside units.
Just to be clear, East Rock Alder and Legislation Committee Chair Charles Decker said Tuesday night, “the proposed text amendment is not changing the levels of affordability that the initial law” imposed. “It’s not changing the geographies of the zones… It’s not changing the substance of what we passed.”
That’s correct, Pinto replied. “The goal here was not to change or alter the umbrella of the policy. It was simply to address the concerns of the [City Plan Commission] that certain authority was not expressly stated.”
As he pointed out during a recent City Plan Commission meeting, Pinto said that there are four main updates included in the IZ amendment:
• A definition of the new term“IZ Affordable Unit” as:“a residential dwelling unit, which is a required or voluntarily set aside unit under this Section 50 and which is restricted for occupancy by households that have a combined total annual income for all members that does not exceed fifty percent (50%) of the New Haven Area Median Income as defined by HUD at the time of initial occupancy; and for which the costs for rent and utilities do not exceed thirty percent (30%) percent of household income.”
• A requirement that the City Plan Department director“review all Applicable Developments at the time of application for site plan review to verify compliance with income and rental limits as required for the IZ Affordable Units.”
• A requirement that the Livable City Initiative director or his/her designee“review leasing plans and rent rolls to verify ongoing compliance with income and rental limits of the IZ Affordable Units.”
• Clarifications of an IZ appeal process involving the Board of Zoning Appeals and the state Superior Court.
Pinto also said Tuesday night that he plans to submit further substitute language to the alders before they take a final vote on the amendment. That’s because the IZ law originally passed in January included a definition of “affordable housing” as housing reserved for a household with a total annual income “that does not exceed a designated area median income (AMI)” as defined by the federal government. That conflicts with an existing definition of “affordable housing” already in the zoning code that refers to housing that costs no more than 30 percent for a household making up to 60 percent AMI.
Click here to read the proposed amendment in full.
Section 8 Language Update?
Downtown/East Rock Alder Eli Sabin.
Westville Alder Adam Marchand and Downtown/ East Rock Alder Eli Sabin pressed Pinto on one other section of potentially unclear language in the IZ law passed in January, and that is not changed in the IZ amendment.
That is, a part of the law that orders developers to prioritize renting out 5 percent of apartments in applicable downtown developments to renters with Section 8 federal rental subsidies.
That part of the law reads: “IZO applicable developments shall prioritize an additional five percent (5%) of the total number of dwelling units for persons or families with Housing Choice (Section 8) vouchers.” That’s on top of the 10 percent of units in applicable downtown developments that must be set aside for renters earning no more than 50 percent AMI.
Sabin said he’s concerned that “this language does not specify what level of rents would be allowed for Housing Choice voucher holders.” Should the city and the alders also update this language to make clear that these Section 8 priority apartments are capped at a certain rent, and not just reserved for tenants with certain subsidies?
Pinto promised to look into it.
Decker repeated that, with this potential update as well, the city and the alders do not plan on making any substantive changes to what the original law was supposed to accomplish.
“We are not talking about changing the mix” of set-aside apartments, he said. “We’re just making sure it actually works.”