Waltham needs more affordable homes. City Council has a solution

Waltham has benefited from the opening of several apartment buildings such as The Alexan, 305 Broadstone, The Point and Leland House over the past five years. Not only have these developments strengthened our tax base with contributions that generally outpace costs, but they have crucially delivered more than 200 affordable homes that are desperately needed for low- and moderate-income Waltham residents. While these buildings vary in size and location, they all have one thing in common: They were permitted via Chapter 40B, a state law that allows developers to override a city’s zoning laws by including affordable housing as part of their plans.

It is great that the state is taking action to address our housing shortage, but it isn’t nearly sufficient to address the large number of low-income households looking for an affordable home. When Leland House opened up its affordable development for seniors, it was only big enough to provide affordable housing for 10% of the applicants. When The Alexan opened its doors to all ages, there were only enough affordable units for 6% of the applicants. 

The gap between the amount of housing we build and the amount of housing we need is massive. We can only bridge that gap if municipalities are willing and productive partners in building more homes. We cannot solely rely on the state’s overrides and mandates.

Waltham City Council does have a way to create affordable housing at the local level: inclusionary zoning, a policy that requires developers to set aside a portion of new homes at prices affordable to low- and moderate-income households. This policy has created a modest 120 affordable homes over the past few decades, the most recent of which was approved on Dec. 23, 2019 … more than 2,240 days ago from the time of writing!

This should concern every Waltham resident. Our housing shortage has only worsened over the past six years, yet our city council has not permitted a single unit of affordable housing in that time. Why did we stop, and how can we fix it? 

Why affordable housing stalled out

To fix things, we must first understand what went wrong between 2019 and 2020. Economic factors due to the COVID-19 pandemic are a reasonable first suspicion, but this theory is proven wrong by the large number of 40B apartments that came to Waltham in this time period. Indeed, the entire Boston region experienced a spike in new housing permits in 2021. The problem is not macroeconomic or regional; the problem is local. Between 2019 and 2020, Waltham City Council revised its inclusionary zoning policy in a way that made affordable housing extremely difficult to finance and build.

What were the changes? The required share of affordable units in a new development doubled from 10% to 20%. Simultaneously, these units were required to be more affordable, with a lower maximum allowable rent. These changes were well intentioned, but this only works if the affordable housing is financially viable to build. Inclusionary zoning does not rely on outside subsidy; it relies on the profit from market-rate units to pay for the affordable homes.

When Waltham increased the affordable share from 10% to 20%, the share of market-rate units dropped from 90% to 80%. At the same time, the more deeply affordable units cost more money to build and maintain. With fewer market-rate units supporting twice as many affordable homes, each of which costs more money to subsidize, the effect was that each affordable unit received less than half the financial support it had before. This undermined the very mechanism that makes inclusionary zoning work. A policy designed to produce more affordable housing instead produced none. 

A solution is in sight

Fortunately, our city councilors have acknowledged this problem and are working on a solution. A new resolution directs the city to adopt the recommendations of independent housing experts who have calculated the cost to build affordable housing. This will enable a new inclusionary zoning policy that will allow new affordable housing developments to be economically feasible. As reported by The Waltham Times, this calculation effectively provides three variables the city can modify to resurrect local affordable housing permitting: the number of affordable units, the depth of affordability and parking minimums. It will be up to the City Council to decide what to prioritize when adopting a new inclusionary zoning policy.

Waltham Inclusive Neighborhoods is advocating for these specific reforms:

• Affordable housing policy should target low-income households most in need of subsidized housing. As such, Waltham’s new inclusionary zoning policy should prioritize depth of affordability.
• We strongly encourage councilors to adopt a lower number of affordable units and lower parking requirements so that targeting low-income households remains economically feasible.
• The city’s new inclusionary zoning policy should disincentivize developers from making a payment to the city in lieu of building affordable units.
• The city should repeat this process and reevaluate its inclusionary zoning policy every five years to ensure that new affordable housing development remains economically feasible.

I encourage readers who care about housing affordability to email their city councilors at councillors@city.waltham.ma.us to express support of inclusionary zoning reform. I also encourage readers to express their support in person at the public hearing at City Hall, which will be scheduled at a later date.