A key piece of zoning reform legislation that Gov. Charlie Baker has said could unlock the construction of over 100,000 housing units suddenly sprang back to live yesterday on Beacon Hill after months of hibernation, raising the possibility that the measure could be headed for passage.
The Joint Committee on Housing is currently polling its members on their support for the bill, co-chair Sen. Brendan Crighton’s office told Banker & Tradesman this morning, a first step before scheduling a committee vote. The move was first reported by the Boston Globe.
An Act to Promote Housing Choices would lower the threshold for housing-related zoning changes to pass local planning and select boards from the current two-thirds majority to a simple majority. Housing production has slowed dramatically in recent decades, leading to a shortage in supply, and Baker argued that many developments that reverse the trend are scuttled by a minority of local opponents. The University of Massachusetts’ Donahue Institute projects Greater Boston needs to produce around 320,000 housing units between 2010 and 2025 to keep up with demand, and is currently falling substatially short of that goal, exacerbating a housing crisis that has pushed the statewide median sale price past $400,000 this year according to data from The Warren Group, publisher of Banker & Tradesman.
The bill is backed by both the Massachusetts Municipal Association, which lobbies on behalf of town governments in the state legislature, and the real estate industry, led by commercial real estate developer trade group NAIOP-MA and the Massachusetts Association of Realtors. However, despite hearings over the summer the bill has been stuck in the Joint Committee on Housing in the face of opposition from a small group of progressive representatives and a small group of suburban Boston towns led by Needham’s board of selectmen. Progressive opponents cast the bill as either insufficiently ambitious or a giveaway to developers, while Needham officials had sought an exemption for the nearly 40 percent of Greater Boston communities that have met their obligations under the Chapter 40B affordable housing law.
Committee co-chair Rep. Kevin Honan had vowed to not bring the bill forward unless it had a clear path to passage in the larger house, raising the possibility that these choppy political waters may have calmed.
All committees on Beacon Hill face a Jan. 31 deadline to report out legislation for consideration by the full house this legislative session. An identical bill died in the last legislative session after progressive Cambridge Rep. Mike Connolly put a hold on the bill in an effort to attach more tenant protections to the bill.
