Adrian for Laurel

The City first adopted affordable housing legislation in 2023, and following three months of conversations, updates to that law are expected to be presented for First Public Hearing at Monday’s Council Meeting.

The law passed in 2023 required new developments in the City with 50 or more residential units to set aside 8% of them to sell at an affordable price.

Amendments to that law were proposed by the Administration in November, many of which dealt with ensuring the affordable units remained similar in appearance, size, amenities, and other features as their market-priced counterparts.

Other amendments, which have evolved over the conversations, include:

1. Who is eligible to purchase affordable units? – The existing law provides that eligible applicants must have incomes at or below 60% of the area median. The Administration first proposed changing that to a range of 30% to 90%, and over a number of conversations, Council consensus evolved that to a figure of 80% or below.

2. What is the price of affordable units? – The existing law contains a mis-statement: It reads that affordable units are priced at 30% of the market rate. But through the conversations, it was realized the original intent was to price at a 30% reduction from the market rate. (This also more closely corresponds to price differentials in other jurisdictions). So the amended language contains the edit, and I proposed an amendment to the preamble to clarify the legislative history.

3. What is the re-sale price of an affordable unit? – The existing law is silent on this question, and the original amendments proposed by the Administration didn’t contain language to address either. I proposed an amendment that purchasers be able to sell their unit at their purchase price plus an inflation adjustment as a way of enabling them to participate in the appreciation of their home value over time. This is especially important since the affordable home provisions apply for a 30-year period.

4. How is the ability to refinance affected for affordable units? – The Administration originally proposed a refinance limit of the mortgage balance at the time of refinance, plus 25%. To my mind, this would have the unintended effect of penalizing someone who paid down their mortgage (e.g., over 20 years) and now needed to tap their home equity for a roof replacement or other significant home maintenance work. So I proposed the refinance limit be at least up to the original borrowings, and later as other provisions changed, concurred with Councilmember Kole’s proposal to link it to the re-sale value as newly defined by #3 above.

5. What size of housing developments trigger the affordable housing laws? – The existing law triggers the affordable housing laws for developments of 50 or more, and the Administration proposed reducing this level to 20 or more. This amendment has remained unchanged through conversations.

There’s a few other odds-and-ends in the legislation, which you can review in full as part of the meeting packet for the Council Meeting for Monday, Jan 12.

And please reach out to me with any thoughts, questions, suggestions, etc. so I can take those into consideration as we go through the remaining steps of the legislative process. As it stands, Ordinance 2052 is expected to have a First Hearing on Jan 12 and then be voted on following its Second Hearing on Jan 26.

(N.B., Also see my blog post titled “Ideas for bringing about Affordable Housing in Laurel”

Right now Council is exploring the Administration’s proposed amendments to Laurel’s affordable housing legislation passed back in 2023.

If you’re curious to see the conversations thus far, I’ve queued up the following two videos to the related agenda items at the:

• Dec 8 Council Meeting, and the

• Nov 10 Work Session.

In addition to thoughts shared there, I also thought it might be helpful to mention additional ideas for bringing about affordable housing in Laurel:

• One thing to acknowledge about the legislation, is that while it impacts new developments, it doesn’t really impact the wider Laurel housing market (which we all hope would be affordable as well).

• Some solutions being pursued by other jurisdictions around the country to impact housing prices in their general markets are: (a) streamlined process to make larger homes duplexes or similar, (b) provisions around Additional Dwelling Units (ADUs) on existing real estate, (c) infill of existing land parcels with starter home kits, (d) pre-approved starter house building plans that thereby reduce the cost of building, and similar.

These types of solutions help create supply on multiple rungs of the ‘housing ladder’, and set anchor points at the low end, which has the effect of creating a much broader impact on housing prices. I suspect these ideas and ones like them may also be part of a solution to creating affordable housing for all.

I was pleased Monday to renew my oath to serve Laurel as a Councilmember for this coming term, and to join with my colleagues, their friends, and family.

Following the swearing-in, I also had an opportunity to share a brief reflection, which I invite you watch in the queued-up video linked below:

If helpful, here also is a transcript, edited for some tidiness. :)

Thank you President Smith.

I did want to share a little bit of a reflection tonight. You know, in some ways tonight’s the conclusion of the election with the swearing-in, and there were a couple thoughts that I shared with supporters following the election, that I thought might be good to share tonight at large.

One of the things that struck me as I was standing on the sidelines on Election Day – and it is sort of interesting in an election that as candidates you’re standing on the sidelines. and that’s appropriate because the voters are the ones that who are the actors during the election, who are the movers – and as I watched the residents stream in and out of the polling place, I was struck by the fact that this thing we call “community”, it doesn’t just “happen” all by itself.

It takes people willing to take time out of their day to come out and to vote and to be a part. It takes people who want to take time out of their day to walk down the street to take the package that was misdelivered at your door to your next door neighbor. It takes people who take time out of the day to volunteer to coach their kid’s sports teams. It takes people to take time out of their day to stay after and join their church choir. Or also to collect and distribute food to those in need. And to come out and vote on Election Day.

A community is not just one person. It’s not even just five people. These few up here cannot carry what it means to be a community. It’s a vibrant ecosystem of people at all levels that make a community strong. The teachers, the shop owners, the bus drivers, the seniors, the pastors, the families, the artists, the architects, and the list goes on. If that ecosystem is strong, a community will carry itself regardless.

And so my encouragement is this: To “be Laurel”, to be proud to be Laurel, to be part and parcel of our life and our space here in our town, finding a way to connect to those around you. Laurel is richer and stronger for what you bring to it.

So, thank you to the witness to everyone who came out on election day to vote, to the testament of your belief in Laurel – And I’ll do my best to keep making decisions to best support you so that together we can be Laurel and to help it flourish. 🙂

Thank you, Mr. President.