GlobeWest today ran pro and con pieces about Newton’s proposed one-year moratorium on the tear down of one- and two-family houses. Writing in favor of the moratorium was Village 14’s own Julia Malakie. Arguing against it was Micéal Chamberlain, Newton resident, Principal, Historic Homes, Inc.
The question posed was:
Do you support a tear-down moratorium in Newton that would prohibit the demolition of one- and two-family homes, and put a hold on additions of more than 20 percent of the existing home for a specific period of time?
Maybe I haven’t tuned in close enough but I had no idea that this proposed moratorium included additions on existing homes. I think the tear-down moratorium alone is a bad idea (although I would like to see a solution to the increase in multi-million dollar homes), but to include additions to houses as well seems outrageous to me. Who will buy a house without knowing if they can build on to it? We added about 400 square feet to our then-1,500 square foot house in 2003. That’s more than 20 percent. It’s also not a large amount of space. Making homeowners wait a year to add a room they might need now because the people who are charged with resolving zoning problems haven’t done so is inane.
NO.
A truly bad idea!
The theory that a moratorium on demos will somehow keep affordable housing in Newton is ludicrous. The median household income for Mass is about $65K. If you plug that into one of the “how much house can I afford” calculators, you come up with about $25oK. Most of the single family homes for sale in Newton are at least $500K. That’s twice what the average family can afford. There are plenty of communities where one could buy a house in this price range, just not in Newton. The demo delay will not save affordable homes, it will just mean that owners have to put in the paperwork well in advance of selling their homes. Affordable housing can only be solved in Newton, by creating affordable housing. We should also consider the changing priorities of the latest generations. Home ownership is low on the list of priorities. With many of the younger generations facing 15+ jobs over their lives, buying a house is not part of their American Dream, and in fact it locks them into a location when they know they will need to move around for work.
The fact that the proposal will make people wait for an addition is even more ridiculous, and not worthy of any more typing.
Makes no sense. What does make sense is that we restrict population growth by instituting a one in one out policy. No additional domiciles. Enough is enough. Schools are taxed. Traffic is ridiculous. You don’t build a new home unless one disappears.
That should really be the discussion. The moratorium is wrong and is simply trying to further procrastinate on the real solution. Make the hard decisions and reform the zoning code already.
Hell, no!
Well if you’re looking to guarantee that nothing in Newton is affordable ever again (and ensure that the city is frozen in time), then I guess this is your key to “success.”
It seems that if the Alder”men” do this then they are acting totally in opposition to the best interests of the citizens of Newton whom they were elected to represent. Did we really elect people like this? If so, we need to give serious thought to the criteria we use when voting.
In your next drive around Newton, take a count of how many 1950/60s style ranch homes you see. Pay particular attention to those is quite expensive neighborhoods. There is quite a large number of them (still!). The stated objective to an anti tear-down policy, should one ever be written, is that it would preserve those modestly priced structures (the post war starter homes). How is that at all possible? You can preserve a footprint and setback of a property, but how does the City preserve the building itself? Do you create a citywide historic district that somehow has authority to keep 60 year old starter homes standing? That is not the gov’t I want. This is a land of opportunity and it the opportunity exists to buy land with an out of place building on it, what elected official is going to tell the buyer tough noogies, you’re stuck with what you got? With an opportunistic buyer is usually an opportunistic seller. Some of those sellers are estates that shouldn’t have to wait for this grandstanding to get over with
@Hoss and others: The objective is to deal with zoning issues that have been identified by both the City’s planning department and the Aldermen as critical issues including setback, footprint, density. These issues have been tabled by the Administration for Zoning Reform Phase 2. We are still in Zoning Reform Phase 1. The City’s Planning Department recently stated that now they want to do a village by village process in their zoning reform 2 process. We’ve asked them how long they think this will take. Their response was several years. The issues identified in the memo that I submitted for the August Zoning and Planning meeting need to be addressed now. What we are losing in terms of affordability is just one of the impacts the continued rush for demolitions is creating. And when I use the term “affordable” I am referring to modestly priced homes – which unfortunately, many of us – could never afford. I don’t want to stop development but I believe we must have a better handle on the by-right development that takes place in the city and I don’t believe we can wait 3+ years to address these issues.
I second everything Amy said.
I don’t have a lot to add to what I’ve said in the Globe West piece, and in many threads here on V14. But if we don’t do anything and let things continue as they are, we’re going to have a very different city in 20 or 30 years. Take a drive by the luxury condos on Elm Street or around Oak Hill Park or down Hartman Road to the hilly section on the eastern end and see the future. If you don’t think it can happen in your neighborhood, go to the FAR calculator on the city website and see what could go up next door to you by right.
I’m feeling like West Newton north of the Pike is the next frontier. The last few years it’s been Elm and Oak and Cherry and Webster Streets. That’s still continuing, and now it looks like Barbara Road, a street of Capes that I’m familiar with because we did one of our first Newton Tree Conservancy plantings there in 2010, will be gradually demolished as houses turn over. If you like the idea of a Newton where 3,000 sq ft or so is a small house, that’s where we’re headed.
The supporters of a demolition moratorium are, I assume, well-intentioned but totally unrealistic. It is the housing market, not zoning, that is the reason you are seeing so many 1950s ranch houses and older homes torn down to build newer, larger houses. I spent a half hour on the phone with someone who has a single family, 1950s ranch house on 21,000+ sf (1/2 acre) in Newton under agreement for $1.25 million. He went to the Historic Commission because he wants to build a two and one-half story single family house, which put a demolition delay on the house and basically told him he could only build a ranch house on that site if he wanted a demolition permit. The previous owners, by the way, bought the house in 1995 for $560,000 (which is also well beyond what a median income household can afford now let alone in 1995).
If someone is going to spend $1.25 million on a 1950s ranch house, they are not going to want to spend the money to renovate and preserve it as a ranch house. Sorry, but that is the reality. The sellers want the same return on their investment as anyone else in Newton, where the cost of housing has more than doubled since 1995. Do you really want to screw the sellers in this case, and reduce their ROI well below what you, yourself would be able to get for your house after making hefty mortgage payments for 20 years? Or, put another way, “I want to sell my house for well below fair market value,” said no one ever.
If you really want to preserve the diversity of housing stock here in Newton, the best, and probably only way, is to allow people to be able to build on far smaller lots and increase density on multi-family lots so that middle class first-time homebuyers might have a fighting chance at finding something they can afford in Newton. But try to get 2/3 support from the BOA for that! I can’t even persuade a majority of my colleagues to allow people to stay in their homes by liberalizing the accessory apartment restrictions.
I do not like the rate of tear downs but some of the replacement homes are better than what was demolished. A halt to all tear downs is a law that both helps and hurts at the same time and has severe unintended consequences for many people. Thus I can not support such a rule.
Low interest rates is a culprit here also. Too bad the Fed. policy has such ill effects. High home prices forces older people to sell and move out of town at an accelerated rate. New families move in . more schools are needed. Taxes go up along with living costs. Roads get crowded and life changes dramatically. Where does it all end?
@Ted: I agree to some extent with what you are saying. A lot more needs to be done if we want to preserve the diversity of housing stock in this city – but again – there are so many inter-related issues and impacts with regard to demolitions and rebuilds in this city. I tried to focus the item on what is being rebuilt by-right in this City. I have tried to identify the issues and related docket items that need to be addressed now – not 3 years from now – (many are your docket items!) I am not against comprehensive zoning reform – I am against sitting by idly for the next 3 years while the folks who remain – you know – the ones that will continue to be our consitituents – have to put up with sideway facing homes, where houses are being built totally out of scale with the rest of the streetscape or where two-families have somehow evolved into luxury 2 separate town-homes with barely a common living space connection.
@Amy, that ship has sailed. Put bluntly, the primary value of ranch houses in the current housing market in Newton is as tear downs. As you know, the city is going to pay between 830,000 and $950,000 for two ranch houses on Beacon Street so we can–wait for it–demolish them. Real estate in Newton is expensive because of location, location, location. I would rather expend energy on enacting a large house review ordinance similar to what neighboring communities have that would deal with some of the design issues that you cite as an interim measure in the short-term until we accomplish the kind of long-term comprehensive zoning reform we really need.
Amy, you said, “I am against sitting by idly for the next 3 years while the folks who remain – you know – the ones that will continue to be our consitituents…”
Well, I am your constituent now, and have been for 60 years. I will someday wish to sell my 1050’s ranch. If your ill-conceived moratorium is in effect, I will not be able to realize the profit I need to downsize and remain in Newton. Why should I, and others like me (yes, your constituents) be penalized?
Ald. Sangiolo — If urging reform and getting BoA members to use political courage to make tough decisions about maximum FAR/setback is the intent, I’m all for it. But the public, the voter-ship, doesn’t study the technical aspects of zoning. The language in the moratorium that people are focusing is the attempt to control the destruction of our cheapest housing stock. Reformed zoning will not do that. The moratorium will not do that. Homeowners and investors will always be fully able to trade up and maximize their investment which often means destroying the cheaply built, awfully energy inefficient post War starter. (Granted some of the current modular homes aren’t exactly high craftsmanship, but albeit) When investors trade up within reasonable FAR/setback, the outcome is a huge win-win for homeowner and neighborhood
home value.
@Ald. Hess-Mahan:
“If you really want to preserve the diversity of housing stock here in Newton, the best, and probably only way, is to allow people to be able to build on far smaller lots and increase density on multi-family lots so that middle class first-time homebuyers might have a fighting chance at finding something they can afford in Newton.”
That won’t work. Just look at what is being built in your own ward on Elm St as an example of increased density. These “affordable” townhouses are selling for between $1M and $1.4M, i.e. hardly affordable. The majority of the in-fill development being done whether it be 2 family townhouses in MR zones or 4 or 5 units via special permit as on Elm St in WN and Auburn St in AUB come with prices well into 7 figures because they are so large. About the cheapest I’ve seen one of these “affordable” units selling for is about $950,000. Allowing for building on far smaller lots will not change this dynamic because the FAR allows and seemingly encourages too large a house to be built on a property – in particular on the smaller lots where the FAR can be 0.48 or 0.58 depending on whether it’s SR3 or MR1 zoned.
One thing I do agree with you on is that most ranches have no historic value – to me homes worth preserving and which classify as historic are generally in the range of 100 yrs and older, but even some of those homes may have no redeeming qualities left.
A large part of the issue is what’s replacing the houses being demolished in that they’re completely out of scale with the surrounding homes and adding units where they didn’t exist before adding pressure on all our infrastructure – schools, roads etc etc. You’ve talked about form-based zoning in the past as a way to better guide what’s being built rather than merely looking at FAR and setbacks which offers no neighborhood context. That along with a large house review, a review of what we mean by 2-family (one of your docketed items) and the items Ald. Sangiolo has identified such as no sideways linguini homes would in my mind go a long way to improve things and better preserve the character of our neighborhoods. We don’t need to preserve all the houses but in my mind preserving neighborhood character and streetscape is imperative. Coming back to Elm St, it’s very interesting comparing and contrasting the special permit dockets for 11-17 Elm St from 2008 (or so) versus the one just filed for the property next door and reading what the planning department had to say in their analysis. In 2008 they were saying that what was proposed was too big and way exceeded what existed around it quoting various sections of the comprehensive plan in terms of preserving neighborhood scale et al. But jump forward a few years and now that street has been completely obliterated and now the increased density is the norm and the planning department is seemingly okay with the proposal citing the other new builds on the street as why it’s appropriate. What changed? The ideals of the City per the Comprehensive Plan did not. 1 overbuild was approved as a special permit and it set a precedent for everything to come. We’re seeing this everywhere across our city. This is why I support the demolition moratorium – not because I want to save 1950’s and 1960’s ranches but because it will offer some pause during which our BOA can take a hard look at making a few modest changes to our zoning ordinances to address some of the more critical issues NOW, and then let zoning reform run its course over 3, 5, 10 yrs, whatever it takes to get it right.
Peter, as NativeNewtonian eloquently explains, the demolition moratorium will hurt homeowners who have invested a great deal in their properties and may need to sell to fund their retirement and/or to purchase a new home. Even if they want to downsize and stay in Newton, they will need some or all of the equity they have built up over the years because housing costs have increased so rapidly since they bought their own homes. IMHO, the speculative benefit from delaying what in many cases will be the inevitable demolition of 100 or so houses a year is more than offest by the harm of preventing individual homeowners from realizing their return on investment, even if for only a year.
We are talking about a moratorium; it is a TEMPORARY STOP, not a ban for infinity! Nobody is saying that owners will not be able to sell their homes ever. Just for a few months, while we, the residents and their representatives, figure out what kind of neighborhoods we want to live in.
In addition, if the zoning issues listed in Amy Sangiolo’s memo are resolved before the end of the moratorium, the moratorium gets nullified. We cannot wait another three years while our city becomes more like Brookline.
Fine, isabelle. Time is money, as they say. Depriving someone of their property rights, even for only a year, costs them money. Are you willing to pay homeowners for their lost opportunity costs? I’m not.
It also impacts people’s lives. That’s one thing for people contemplating purchasing a property, but for residents who have an urgent need to build, changing the rules could be a real hardship. I know it would have been when my family was in the middle of an addition 3 years ago. It was bad enough that the FAR and bonus rules were in flux. A major renovation is not something you really have the opportunity to do over when the rules improve or the ban is lifted.
Telling people to put their lives on hold, or that they can’t fully exercise their by-right build out to accommodate an extra bedroom for a child, while the city tries to get its act together is simply wrong.
Also, let’s please decide whether we’re trying to prevent McMansions (even that is difficult to define) or preserve
affordablediverse housing (even entry level homes aren’t affordable anymore) or try to place some value judgement or perhaps more weight on which homes are worth preserving. Is it the style of the homes and the way they tower over other structures that’s the issue? (Story height based on today’s building code, grade changes and setting of the structure can easily make a new home out of scale with surrounding 1920’s structures) Because that’s a very different problem than the zoning rules which typically impact living space even for historically-sensitive construction and additions. A moratorium targets everything. If you really want “affordable” housing, you need to restrict zoning to tell people like me not to expand their homes at all and leave them at 1,400 sq ft. Heck, to keep pace with skyrocketing property values, you’d have to do something to make those homes even smaller.What Adam said. That’s the problem with a moratorium. We’ll spend a year figuring out what the questions are and won’t even begin to come up with answers. That’s not a criticism. That’s how Newton operates and it’s the reality the board, the planning department and homeowners will be living.
John Lojek was quoted as saying that the proposed moratorium would cost Newton $1.25 million in permit fees. That translates into $67 million of construction activity, most of which goes directly to contractors…GCs, electricians, plumbers, HVAC, landscape contractors, etc., many of whom live in Newton. And that $67 million does not include payments to the architects, engineers, or surveyors, or commissions to realtors, many of whom also live in Newton–which could be another $10 million? (Profits made by developers are also not in that number–not the big concern here, but just to be clear.) That is a lot of grocery and mortgage money for a lot of hard working people. I am in favor of zoning reform, but can’t we do it without putting that many people out of work?
Gail, the problem is even more complicated than that.
Right now we have just three single family and three multi-family residential zones. Yet, we have at least 13 distinct villages, and many more neighborhoods, all of which have their own unique history and character. What might work on a 10,000 square foot lot in one neighborhood may not work at all well in another one.
Preserving the “character of the neighborhood” is a very subjective standard. One person might reasonably conclude that every neighborhood in Newton should remain as a Levittown (an idealized suburban community that inspired Malvina Reynold’s song “Little Boxes”). Others might reasonably conclude that modest additions and renovations or replacements would be okay, so long as they are in keeping with the size, scale and design of other houses in the existing neighborhood (which is the criteria for granting a special permit to exceed the FAR). But someone has to determine whether a particular house satisfies that criteria (which is why I prefer a large house review ordinance). Still others might well conclude that a Walter Gropius house can coexist, side by side, with a Dutch Colonial despite the obvious fact that the Germans and the Dutch have not always gotten along. In the final analysis, it all comes down to a matter of taste.
Even the short term fixes Ald. Sangiolo refers to are not necessarily going to lead to better houses. There are some lovely two-family houses with entrances on the side that already exist, as well as some horrendous examples of the same thing. And even if we could come up with a definition that would prevent the worst abuses, it is only a matter of time before clever developers and builders find a way around those ordinances, in much the same way they have gotten around our definition of a “two family,” which was supposed to “fix” the problem of the so-calked linguine effect. #epicfail
Others have noted the effect that a moratorium would have on homeowner finances, but it would cost the city a lot of money as well. If, as reported by the assessor, the median value of a teardown rises by 2.7X from $700,000 to $1,900,000 after construction, the property taxes paid annually on each teardown rise by about $14,000. Multiply by 100 projects a year, and that’s $1.4m in annual property tax revenue that would be deferred by a year or more. That’s a significant fraction of the above-2.5%-cap revenue growth that’s already built into the 2015-2019 city budgets. It would have to be made up from somewhere.
In my opinion the proposed moratorium is too blunt an instrument, and we need to be much more specific about the problems and much more precise in our remedies.
What Ted says (I can’t believe I’m saying that).
Also:
While the impact of teardowns affects some neighborhoods more than others, what are we really talking about? With 32,000 households in Newton and 102 teardowns in 2014 that’s .003% of the housing stock. (Couldn’t find how many apartments there are to subtract them from the divisor). From 2006 to 2014 we’ve torn down less than .02%.
We’re in a hot real estate market for Newton at the moment and in a trasitional time demographically with many babyboomers ready to move on, but there is a limit to the market for multimillion dollar properties, even here.
So it is OK for the city to demolish two ranch house and a one story school building so it can build a three story mega school. No wonder developers feel it is OK to build four story housing units at both the St. Philip Neri and the Waban T sites along with the developments planned at Court Street and Rowe Street. And let’s not forget the five story project in Newtonville. It is OK for the city to have different rules than private sector businesses and city residents?
@Rhanna Kidwell: John Lojek also said it would result in the loss of an additional $1 million in “new growth” revenues over and above the 2.5% tax levy increase.
@Terry Malloy: FWIW, even a stopped clock is right twice a day. Once if it is a 24-hour clock.
@Ken Sinclair: Not only that, but it would prevent the City from demolishing those 3 houses we just bought for $2.415 million.
@Patrick: Is it right for a different set of rules to apply to the city than to the private sector and Newton residents? It depends on whom you ask.
“Is it right for a different set of rules to apply to the city than to the private sector and Newton residents?”
Come on now, the collective “we” versus the individual “us”? There’s a question about that?
@Hoss, please allow me to introduce you to the concept of sovereign immunity.
I’m getting flash-backs to the great William F Buckley Jr debates. A great use of free public airways. (Oh wait, is that another public advantage over private? Yes it is.)
Can I be Gore Vidal?
Ted, No joke. If you alderpeeps could organize a true Oxford-style debate about the “Alderman” nomenclature (for charity maybe), I think that would be a HUGELY entertaining debate. Think about it
@Amy, if the zoning overhaul is going to take several years — by your own admission — what is the point in a one-year moratorium? Or are you going to come back near the end of that year and ask to renew it?
No one discusses the impact on overbuilding on abutters and neighbors and a neighborhood. Newton Residents who
bought into specific neighborhoods because of size scale character or financial affordability have also invested a great deal in our community through taxes and civic participation also have Property rights. What about the loss of privacy, green space, burden on city services and the environment? The overbuilt out of scale home built next to me doesn’t ‘add’ value to my home. Let’s face it: it’s a land grab motivated by greed. Many of the overbuilt homes languish on the market on spec. The naturally affordable homes ( affordable in Newton’s market) sell quickly to first or second time buyers eager to live In our ‘Garden City’
I wonder how attractive these properties would be if the listing included the by line ” attractive affordable home for sale with soon to be constructed overbuilt abutting home that will block all your newly purchased green space, privacy, sunlight and quality of life?’ a moratorium is an opportunity to take a breath and have a time limited reasoned discussion with public input about what our community can or could be. It doesn’t preclude selling a home, adding on or renovation. If we wait for zoning reform or alternative docket items to take shape, get vetted and passes, Newton will no longer be the Garden City, an inclusive diverse community or one of the country’s best towns to live in. I certainly would never have the opportunity to buy into this community that I did 20 years ago.
Lisa — The problem is that the ultimate code changes will not give you the outcome you desire. Demand for new homes will still exist, then having been pent up for 12 months, and builders will give the market what they are looking to acquire. Apply a strict modern code to Newton’s 600 new homes built in the last ten years and see how many get eliminated if at the design phase. Even if it’s one-half of them, we know that a builder will just be creative and fit the same space on a reduced footprint. We also know it’s impossible to save 50 year old housing stock that were built for a different set of neighbors than those currently buying in Newton. Times change.
Lisa, it is about balancing the competing interests and property rights of all homeowners. Your “rights” end at your property line, but everyone has an interest in improving and enhancing our neighborhoods. A lot of work was done by citizens who volunteered to be on the FAR working group a couple of years ago to come up with a formula that allowed for reasonable expansion of homes, without crowding out neighbors. Previously, we had a 50% demolition rule which actually allowed far greater expansion to the limit of the setbacks and were not subejct to FAR at all, provided that at least 50% of the existing house was preserved. This led to some awful examples of overbuilding.
The problem, as I suggested above, is complex, in that we only have 6 residential zoning districts, with a corresponding set of FAR and dimensional restrictions, which apply citywide. But we have 13 villages and many other neighborhoods each with their own distinct character, and those very general zoning districts have disparate impacts.
But one thing is for sure: a demolition moratorium will hurt homeowners, homebuyers and everyone involved in housing construction, at a time when the economy is finally starting to revive after bottoming out in the past few years. Some of these people are likely your neighbors. Calling developers greedy glosses over the fact that they provide jobs to carpenters, electricians, plumbers, roofers, plasterers, architects, landscapers and any number of other people who are probably not able to afford to live in Newton unless they bought many years ago. Heck, I could not even afford to buy the house I have lived in for the last 18 years. While I am not unsympathetic to concerns about what gets built next door to you, I am also concerned about the people whose livelihoods depend on development and homeowners who have invested a lot in their greatest asset over the years, and deserve to get a fair return on their investment as well as folks who are paying $1 million for a ranch house and want to live in a house that is a little more expansive for their hard earned money.
I should note that abutters do have rights with respect to enforcement of zoning and building codes and the issuance of special permits, variances and comprehensive permits under Chapter 40B. Those rights, as well as the rights of property owners to pursue relief from the zoning code, are defined by statutes and the courts.
Ted and others, renovations provide work to carpenters, electricians, plumbers, roofers, plasterers, architects, and landscapers, too. One argument you I think, and others have made for teardowns is that renovation can be more expensive than building from scratch. So wouldn’t that mean more income for the building trades if they were renovating existing houses?
And I don’t think enforcement’s working all that well. Ask Lisa. And look at all the retaining wall problems.
Julia, I am not an economist, but the fact that demolition and new construction is cheaper than renovation or partial demolition and addition is all the more reason not to impose a demolition moratorium. If it is going to cost more to renovate, owners will demolish and do new construction. If they cannot tear down and replace, they simply won’t do it at all or will wait until they can (which is why so many developers wait out the one year delay rather than come back to the Historic Commission with plans to preserve the existing house). Granted, some people can afford to spend the extra money to preserve an existing house. But even if they can afford it, why would they do it if they can spend less or even the same amount and build their dream house?
@Mr. Welbourne: The impetus for the one-year moratorium is because of how long it will take the City by its own admission to complete Zoning Reform Phase 2 – which is envisioned to include be a village by village study. It is a comprehensive approach which I fully support but we were supposed to have started that a year ago. We are still in Phase 1. The City has suggested it could take at least 3 years to complete.
I am suggesting that we isolate 5 particular issues regarding by-right development and address those now. These can be incorporated into the big Phase 2 Zoning Reform but at least while we wait for that to be completed – we can have some comfort of knowing that the rebuilds from the demolition will be a little more in keeping with the streetscapes of the neighborhoods in which they are located. If the Administration would work with us on these topics NOW with a reasonable timeframe- there wouldn’t be a call for a moratorium.
Ald Sangiolo and/or Ald Hess Mahan, Who owns this process of zoning reform? If it’s not the Mayor, can’t we pass a resolve to make it the Mayor’s job to take charge? The purpose would be that the ultimate judgement on whether this gets done falls on just one person, and that one person has short number of years until next election. I know Newton has lots of expertise, but if we haven’t hired someone with national recognition to come up with a plan, the Mayor is the one that can allocate funds to do it.
To those who are happy to condemn Ranches. Are these the very same people who have concerns for the older generation, and unable to sell?
If nothing is done, and market pressure prevails what options will the older generation have when they want to downsize, where will they go?
Ranches are ideal for older people who do not want the burden of staircases. Is Family friendly Newton only going to be friendly to younger generations in the future I wonder?
Ah yes, the comprehensive plan phase 2 will fix this… If it has anything left to save !
The Mayor/planning department needs to get behind a short term zoning solution that would address the issues Amy is raising. Since he’s not doing that, I support a moratorium that is limited in time and scope that would a) force some straightforward amendments regarding size and scale of the replacement homes and b) set up a review board to streamline the granting of permits for inoffensive projects.
The point with a moratorium is to make it targeted towards solving a specific issue, to timebox it to one year with no extensions, and to identify the specific parameters that are to be addressed. During the moratorium people would still be able to buy and sell homes and do regular additions. Once the ordinance is amended, you hopefully will see more undesirable projects directed into the special permitting process where the city can have a little more control over what gets built.
Some of the changes needed immediately are not that complicated. This is a matter of forcing some short term changes while waiting for comprehensive reform. I don’t see why we can’t do it in a way that has minimal impact on the housing market, people’s lives and puts at least a temporary bandaid on the bleeding.
By the way, why is zoning reform taking so much longer than predicted by the city? We were supposed to be finishing it up next year and we haven’t even started it yet, really. Phase 1 is not zoning reform – it’s cleaning up and organizing the existing ordinance. I get that we are going to go village by village, but we haven’t even started that part of it.
Let’s put to bed the idea that a demolition moratorium will preserve affordable or moderately priced housing, even by Newton standards. It won’t. In my neighborhood, West Newton north of the Pike, two-families are being sold for $600,000 and converted to condos that sell for $600,000+ each, without any exterior demolition whatsoever. That means a loss of rental housing, and creation of units that middle class families looking for a starter home simply cannot afford. With a minimum 5% down payment, a couple would have to earn about $125,000 a year to afford one of these condos. In 2013, the median price for a single family house in Newton was $855,000. There is also a whole cottage industry of builders who buy single family homes in Newton for $600,000-900,000, gut the interior, renovate, upgrade to a gourmet kitchen, put in a state-of-the-art media room, add a couple full baths, build out the basement, and, voila, flip the house for over $1 million. Nuff said.
An FAR working group did an incredible amount of work coming up with a formula that reflected existing housing in each zoning district across the city. As I have previously noted, every village and neighborhood is different and the same FAR may not reflect existing housing in a particular village or neighborhood, where lot sizes, density and lot area per unit vary widely. And until the planning department does a thorough and comprehensive village by village study, there is no way to come up with a formula that will work just as well in Upper Falls and Nonantum as it does in Chestnut Hill and Waban. That is going to take time.
The real problem is design. Well designed houses do not have the negative impact that poorly designed houses have on neighborhoods, even though they are the same size. The so-called “easy” fixes are neither easy nor fixes. At best, they are blunt instruments, sort of like doing brain surgery with a chain saw. They will not guarantee good design and they will likely prevent homeowners from building houses that work well too.
So, I have co-docketed a proposed large house review with some of my colleagues, with the support of the planning department, which would require review and approval by the urban design committee of all residential structures over a certain size. The UDC includes professionals who are qualified to do design review and with appropriate design criteria can ensure that whatever gets built is going to fit better with existing houses in the neighborhood. It would not deprive homeowners of their right to build a house that is consistent with their needs and pocketbooks, while curbing the negative impact of poorly designed, oversize houses. The added benefit of design review is that the city will complement the planning department’s village by village study with individual case studies that will inform the process. While this is intended as an interim measure until zoning reform is complete, it could also become permanent if it works well.
Questions: Does the citizenry of Newton and our elected officials want to continue to provide and/or preserve opportunities for people at all income levels to purchase homes and live in our city? If so, are we limiting the ‘affordable’ properties, by whatever definition that is in Newton to condos and multi-unit residences or are single family homes still the goal? What is the priority: 1) employing construction workers, architects and contractors some of whom live in Newton (many do not) 2) preserving, creating and maintaining housing options (and yes I mean single family homes as well) for Newton’s teachers, public employees and business owners? IF BOTH, can something sensible be developed now to meet those goals?
If it is a moratorium, it is time limited with a specific purpose. If it is a large house review, when, how soon, how does it interface with the current FAR which by admission of nearly everyone does not work and is still responsible for overbuilding in many neighborhoods and villages? Zoning reform will not solve the current crisis as I see it all around me in Oak Hill. And to Simon’s point; ranches are ideal for people who may be downsizing and treasure small spaces or have mobility, limitations and need adaptable or barrier free housing. We can talk and argue until we are blue in the face about the crisis and potential solutions, but the moratorium is a good step with solid goals to effect some change and immediate review. Though different in some ways, it has worked well in Wellesley, Belmont and other communities…why not Newton?
As co-docketer of the Large House Review item, I agree that this is one of the tools that Newton should employ in terms of dealing with the problem of large houses. That’s why it was identified in the August presentation I made before the Zoning and Planning Committee as a tool our neighboring community had employed to control development.
Ted’s last post makes a point that I think needs more attention. He states the Large House Review item has the support of the Planning Department. We – the Zoning and Planning Committee and the Board – seem to be stuck because the Planning Department has been unwilling to address many of the issues we’ve identified in the moratorium proposal and independently as docket items on the agenda – preferring instead to address them under Zoning Reform Phase 2. Even our esteemed folks who served on the FAR working group had suggested problems and issues that needed to be addressed 2 years ago with the FAR regulations they had recommended. That too, under the recommendation of the Planning Department – has been referred to Zoning Reform Phase 2.
Folks – what is driving the move for a moratorium is the lack of leadership in addressing zoning – particularly by-right zoning regulations. When residents walk down Auburn Street or Watertown Street and see a new build – where the side of the house is facing the street, where the back of the new house abuts the side of it’s neighboring house, where rear setbacks are now side-setbacks – when these residents ask how could this be allowed – the answer is it’s allowed in our zoning ordinances and we have not been able to address these because they’ve been kicked into a Zoning Reform Phase 2 process which is already 2 years behind schedule, has not even begun and is anticipated to take 3 years to complete.
Is that acceptable? And how many more of these types of developments will take place while we wait at least 3 years for Zoning Reform to be implemented. Demolitions are on the rise and with these demolitions are new builds where the existing zoning regulations allow for the type of development – that can truly negatively impact the character of the streetscape and the neighborhood.
Changes need to be made now – within a finite time period (shorter than 3 years!) while we wait for the Comprehensive Zoning Reform process to take place.
@Lisa, Wellesley and Belmont have the same issue with soaring housing costs that Newton has, as do other towns that have adopted a large house review ordinance. In Newton, you need to earn over $200,000 a year to afford the median price single family home, while the median household income in Newton is around $110,000. Unless housing prices collapse, as they have in Detroit and other cities around the country that are in dire economic straits, that situation is not going to change.
In response to soaring housing costs and population growth, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh of Boston just announced that it will cost $21 Billion in public and private development over the next 20 years to create 53,000 units of housing for low and middle income households. That is “Billion” with a “B”. Most of the units of affordable housing we can build in Newton over that same period is most likely going to be privately developed through 40B.
@Amy, I share your frustration.
It sounds to me like the planning department has been letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. Or they just got fascinated with alphabetizing their record collection (i.e. phase 1).
We need a bunch of new rule changes to address the problems Amy is rightfully focusing on. Sure, piecemeal changes will not address the whole problem. But guess what, if you ban snout houses, there won’t be any more snout houses built. That solved that problem. Move on to the next problem…
It’s great to explain why one reform or another won’t solve all of our problems. We can solve some of the problems sooner rather than later. Nothing is happening. We need to wake up and *do something*.
Thanks to Amy for putting the moratorium idea at the center of the stage. Ted, you should support it if for no other reason than to spur action. It doesn’t have to result in bring us to a zoning paradise. It has to push the administration into supporting short term action on zoning amendments that will make some significant improvements in stopping the most egregious buildings from going up.
Now.
I agree with Amy, especially about the urgency to act now. However, 40B is not the solution. It is a very limited view on ‘new housing’ and of what ‘affordable’ housing is. Listen to some of the comments made by proposed 40B developers and members of our ZBA about what they perceive the needs and desires of the targeted populace for affordable housing are. Specifically ‘those’ lucky enough to get one of the affordable units. It’s elitist, presumptuous and uninformed. This is not a simple situation but it needs comprehensive vision and prompt action and our planning department is not aiding the case for either. I hope we can all work together for a comprehensive solution to this issue. Thank you for the perspective and energy to improve the situation for all citizens of Newton and those wishing to be a part of our city.
Ted.
You mention to own a single family home in Newton you need to earn 200k. Yet the median is 110k.
So I’m intrigued about the stats. Are you saying people who have lived in Newton for years are ok, that they purchased or inherited at the right time?
The reason we have so many tears downs replaced with over sized homes is that it would seem affluent (or people are in over their heads) are buying them.
It is one thing to mention market pressure, but what are our Long Range Plans, after all Newton does (or did) have a long term planner? Is there any public documentation on what the long range plan is?
And on stats and 40B.. Tear down a couple of houses. Replace them with 2 affordable, 8 not so. How many 40B’s will it take?
For the last 15 years I have been involved in creating and/or advocating for the development of affordable housing in Newton. There is not enough space here to explain how the economics work, but affordable (i.e., below market rate) housing requires subsidies in the form of public funding, tax incentives, and relief from zoning or some combination of all of these. It ain’t easy.
People are always asking why 40B developers don’t just create fewer units that are all affordable instead of 75% market rate units with only 25% affordable. Briefly, because it is not economically feasible. Once you take the costs of buying land, add construction costs, permitting fees, etc., the profit margin is laser thin.
For example, a developer buys a single family home for the median price of $855,000 in Newton. Using HUD regulations, a moderate income family earning 80% of the area median income for a family of four ($67,750) can only afford a home that costs around $295,000 (assuming a 5% down payment with 4% annual interest, and spending 36% of income on housing, excluding private mortgage insurance and other costs).
Under 40B, in order to make that $855,000 house affordable to families making a moderate income, the developer would have to add units and sell them at market rate just to make at least one of the units affordable and make a profit (which is limited to 15% under 40B regulations). The number of market rate units would depend on construction and other development costs, which, in Newton, are higher than elsewhere. And it only gets harder when you try to build units that are affordable for families making a low (50% AMI) and very low (30% AMI) household income.
What drives the high prices in Newton are the exact same reasons people want to live here: good schools, close proximity to high paying jobs, educational institutions, arts, sports, etc., very low crime, parks, playgrounds, a great library, etc. Demand for all of those is high, so the price is high.
This is a highly over-simplified explanation, but I hope it makes the point.
Hi Ted,
Thank you for sharing so succintly this information on 40B. A quick look on wikipedia and it seems 40B was introduced in 1969. I wonder what the original architects of 40B would think of tearing down an 800k+ property in the name of affordable housing. I doubt you could replace it with 5 affordable units. The economics must have been a lot different then.
Some further googling around and stats from a couple of years ago say an astonishing 35% of building is done under 40B, yet only 1% is returned back as affordable house. Back in 2009 proponents of 40B raised over $1m to keep it that way. 40B is obviously big business..
I think many great points are described here. I just don’t understand how a moratorium “forces” the Planning Department and whatever else department, to take these needed changes out of Phase Two and handle them one by one to get the process started. I agree that making some good decisions now, instead of waiting for the “perfect” wide ranging ones, is what is necessary. (Is there a “perfect” solution? Probably not.) Trying to force a government to do the right thing by doing something nobody wants to happen, hasn’t worked in the past.
Simon, here is a recent fact sheet from Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association (CHAPA) which sets out accurate statistics on the impact of Chapter 40B.
There is a big difference between publicly subsidized and privately financed 40B developments.
Private developers can use 40B if at least 25% of the units are affordable to low to moderate income households. Without using public subsidies, private developers use the profits from the market rate units to subsidize the construction of the affordable units. Under 40B, their profits are limited to no more than 15% on a project (many developers make far less).
On Lexington Street in Auburndale, using public subsidies and Chapter 40B, SEB LLC was able to build 10 homeownership units that are affordable to low to moderate income families by buying a ranch house which was demolished to make way for housing. SEB purchased the ranch house for $715,000 in 2010. Each of those ten units sold for between $163,000 to $278,000 in 2011.
@Marti, it wouldn’t “force” them, but it would be a great incentive to act on those discrete items, because if those items were addressed, the moratorium would end early. These are docket items which has been sitting around for years, some of them. Waiting for nature and Planning to take their course isn’t getting them done. Keep in mind that other communities all around the country as well as most recently in Belmont have used moratoria to address zoning issues, and all those communities probably had people who wanted to sell houses. It’s not some bizarre alien un-American concept.
@Marti: I am always open to suggestions.
“Trying to force a government to do the right thing by doing something nobody wants to happen, hasn’t worked in the past.”
If the BOA enacted a moratorium – appropriately limited in time and scope – then the administration would be under pressure to address a small set of specific issues. If that’s in effect, the mayor can’t ignore it – he’d be defying the BOA trying to fix a problem that most people agree is a problem. Saying that it’s not going fix every zoning issue we have isn’t a sufficient response.
Currently they’re response has been a) give us time to rewrite the whole thing, which will take years, and b) the problem isn’t that bad: don’t think about losing over 100 homes/yr, think of it as only .5% of our housing stock. So give us 5 or so years and see what we come up with.
I’m all for comprehensive reform (still would like to know why it’s dragging on so long) but we need to fix a few of the most obvious things sooner rather than later if we can.
So basically publicly funded 40Bs are great. The city gets a lot of say as its funding it? Looks like a great postcard for SEB and 40B.
Private ones not so great. The more recent Court St 36 unit 40B project doesn’t seem all that friendly. Just 9 of those units will be affordable.T he board made multiple requests for the proposal to be smaller, and in this case SEB told them he would see them in court if they refused to bend to to his will. That said is does appear SEB did compromise a little – he made the affordable units smaller!
Yes, and of course smaller units are really what’s needed for those that are adaptable or designed with universal access in mind???? More space is needed for anyone with a mobility limitation, not less! ..SEB doesn’t want to get it. Smaller is more convenient for profit margin and 15% isn’t too bad when you are ‘helping’ the public. FYI: Oak Hill Park was the FIRST, public/private housing partnership in the United States that was designed to provide affordable housing for returning WWII GI’s. I wonder how many of our returning GI’s today could afford a house in Oak Hill Park when this is the land of the teardown and overbuild lot line to lot line on every corner???
@Lisa brings up an important era in Newton’s history – when the City took a proactive role in creating affordable housing. I have posted some documents here – a brochure describing the new Oak Hill Park homes and a history of the development.
Also posted there is a powerpoint offering the data discussed in a recent Newton Tab article by Senior Services Director Jayne Colino – bottom line Newton residents are getting older, but the vast majority would prefer to “age in place.”
Figuring out how to achieve affordable housing in a community next to Boston with a strong school system is no easy task. I think easing restrictions on accessory apartments will be part of the equation. I also think the City should look at the model that worked so successfully 70 years ago. Alderman Jim Cote has been leading an effort to explore this idea, and he spearheaded a meeting with the Newton Housing Authority a couple weeks ago to get the discussion started.
Thank you Emily. I’m happy to work on exploring these ideas. It takes creativity and out of the box thinking to address these issues, especially the ones you raise. I’ll be in touch. Thanks again
I heard an intriguing suggestion from a Newton citizen the other day…she suggested that we explore the idea of converting several apartment rental buildings that already exist to 40B status, with 20-25% affordable units. That could be achieved by the City’s offering the present owners of the buildings a tax incentive along with funding from CDBG or CPA sources to relieve that owner’s new burden. In that way, we would not be forced to accept higher density developments, but could use already functioning units. The affordable units could be achieved through attrition, as present tenants vacate and a proportional assignment of the total units could be applied to a Housing Production Plan as tenants occupy the affordable units. Maybe the Newton Housing Authority could be helpful with support system advice to the new tenants. The more I think about it, the more brilliant I think the idea is! It might make the developers angry, because we could reach the 10% rapidly, but then they could turn to reasonable development within whatever zoning guidelines are finally developed and the developer’s Sword of Damocles, aka 40B, over our heads, would be shattered.
Even if the 40B rules allowed this, I don’t see how gradually adding affordable units through attrition allows us to rapidly reach our 10 percent requirements.
Brilliant idea
That’s an interesting idea. We have around 32,000 units in the city and of those about 2,400 are affordable. So we need roughly 800 more units to get to 10%. Is it realistic to think we could get that many units converted to affordable any time soon?
I think we could speak with rental realtors and ask what the turnover rate for units is in this City. It certainly is thinking outside the box and although I wish it were my idea…it was suggested to me! I think it very worthwhile and hope Planning will take it up for study. Even if not fast, it could definitely help!
What an intriguing idea. Certainly seems worth exploring even if it doesn’t add units quickly and it would be a good way to create housing that isn’t smaller than other units in the complex like some developers do with 40B’s.
Here’s how I imagine the idea could be approached: Assume that there is a 100 unit rental building that already exists (Is there such an animal…I don’t know). Then, under this plan, as 20-25 new units become available to the market, they become “affordable units”. If, in year one, 5 units were converted, then (given my understanding of rental units developed under 40B), with 5/25 units toward goal, 20 market rental units plus the 5 converted rentals could count toward the Housing Production Plan. That would increase the count toward our 10% goal by 25/800 with a small investment (someone do the finance calculations, please) and not confuse increasing our housing density with increasing affordable living! As to size…I don’t think the units have to be big or small. The market rental rate today for the available unit would determine the level that would need to be reached for the building owner to be made whole. The City would come up with the difference…either with CPA, CDBG, tax reductions, or other monies. In fact, since this is a State demanded regulation, perhaps State monies could be drawn in! Developers would then be able to develop what our zoning codes allow, with plenty of input from the City and the citizens and zoning relief for them would become unnecessary!
@Sallee:
Let’s pretend that the 40B rules allowed this and that you are the owner of this apartment building. It’s your only investment and you’re depending on the income to put your six grandchildren through college.
You take 25 units and rent them at “affordable” rents and the city pays you the difference through CDBG or some other source. (Oh and by the way one of your model tenants of two decades, the Jones family in unit 4B, are really mad that they pay $900 more a month for their unit than the new family in unit 3B pays for their identical apartment. Heck, maybe they even get up and move to Marti’s apartment building where they qualify for 40B rates and you have to find yet another tenant. But, oh well. It’s a win-win for you and those of us who don’t want that big new project down the street. You’re now collecting subsidies for 26 “affordable” units!)
But then — just as grandchild number one gets accepted to Stanford- along come President Rick Perry and the Republican House/Senate kill the CDBG or similar program. The city says “Sorry Sallee, no more subsidy.” Will you be allowed to now charge the tenants in your 26 units market rate? Can you evict them? Or is that grandchild now taking the T every morning Bunker Hill?
Sounds interesting, Sallee. And I didn’t mean it would matter what size units might become available. I was just referencing Simon’s (and others) information that developers can meet affordable housing requirements in 40B’s by making the sq footage of those units smaller than the sq footage of similar market rate units. (Studio, 1 BR, 2 BR +)
Converting existing apartments to 40B affordable would make getting to 10% fast in at least one important way: we’d be adding units to the numerator without adding to the denominator. (In addition to not adding to traffic congestions, etc.)
Yes Julia but my point is converting apartments to 40B and subsidizing property owners doesn’t work unless you have a permanent revenue source to keep paying that subsidy.
Oh and Hoss’ point is a good one too.
Faster. (Gotta proofread.)
Seems to me the economics of what Sallee is describing would need to be very attractive. If it is, that reduces the supply of plain vanilla apartments which equals increased rents in Newton. Still ok?
To meet the requirements of the HPP, I believe we would need to be creating 162 affordable units each calendar year (0.5% of the 32,000 units in the city). Last year we created 2 units. So I don’t think Newton is in any position to be meeting the HPP requirements or the 10% any time soon.
It is easy to poke holes in any new idea. The much more fun and interesting work is to set the end goal then figure out how to get there. Our current laws and regulations were written by humans, they can be amended by humans as well. I like Sallee’s idea and think it’s worth exploring.
Not my idea…just my mouth! But I also think it’s worth vetting. @Greg: Who pays for the lower rental in a new 40B? Ans: The 75% market rental units! So how is this different? The advantage is that the total number of housing units doesn’t explode. Density isn’t the only answer. Keep the denominator constant and maybe the 40B goal of 10% affordable housing could someday be achieved.
@Sallee @Emily
I think this is an excellent concept. It should certainly be investigated. Surely other districts have done something similar. Surely they must talk to one another and shares ideas?
To be quite honest any action vs anything of short term consequence sounds good to me right now.
Even if it mean a slight rise in taxes I would be delighted!
Its no surprise than our planning dept are quick to mention than a Moratorium would not affect 40B. We need somebody more controversial than conventional to lead us out of this mess.
@Emily – I agree we should explore the idea. I just want to be mindful of how many units we need to produce either annually or in total in order to get the 40B albatross off our necks. I’ve heard the planning department say they see no realistic way to get there. I’d love to hear their response to this idea.
Sallee — I think the concept of the 40b model is that developers are encouraged financially to include units officially dedicated to those that qualify for rent subsidy. There’s no extra cost (premium) baked into the at-market rents. Reducing rental opportunities does generate a premium.
It’s interesting you got some commenters that want to artificially preserve old “moderately” priced older homes liking a concept that artificially attrits at-market rental units. It’s like the girl on the 1970s Zoom show that would say things like, “I love summer, but I hate warmer weather”.
I’m all for creative brainstorming but — pretending that this is even allowed under 40B — this one starts with a concept that should be a non-starter.
I’m surprised that only Hoss appears to see that.
The idea here, if I understand it correctly, would be to take existing apartments and convert them to “affordable,” which means lowering the rents tenants will pay to a price that meets 40B standards.
Since I’m guessing we wouldn’t be converting luxury apartments, it’s safe to assume we are talking moderately priced market rate units off the market. But we need more, not fewer, moderately rate housing options in Newton. This idea would, by definition, widen the gap between the haves and have nots here. Why would we as a community want to do that? (Except that it solves/addresses individual NYMBY issues. Handy, but very bad public policy.)
I also worry about the basic economic model here, which assumes that current property owners will be charging under market rate for their apartments and presumably get a government subsidy to cover their loss. But what happens if/when that funding runs out? Evictions? Tax increases? Bus fees? We already have enough unfunded liabilities in Newton, do we really want to add another?
Better if we used that subsidy pool to build new affordable housing. Better if we used our creative energy finding a way to build affordable housing so we meet our 10 percent and no longer have to be held hostage to unwelcomed developments.
OK: …we need to convert 200 units (200/800) to get the number targeted for affordable housing. Let the developers build other market rate housing instead of 40B. Let them follow the rules, not get special treatment.
Hoss:If it gets too hot in summer, I go into the air conditioned rooms!
Let’s really think through this one.
Thank you Sallee for putting forth something that deserves to be heard and debated, openly and honestly. We are in a real pickle over this 40B requirement and I think it’s it’s important to consider any proposal and refine or dismiss it if necessary, but not arbitrarily and certainly not in a blog post. I’m anything but a fan of Herbert Spencer who was an outspoken advocate for Darwinian “survival of the fittest” Capitalism in the 19th century; but he said a few sensible things, one of which those in authority should ponder with at least a modicum of humility before arbitrarily dismissing anything that isn’t proposed by some high powered (and high charging) consultant.
“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance–that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”
All Newton voters (with the exception of Ward 1, Precincts 1 and 4) will have an additional two non-binding ballot questions to elect on November 4:
QUESTION 5
Shall the state representative from this district be instructed to vote for legislation to require that a majority of the voters in a municipality approve the sale of any municipally owned real estate containing more than 7,500 square feet of land?
QUESTION 6
Shall the state representative from this district be instructed to vote for legislation that would allow local elected officials, in communities that have taken steps to promote affordable housing at a local level, to have binding input regarding density, required parking, and other project characteristics to the extent that those changes would help to protect existing neighborhoods and businesses from negative impacts on infrastructure and public services, when a local zoning board of appeals is deciding whether to approve an application for a comprehensive permit to build affordable housing in that locality under Chapter 40B of the General Laws?
Greg Reibman — This 40b stuff being very complex; I’m not sure that your thought that 40b “means lowering the rents tenants will pay”. Having happily and appreciatively rented at Section 8 level units, the experience at that level has been that a good negotiator gets EXACTLY market for subsided space. If that’s not the case with 40b like units, there’s something broke.
Put that on the table, too, Greg. The important thing is that we start talking about these issues early and openly.
@Bob: Totally agree. What you are talking about is called creating a proactive housing production plan for affordable housing.
And here’s a proactive idea to put on the table:
Let’s look around the city for locations where we should be building affordable housing and then encourage developers to partner with the city and create friendly 40Bs.
For example, do we have any underused municipal parking lots that could accommodate housing, while also leaving some parking spaces to meet the prior need? The ideal location would also have public transpiration and shopping nearby (i.e. a grocery store across the street, a pharmacy around the corner, restaurants, etc.) which would held reduce traffic. Ah, if only. If only.
@Greg. Could that location possibly be in Newtonville?
On the issue of overcrowding which has been brought up often, can someone explain why Newton’s population declined from 92,000 in 1960 to about 85,000 today (down 7.5%) while Massachusetts population increased by 27% during this period? Is this solely because we’ve attracted richer families who have few kids?
@Hoss. That’s a big part of it. There were only two kids in our family, but just about everyone else I grew up with came from families with 4 or more.
Hoss, I think in addition to your observation, many people in Newton have grown older and their grown children don’t live here anymore.
Greg, I see your point and realize the flaws in the idea. It’s like all the great theories we had in college that sounded brilliant until applied to the real world. We certainly don’t want to loose any moderately priced housing; it’s leaving on its own soon enough.
What is happening with said parcel of land, anyone? Talk of Zervas seems to have pushed it aside.
I also hope the ideas and plans for affordable housing keep coming.
@Marti
Pushing a ton of bricks uphill takes great force and commitment.
So why is the school population up?
Sallee — I think I’m seeing in Table 4 (p.12) of the attached link that enrollment in 1967 was 18,484 (1960 not there) and declined to 12,170 in 2012. The is a theoretical loss of 6,000+ residents (children). (Theoretical since it does not incorporate kids in private schools and out of town kids in Newton) That pretty much fills the population loss gap that I was trying to understand. Just think of the line at JP Licks if we didn’t lose all them kids!
http://tinyurl.com/studentdecline
When I moved to Newton initially in 1987 I recall that the population then was 73,000. Anyone know why it fell that low? And why it then increased to 85,000 since then?
@Marie: Interpolating from Wikipedia, the population of Newton in 1987 was around 82,000.
@Hoss and Sallee: The trends over time are pretty interesting:
In 1967 Newton’s school enrollment was 18,400 and our population was 92,000. A full 20% of our population was enrolled in our public schools.
In 1988 9,100 enrolled students represented 11% of our city population of 82,000.
And today, 12,600 enrolled students represent about 15% of our city population of 85,000. What is noteworthy about the numbers today relative to 1988 is that our city population has grown by 4% while our student population has grown by nearly 40% over the same timespan.
The general narrative that we understand is of broad demographic shifts, largely associated with the post WWII baby boom. By 1967 our school population peaked with the children of returning veterans and declined from there. By 1988 these baby boomers were long gone from Newton schools but their parents had only just started selling their family homes and downsizing. As they sold, young families moved in drawn by proximity to Boston along with high quality schools. The baby-boom baby-boom has caused our school-aged population to rise again relative to the overall population but it seems to be peaking. A surge of recent construction and associated new-family move-ins (the subject of this thread) may be keeping our school populations from declining just yet.
My own story may be representative – I was born the last of three children in 1959 to a post-WWII couple. This is considered the tail end of the boom. I finished high school in 1977. In 1989 my wife and I bought a Newton house from a family in which the last of three kids had recently finished NPS. We had our first child in 1996 and our last child will leave NPS in 2017. We are slightly behind the timelines of many of my Newton friends who have otherwise similar family stories.
Very interesting. I was just trying to test the increased density assumption to understand if Newton might have already been where there is concern.
If we can bring one thing back from the 1960s and nothing else, I vote for Saturday morning cartoons and Sunday morning funny pages.
I’d vote for the Smothers Brothers.
Hey Greg, if instead of throwing cold water on Sallee’s suggestion about converting existing units, you had merely Googled “can existing housing be converted to 40B” like I just did, you wouldn’t be saying “even if the 40B rules allowed this.” They do. Other cities and towns have been looking into just that as one way to meet 40B goals. One of the top search results was Walpole: http://www.walpole-ma.gov/sites/walpolema/files/file/file/walpoleunitconversion.pdf
That was from 2009, so I searched past year and here’s a couple more. Deerfield: http://www.deerfieldma.us/Pages/Deerfieldma_Planning/HPP_ExecutiveSummary_FINAL.pdf
and Everett:
http://www.ci.everett.ma.us/Everett_files/planning/everett_visioningmtg_recap_may22%5B.pdf
Interestingly, all of three of these have, or are working on, Housing Production Plans. If they can do it, why not Newton?
Maybe, Greg, you are being misinformed by your developer friends who would rather we not meet the 10% goal, so they can keep using the implicit or explicit threat of a 40B to intimidate abutters from objecting to mega- Special Permit developments.
Hi Julia: I’m not sure which “friends” you are referring to but I personally want Newton to meet our ten percent goal both because (a.) I don’t like to be held hostage to developments we don’t want and (b) because I believe we should do all we can to make our city affordable to a diversity of residents. Ten percent “affordable” seems like a reasonable goal and we should all work together to achieve it.
I’m not very familiar with Deerfield but I used to publish the newspaper in Walpole and know a little about Everett. I don’t think our circumstances are very similar. But that’s besides the point because this feels wrong for Newton. Again, my concern with this proposed solution is that it appears it would take moderately priced housing away, which I doubt you want to see happen either.
Oh and the suggestion that I’m throwing “cold water” on the idea seems odd. This isn’t a tea party, it’s a blog. Someone presents an idea, we discuss it. Given that we’re at something of a crisis stage in terms of pending 40B’s, I don’t believe we should take two years for our aldermen or planning department to ponder ideas that fundamentally wrong in the first place.
@Gregg.
As I am a new comer to this debate, maybe you could enlighten me on your thoughts about what you believe the city is doing to address the 40B issue?
@Greg – only wondering whether sometimes your views are affected by your day job! And presuming that at least some builders are members of the NNCofC. But maybe that’s not their thing?
I agree that losing moderately priced housing in the middle is a concern, but in this context, we’re talking about 25% of units in an apartment building becoming more affordable. In the case of teardowns, pretty much 100% of those houses are replaced by less affordable ones, and correct me if I’m wrong, but you don’t seem very concerned about the loss of moderately priced housing in that context.
@Julia: In my day job at the Newton-Needham Chamber, I’m far more focused on commercial development and attracting and keeping businesses here than on residential projects. (Doesn’t mean both aren’t important to me as a citizen, I was just answering your question.)
But the two things companies repeatedly cite as impediments to being located here are infrastructure (roads, traffic, mass transit, bike lanes, etc.) and attracting employees, which depends to a degree, on workforce housing.
That why I look favorably upon the Austin Street and Wells Ave projects; both offer housing opportunities for folks who don’t necessarily want a house with a garage and a yard. And that’s also why I worry about converting moderately priced apartments to “affordable” when in fact we need more of both.
Greg is correct that Deerfield, Everett and Walpole are very different communities from Newton in the context of housing costs. According to the 2010 census, median priced owner-occupied housing units in Everett ($323,000) and Walpole ($357,000) cost around half of Newton’s ($687,300). (Deerfield’s data was not available.) The Deerfield HPP states the 2013 median single-family home is $250,000 compared to $844,000 in Newton. The HUD area median income for all three communities, however, is the same or similar to the AMI used to measure affordability in Newton. To obtain the requisite affordability deed restrictions on converted units so that they can be included in the subsidized housing inventory (SHI) which determines whether a community has reached its 10% threshold under Chapter 40B, the amount of subsidies needed to convert affordable units is therefore far less in those three communities than it would be in Newton.
It should also be noted that having a Housing Production Plan (HPP) is not the same as successfully implementing it. As of 2014, the subsidized housing inventory for Newton is at 7.5%; Everett has 7.9%, Walpole has 5.2% and Deerfield has just 1.5%. Moreover, some of the methods for achieving the goals in the HPPs include allowing greater density and more multi-family units through zoning reform, which is somewhat antithetical to the stated goals of the moratorium on demolitions in Newton.
It is not as if Newton’s planning department and non-profit housing developers in Newton have not been thinking about every way possible to create more affordable units in Newton, and are just sitting on their hands. While I appreciate “outside of the box” thinking on promoting housing affordability in Newton, it needs to be tempered with reality-based analysis of the challenges. And the primary challenges are the high costs of real estate and construction. Which is why Chapter 40B, which allows developers to circumvent zoning restrictions on density, is such an attractive strategy for creating affordable units.
If Newton were to implement a one-year demolition moratorium, would it even affect 40B developments? They seem to be immune to other zoning restrictions.
And with the Historic Commission inclined to hand out 12-month demolition delays, what practical difference will the moratorium make? Would the moratorium be tacked on to any to developments already in the demolition delay period?
@Greg, you say that companies want “housing opportunities for folks who don’t necessarily want a house with a garage and a yard” yet at the forum you moderated at TripAdvisor last spring, when asked what co’s would need in order to be attracted to Newton, not one of your panelists brought up housing. Then when *you* suggested it, one of them responded with “well you can’t really create much more housing in Newton, it’s so built up”. Then there was the Globe article a couple months back that said young tech workers want to live in urban environments near other young people, then when they have marry & have kids they want the suburban house/yard. If I can find the links to the forum and the Globe piece I’ll post it later.
Emily, you said “@Greg, you say that companies want “housing opportunities for folks who don’t necessarily want a house with a garage and a yard”’
Greg didn’t connect “workforce housing” with “housing opportunities for folks who don’t necessarily want a house with a garage and a yard.” I don’t know if companies say they need workforce housing, but there are many young people who want housing without a yard, etc. It may be until they have kids, but if so, they would move. Many adults in their 20’s and 30’s aren’t envisioning the long term commitment to jobs or housing that their parents did. In addition, many older downsizers are attracted especially to the “no yard” part.
Julia, the HPPs linked also loosen zoning to include residential in commercial, to allow accessory apartments, to allow multi family units in single family, etc. Creating an HPP also means the city would have to assess good places to build affordable housing. With the uproar over building an elementary school and building a mixed use building in a parking lot, it seems almost impossible for the citizens of this city to decide anything without looking for conspiracies, governmental or otherwise and slinging insults. I’m really not sure it could be done.
Emily/Julia:
New ideas are always great to hear. But we also have to come at them with some degree of knowledge and skepticism, and in my view that is where blogs add some value (both in the forum for the new idea as well as the forum for rebuttal). Blaming the commentator for stating potential issues about said new idea does nothing to convince others that said new idea is workable. A bad “take” on that new idea would be a simple “that idea doesn’t work” with no back-up. Ted/Greg have generally provided such back-up, which in my limited experience on this issue is correct.
I see no “easy” way for us to get to that magic 10% number dictated by 40B. I believe in affordable housing in Newton, especially moderate affordable housing. But low income housing tax credit projects won’t work well here for too many reasons to discuss in this limited post. But considering acquisition costs, building costs, and limited locations, Newton is just a very tough place to build substantially more affordable housing, and some of our affordable units will be repurposed over the next 10 years.
So as I see it, we are in a bit of a bind. 40B is here to stay, it just survived a referendum. So with that, we either put up with the difficulty of building substantially more affordable housing (some of which is likely to have to be on those 40B lots so many folks are complaining about right now), or we put up with the difficulty of having 40Bs in our community and giving up some local control.
Frankly, no one “loves” 40B, but in a flawed world it at least attempts to deal with the issues around affordable housing, and it doesn’t let wealthier communities off the hook.
So in terms of the idea itself, the key fact as Ted pointed out is that the communities who are repurposing these units have vastly different cost structures in place. In fact, in many of those communities the “market-rate” rental rates are extremely close to the “affordable” rental rate. So the amount of needed subsidy to convert a market rate unit to an affordable unit is much less. The amount of subsidy to convert those units in Newton is so huge that I can’t see a source on the federal or state level, and even if one was found for a year or ten, it wouldn’t be sustainable.
I’ll also point out that folks wanting to get to the 10% level seem to have selective memories. Doesn’t anyone remember Engine 6? Effectively half of our fair city isn’t going to accept any significantly sized affordable housing project near their homes (I’m looking at you Waban/Chestnut Hill for instance). Newtonville and Nonantum and Newton Corner already have a lot of affordable housing, enough to get those communities taken alone to 10% I’m sure. I somehow doubt that the various villages in the interest of fairness would be willing to mandate that each VILLAGE get to 10%, right? Ask yourself how that will go over in our fair community. Most folks seem to not like 40B, but if you quantify the new affordable units that don’t like the impacts there either (traffic/schools/expense/NIMBY)
As for the individual 40B projects, the traffic impacts generally are much less than predicted. My gut tells me in Newton that the school impacts would be worse.
Finally, can we quit with the “Greg’s job makes all of his takes suspect”? Didn’t he set up the blog? Does he keep his job a secret? Doesn’t he usually tell us when his job has influenced his opinion? Every so often someone gets frustrated with the logic of a greg post and uses that as a crutch. When even someone like Julia does it (whose posts are usually great) I get worried that the meme is taking hold…
And Emily, just because a roundtable discussion at TripAdvisor didn’t mention housing doesn’t make it less important. Transit oriented development and housing is a huge issue for business relocation. I certainly considered it when moving, as did my place of business. Not sure you made much sense there, except to try and prove a point with a very limited subset of data.
It was just an observation @Fig. When pressed on what they would want to see a community offer them in order to get them to relocate their businesses to the N2 Corridor, none of them said housing.
I agree w Ald Norton. If anyone planning on working in Newton is inquiring about housing it’s only because they have to pack two meals to get to the office on 128 or the MBTA. Boston had little desirable housing in the growth years yet the market made up for it w a sexy address and above market incomes to compensate for the commute. Newton is nice, not sexy
I disagree. I think most companies have just assumed that Newton has so little affordable and moderate income housing that it isn’t worth putting it on a spoken priority list at such an event. This is a longer term item. And we are somewhat bailed out by our neighboring communities I guess.
As we’ve all discussed before, this really is a matter of what you want Newton to be. I moved here for many reasons, but one of the main ones was that there was some degree of economic diversity. I don’t think I would have “fit in” in Wellesley/Weston type areas. To some, I think if our housing stock/prices became like Weston, they would think it a huge improvement (I’m not sure our lot sizes would allow for that with any type of grace or style, but hey, nothing is perfect). To me, I’d start to look to move.
That said, I recognize the frustration many feel with 40B. It isn’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination.
What Fig said.
If we really want to be a diverse city we need a diversity of housing. That not only includes price point (although that’s obviously the most important) but housing that appeals to different demographics. Not everyone wants a yard and a garage. Not everyone wants to drive to work. We offer many good reasons to live here, even if you don’t have kids, including great restaurants, shopping and open space.
@Hoss you are using your filter for what you think someone working here (or considers “sexy”) wants based on your own demographic/experience. That’s not always the case.
Greg, a developer in Allston was so confident he could sign tenants who wanted to live car-free that he included a clause in their leases to that effect. We should have a diversity of options like that in Newton, especially near transit connections like at Austin Street. It promotes economic vibrancy without the vehicle congestion.
http://www.bostonglobe.com/editorials/2013/03/30/architect-sebastian-mariscal-dilemma-shows-boston-future-people-not-parking/HLHzHe1GaiycDe6jI09EmJ/story.html
@Fignewtonville, I’m not blaming Greg for stating issues. I absolutely think financial viability is a valid issue (although not one that can be resolved on the blog). I just don’t see how suggesting that the idea Sallee described may not even be permitted — when it’s so easy to determine that it is — advances the debate. Especially when Sallee is a relatively new contributor who may not be as used to the rough-and-tumble of blog debate as the rest of us are. (Although she probably is now.)
Nathan, it’s nice to have you back in town. Your car-free living vision is a nice ideal, but I fear it is impractical for most people and families. Public transit just doesn’t go to enough places. One half of a couple may have a job reachable by public transit, but what are the odds both will? People work night shifts. People may have to carry stuff, as Jane pointed out on the Zervas thread. Some people’s jobs require driving during the work day, not just getting to and from work. If you locate based on a public transit commute, and you lose your job, or change jobs, or the company relocates, do you move?
I had the misfortune lat week to have to drive from Agganis Arena (photographing the best American hockey prospect ever, I was told!) back to the Lowell Sun at slightly before peak rush hour. From BU to the BU Bridge to Alewife Brook Parkway all the way up to Rt 2 was a nightmare. It was a one-off for me, but presumably it is many people’s daily commute. I can’t believe they would be doing that if they had a better option, and I think that’s an indication of how hard it is to get people to give up their cars.
@Julia: You’re right. My bad for suggesting that this wasn’t allowed under 40B. It would have been better had I said “Even though this is allowed..here’s why we shouldn’t pursue it.”
As for Sallee, I’m was never too worried about her. She’s, as my grandmother would say, a tough cookie and I’m pretty sure I couldn’t scare her away from speaking out even if I tried. That, and this wasn’t even her idea.
Julia, I get that “not everyone” can live without a car (and BTW, I don’t). But too often the “not everyone” is equated with “no one”. Increasing numbers of seniors and millennials would like to live without a car. We need a diversity of options for this growing segment of the population.
It would really be nice if links provided for supposedly relevant backup for posters’ suggestions were actually relevant.
Nathan, I think your carless vision of the future is an admirable one, but your link to support that vision leads me to question it’s sincerity. It is truly annoying to read what is linked and find that Marsical may have been “confident,” but there were no clauses because there were no leases and it all went nowhere fast. It not only wasn’t approved, he didn’t even own the property. In addition, one observation was “Commonwealth Avenue and its side streets are packed with parked vehicles from residents of the parking-free buildings that line it. This, despite the B-line that runs up the middle.” Also, comparing Allston with Newton is ludicrous.
Please check out the links you (plural) post to see if they have relevance instead of just googling what you want to be true and finding a headline you think will work.
Those who know me know that I bike a LOT – to do errands, meet people, pick my kids up from school, whatever I can. However there is no way I can imagine living in Newton without a car. We are not Boston or Somerville or Cambridge with the plethora of public transit options. The commuter rail is great if you want to go back and forth to Boston during commuting hours, but otherwise it’s pretty useless. It is NOT the T. When I need to go into Boston at an off-hour, I park in a friend’s driveway in Newton Center and take the T, but I make sure to bring a lot of reading material because it’s not a quick trip. I have taken the express bus before but I find the schedule opaque, even with the nextbus app. And obviously public transit doesn’t go to a lot of places that we all want to go – medical appointments, youth sports, jobs not near public transit, etc. And even for a bike enthusiast like me, you won’t see me riding it in the rain or snow or even mere cold or at night. Nor will I be riding a bike if I will be carting 6 bags of groceries home. That is one reason I’m such a fan of electric vehicles like the Leaf or the Volt or the Tesla (dreamy!) – it’s still a car but it’s a much lower carbon option.
Greg,
It would be nice if you provided some (any) data that backed your arguments. Thus far, its been data-free speculation. I personally don’t see many young professionals that want to be car-free choosing Newton as their home as others have said.
Julia:
I think the point Greg (and certainly I) was trying to make that while technically possible under 40B, Sallee’s proposal won’t work in Newton for financial reasons. Talking to folks I know who understand 40B far better than I do, they also couldn’t find a way to make it work without massive subsidy. Frankly, that massive subsidy from the state/Feds would be put to much better use in other communities if the Commonwealth as a whole is trying to solve affordable housing issues.
I was walking near downtown Boston today and ran into a young mother with her two year old child and (I believe) her own mother. 3 generations. They were a bit lost and as I directed them, they mentioned they were in downtown for an affordable housing lottery, and that they really needed a two bedroom unit for their family, but that none were available they could afford. They were willing they said, to live anywhere there was a safe, clean, unit.
Massachusetts and Boston in particular is many wonderful things. Educated, beautiful, unique in so many ways. But affordable housing is and has been a challenge that the Commonwealth consistently fails at. It is a statewide problem, and is as important as health care and education in the quality of life.
The hard part, and the part that we are struggling with, is how to build affordable housing and sustain it. 40B is all about that struggle. And effectively it is a way to generate affordable units with little to no other subsidy, by fast tracking developments in exchange for affordable housing. Ideal? No. Effective in generating affordable housing? Yes. Some negative externalities? Also, yes.