Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Need Zoning Law Expertise

[Philip Dowds (rphilipdowds]

I think Melanie provides an excellent amplification of some of the points I’m 
advocating.  I’ll go a bit further:

Yes, it’s absolutely true that owner-occupied single family homes on registered 
single family lots are the most preferred and trusted form of housing 
throughout America.  Everything else — rental apartments, condos, and co-ops in 
multi-family structured … even stand-apart single family structures on land 
owned in common, or rented out by absentee owners — is often viewed with 
caution at best, and fear at worst.  So in most municipalities, the cohousing 
model faces an uphill battle, not just contrary to zoning, but also contrary to 
public sentiment.  (If I sought to provoke an argument, I’d say, Contrary to 
public mythology.)  Thus from a public relations standpoint, one of your best 
approaches might be to assert that cohousing is just like the condo complex 
across the street, except that the residents will know and help each other.

But I’m not sure I’d go too far in leveraging off the rental bugaboo.  In 
America, about 2/3rds of dwelling units are owner-occupied, and about 1/3rd 
tenant-occupied.  Sadly, as our lobbied economy continues to pump money from 
the bottom to the top, home ownership is declining, particularly among the 
youngest generation.
     Interestingly, in my city — Cambridge, MA — the ratio flips:  We’re 2/3rds 
rental, and 1/3rd ownership.  Cambridge is widely recognized as being a safe, 
diverse, well-integrated and progressively managed City.  When I say 
“well-integrated”, I will further assert that people of differing cultures and 
income levels, both citizens and non-citizens, are accustomed to encountering 
and dealing with each other in a wide range of public forums.  So if you want 
to push the neighborhood benefits of cohousing, you could go for the high level 
of participation, engagement, stability and civic consciousness that 
characterize those who chose the cohousing lifeway.  But perhaps do not 
over-beat the ownership drum.

Just my Cambridge opinion.

The other technical point I’d make is this:  Budget-smart households will buy 
as much housing as they can afford — and their upper limit on housing expense 
is the point at which housing costs make it impossible to meet the other needs 
of food, clothing, transportation, education and healthcare.  And so OK, now 
that the budget-smart household has established that $X thousand a year is what 
they want to pay for housing, they should have choices:  Like, buy a single 
family home with a relatively large amount of privatized square footage.  Or, 
buy a cohousing unit, which will offer less privatized square footage, but 
great access to a diverse commons full of amenities they’d never succeed in 
establishing in their single family home.  In other words:  I am not willing to 
concede, not even a little, that the cohousing model is “unaffordable”.  It’s 
just as affordable as anything else — but what you get for your finite buck is 
a pretty different lifeway.  If that works for you.

Thanks,
Philip Dowds
Cornerstone Village Cohousing
Cambridge, MA

mobile: 617.460.4549
email:   rpdowds [at] comcast.net

> On Mar 29, 2019, at 12:10 PM, Melanie Mindlin <sassetta [at] mind.net> wrote:
> 
> Hi Elias,
> 
> I have been on the Planning Commission of my small city (20,000) in Oregon 
> for over 10 years.  In my city, we desperately need rental housing, so our 
> issues are different and the question that our City Councillors would ask 
> would be more like, why should we rezone to let you do this and not let 
> someone build rental housing?  If the area you want to build in does not 
> allow the density you want, it sounds like you are asking for “spot 
> rezoning”.  This is highly unusual as most jurisdictions prefer, and rightly 
> so, to consider overall patterns of use.  That being said, my project, the 
> Ashland Cohousing Community, applied for and got our zoning changed to a 
> greater density as part of our specific application.  Our application went 
> through the City’s comprehensive Plan and demonstrated how we met almost 
> every one of the City’s goals, including such things as beneficial use of an 
> unusual piece of property, sustainability goals, increased neighborhood 
> connectivity and more.
> 
> I think Philip’s suggestions are useful.  If your City does in fact want to 
> create a new zoning or overlay category, as opposed to simply allowing you to 
> upzone as part of your specific project, it is possible to restrict 
> development using your new category in ways that would make it unattractive 
> for someone creating dense rental housing.  Extensive common space would put 
> the costs out of reach for most rental projects.  In my opinion this would be 
> the easiest way to approach the matter.  If a rental developer was willing to 
> provide that level of amenities for their housing project, it seems like it 
> would be as compatible with your neighborhood as yours will be.  It is a far 
> more objective standard than most of the things we are looking for in 
> cohousing.  Extra sustainability features would also tend to make it cost 
> prohibitive for rental projects and helps to promote the importance of 
> sustainability goals.
> 
> Another useful item would be a certain percentage of resident ownership.  
> This is related to Philip’s suggestions about the rules governing the 
> transfer of ownership from the developer to an HOA.  This would preclude 
> having a single ownership rental project from using your new category.  
> Another advantage is that if you are trying to build in a single family 
> housing neighborhood, having resident ownership is a form of single family 
> housing even if it doesn’t look like your neighbors in building form.  It 
> should be considered more compatible.
> 
> The new buzz word in housing around here is “the missing middle”.  Most 
> cities are lacking housing that falls between single family homes and 
> apartment complexes.  Single family homes promote sprawl and the new ones are 
> out of reach financially for many people.  Many neighborhoods and many people 
> don’t want to live in apartment complexes.  Providing the missing middle is a 
> big topic in Oregon and includes strategies such as duplexes to fourplexes, 
> conversion of single family homes into multiple units, accessory dwelling 
> units, cottage housing and more.  Maybe you can use this trend to support 
> your project.
> 
> Good luck,
> Melanie Mindlin
> 
>> On Mar 29, 2019, at 3:16 AM, cohousing-l-request [at] cohousing.org wrote:
>> 
>> Date: Wed, 27 Mar 2019 21:00:23 -0400
>> From: Ellis Cohen <e.cohen [at] acm.org <mailto:e.cohen [at] acm.org>>
>> To: cohousing-L [at] cohousing.org <mailto:cohousing-L [at] cohousing.org>
>> Subject: [C-L]_ Need Zoning Law Expertise
>> Message-ID: <bd25edbd-379d-deda-045a-25eea3d1eeae [at] acm.org 
>> <mailto:bd25edbd-379d-deda-045a-25eea3d1eeae [at] acm.org>>
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