Defining 'Local:' Officials Consider Preferences for Affordable Housing

What does “local” really mean when it comes to eligibility for affordable housing in Southampton Town?

Is it people who already live here? People who used to live here but were forced out of town by skyrocketing rents? Or is it people who want to move to Southampton to fill jobs, assuaging a staffing crisis that’s running parallel to a housing crisis?

As officials in Southampton Town consider methods for providing affordable housing through the newly created Community Housing Fund, Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman is mulling the definition of “local.”

Approved by voters last November, the Community Housing Fund, which will be created on April 1, derives revenue through a 0.5 percent tax on real estate transactions. The money, which could add up to millions of dollars each year, must be dedicated to providing affordable housing.

Against the backdrop of a potential windfall, lawmakers are tasked with coming up with strategies for creating much-needed workforce housing. But how, and for whom?

Municipalities have to comply with federal housing strictures that prohibit discrimination against protected classes. After that, Schneiderman pointed out, if you’re not using federal, state, or county money, you don’t have to use their preferences, which often opens up housing eligibility to any resident of their jurisdictions.

“We can have our own rules, as long as they are not discriminatory,” the supervisor said.

What if “local” was defined to include essential workers — people who don’t currently live in the town but would accept a job in Southampton if they could find housing?

Can the definition of “local” be expanded?

“So many of what would be our local community have been driven out,” Schneiderman observed. “People who are already here, they have a place to live. But every business, they can’t hire anybody. People are not going to drive two hours for these jobs every day.

“We have to rebuild our local community,” he continued. “We need people in the community who sustain the community, instead of importing people every day.”

How is “essential worker” defined? The lawmaker listed emergency service volunteers and professionals, people in the health services, and those connected to the schools as some essential workers. “The cashier at the grocery store? I would argue that that’s essential,” Schneiderman added.

“The idea that they have to already live here is silly. They have to either be working here or have a job offer,” he maintained. “That’s what I’m looking at as a preference.”

The town could build housing for essential workers needed in the community. They become, he said, “our future locals.”

Town Director of Housing and Community Development Kara Bak explained that a local municipality can craft a preference if it can show a legitimate governmental purpose. “With essential workers, we have a legitimate governmental purpose, because we have to sustain the town,” she said.

The legislation defines an eligible applicant as a resident who lives or works within the town or someone who has been a resident within the last five years. The legislation does not define an essential worker, she said.

State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., an author of the CHF legislation, agreed that once compliance with federal housing laws is in effect, individual towns have leeway in creating preferences for eligible housing applicants. “If you’re doing it with town money, you don’t have all the strings attached,” he said.

He believes the town would have the discretion to craft preferences for essential workers.

Overall, Thiele reported town officials are focused and working on plans, as well as meeting criteria outlined in the CHF legislation. “It’s progressing. There’s a lot of moving parts to it, and still a lot of work to do,” Thiele said.

Drafted to be “very flexible,” the state law, Thiele said, “really invites the local government to exercise some creativity in how they can best use the funds to meet the needs of the town. I’m hoping having the resources breeds some creativity. I’ve seen a number of good ideas already.”

In Southampton, Schneiderman is looking at strategies that, through changes to the town’s zoning rules, could open up pathways to creating affordable housing, both for the town and private developers.

The town code allows a developer to build a massive, 10-bedroom mansion; what if that mansion contained five or six affordable units? Instead of a 6,000-square-foot house, what about six 1,000-square-foot units inside the mansion?

It’s not allowed under current zoning. “We don’t have a pathway for that,” Schneiderman said.

Such an alternative wouldn’t produce any more sanitary requirements or produce more nitrogen, the lawmaker noted. There would be less clearing, since no tennis court or pool would be built.

“Is it really more environmentally a problem? No,” he said.

There may be more cars on site, but there’d be fewer in the “trade parade” commute.

“Now you have the people who are serving the community living in the community,” Schneiderman maintained.

If the development looks like something that’s already in the community, that’s part of gaining public acceptance, Thiele said.

“The key to this is to work with the community and do a lot of outreach and see what they will accept,” he said. “Some things will work in some areas, and they won’t work in others. That needs to be part of the process.”

Much of the town’s zoning is based on the desire to protect the environment. In some ways, the result was a community that’s no longer sustainable, the supervisor offered.

“We did a great job protecting the environment,” he said, “but we can’t really function if there’s no one to pick you up in an ambulance when you have a heart attack.”

Tweaking an out-of-balance Comprehensive Plan is a challenge. If it were brought truly into balance, equally protecting the environment while meeting housing needs, Schneiderman mused, “You wouldn’t recognize this community — there’d be apartment buildings everywhere.”

Since there’s no good pathway for a private builder to undertake smaller-scale affordable housing, unless the zoning code is amended, only developers looking at large-scale projects put forth housing proposals.

“You either have a big thing, or you have nothing,” Schneiderman said.