07-12-2017 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

8 Housing Link maintains a website to assist people in finding apartments where vouchers are accepted. Their research manager, Dan Hylton, recommends cities give rental licensees information about Housing Link and urge them to list there if their units are affordable. Minnesota Challenge A particularly helpful study of practical things that can be done to increase the willingness of local governments to build affordable housing is the Minnesota Challenge study conducted in 2014. The goal is to give state and local communities additional options for providing a full range of housing choices for low and moderate income residents. The study was conducted by CURA, the Housing Justice Center and Becker Consulting and funded by Minnesota Housing, the McKnight Foundation, ULI Minnesota and Enterprise Community Partners. The most important lesson from the research is that local policies that affect cost play an important role in determining whether it is feasible to build affordable housing and in the amount of affordable housing that can be built throughout the region. The report identifies eleven areas where improvements can be made, such as: ● Supporting appropriate density. The single area with the largest impact on cost is the failure of cities to support cost-effective density and scale of affordable housing projects. Several cities have been successful in resisting this tendency. ● Finding and acquiring sites for new developments is one of the most difficult, time consuming and expensive tasks developers undertake. A number of cities have been quite proactive in easing these burdens, from identifying appropriate sites to zoning sufficient land. ● Fee reductions and waivers. Local fees, which vary widely, can easily add $20,000 to $30,000 in costs per unit. ● Supporting inclusionary housing, where market rate units must include a certain ratio of affordable units. Hope for the Future Despite the complex challenges listed in this report, we are guardedly hopeful for the future. The Greater Minnesota Housing Fund, a nonprofit affordable housing lender, is developing the nation’s first regional pool of money to help affordable housing stay that way. The Fund will assist buyers who want to buy apartment complexes when they come up for sale in the seven-county metropolitan area. The goal is to purchase 10 to 20 percent of the affordable housing buildings that go on the market. In our area, Aeon, a Twin Cities non-profit organization, recently purchased a pair of apartment buildings that will provide much needed workforce housing. The first, Goldenstar, is a 109-unit building in Maplewood. The other, Sun Place, is a 30-unit structure in Roseville.