Addressing Affordability Challenges: The Role and Scope of Local Housing Plans

Faced with mounting affordability challenges, many cities across the country have recently adopted local housing plans, which either establish new commitments or step up prior commitments to produce and preserve affordable housing. Despite the prevalence of such local housing plans, there has been little examination of their purpose, scope, and effectiveness. What do they include? What goals do they set? What populations do they target? This chapter begins such an inquiry, drawing on recently released plans from ten selected cities around the United States, most of which are high-cost, growing cities, paying particular attention to the case of New York City. The chapter also draws on discussions with participants in a Community of Practice facilitated by the NYU Furman Center and Abt Associates, which includes 15 leading public and private sector practitioners working to address affordability problems in cities around the country. While this group has greatly enhanced my understanding of the content and purpose of local housing plans, the arguments expressed here are my own.