After decades of failed housing policy decisions that have lead us to the edge of a cliff with our housing crisis in many parts of the country, my concern today is that the perspective from some leaders may be sit tight and wait for the effects of minor policy changes to play out to determine whether or not they have an impact. As we saw with major downzoning efforts in Massachusetts in the 70s, it took decades for the impacts of those decisions to fully play out and result in housing production numbers dropping by half into the 1990s. Despite this drop, our population continued it's steady incline, gaining nearly 2 million people since the 1960s.
We’re not being nearly aggressive enough to counteract 50+ years of failed housing policy. We need to more aggressively investigate all the available policy levers we can pull from the state government side (including zoning, financing AND building codes, something we have not discussed much here in MA) and investigate creative private sector funding models that can better support more robust housing production in communities across Massachusetts, not just in the urban core.
The decisions we make today need to address our regional housing crisis we all face in 2024, but ensure we're setting ourselves on a course for a more sustainable, equitable, abundant housing future for 2124.
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